That Dragon, Cancer may not be a triple-A title nor receive widespread critical acclaim, because it’s more than that.
Joel, the son of indie developer Ryan Green, passed away due to terminal cancer at the age of five four weeks ago. That Dragon, Cancer is an upcoming low-poly adventure title that documents his and his family’s struggle with Joel’s condition, while the film documentary Thank You For Playing from David Osit and Malika Zouhali-Worrail will follow the team’s journey through the development of the extremely personal game.
Speaking with interviewers at PAX and E3, Ryan wanted to express his love, sacrifice, and turmoil through the video game medium, his craft, and give other people a means to walk in his and his family’s shoes. In a recent entry on the game’s official blog, he hopes that the documentary will also spread word of the game despite being hesistant at first:
We haven’t talked about it publicly, but back in June of 2013, we were contacted by a documentary film director who had seen a one-liner mention of our game on killscreen, and was interested in finding out if we’d be open to letting them come out and visit our family in order that he and his partner might produce a documentary about the making of the game.Thus began the production of the film “Thank You For Playing.”
You wouldn’t think it so, since our family has been so public and in the news about sharing the game, and we’ve been part of a web-based documentary before, but letting a film crew in to our personal, creative and professional lives was a little scary.
You can watch a teaser for the documentary below and visit the film’s official website. It will release in 2014 as a timed-exclusive for Ouya and be available for PC at a later time.
