After being given a press release pass to check out the new Mystery at Mansfield Manor game, I was kindly offered the chance to interview a few members of cast and crew and get all the questions I had about the game off my chest.

This is the first of a three-part series of interviews for the game. So without further ado, here is the interview with Rory Scherer, producer and screenwriter. 

Andy Ogier: I'm here with Rory Scherer, the producer and screenwriter for the brand new "Whodunit?" interactive movie game Mystery at Mansfield Manor.

Could you please tell our readers a little bit about yourself Rory?

Rory Scherer: Hi Andy. To make a long story short, after working in software for a few years I went back to school in September, 2003 for an MBA with the intent of learning the business skills (marketing, business plan writing, etc.) to produce an interactive movie. In my last semester I completed an independent study with a professor in which I wrote the business plan for Mystery At Mansfield, an interactive murder mystery movie in a DVD format. Once I graduated, I shopped the idea around to several companies. The usual response was “sounds great, but show me a prototype.”

Finally I decided it would not make sense financially to produce a prototype because if you were to spend a little more money, you can complete the entire production and rather than creating a DVD, I could create a website. Some of the advantages of creating the website is that distribution is no longer a concern, DVD piracy is not a concern, and there is no packaging needed which significantly lowers your costs. I wrote the screenplay, applied for a small business loan at a bank, and arranged to have a production company handle the production aspect and another IT company to follow my directions to create the website. Once the loan was approved, we started on pre-production immediately.

Andy: How did you get into independent movie making?

Rory: As a hobby, I would write screenplays. Finally I decided to pursue the dream of producing a screenplay that I wrote. However, when I wrote Mystery At Mansfield Manor, I wrote with more of a business approach rather than an artistic approach because I was financing the production. That is the key reason why 95% of it takes place in one location. My other screenplays do not have any artistic limitations.