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Notes -
People that are smart, and are interested in writing, will generally not be interested in video game writing. They'll want to be authors, or journos, or work in more prestigious arts like film.
People that are smart and interested in video games will probably not be writers. They'll most likely be programmers or some form of designer. Perhaps if they create themselves or rise high enough they'll also take on the writing, hence why all the games regarded as being well written generally come from creator figures like Avellone or Ken Levine or the Houser brothers.
As such, you're not going to be getting great talent coming through organically. The other issue video games face is that it is an incredibly popular industry. There are millions of people who dream of making their own video game and are willing to do anything to work in gaming. Thus, supply of labour is extremely high, and as such gaming companies can treat their employees like shit, with terrible salaries and conditions, knowing that there are thousands more out there ready to jump in. The reason why a studio doesn't just reach out to offer a decent salary to a grad is that it will upset the apple cart, wrecking a studio's salary structure - plus it probably just doesn't occur to them.
Now, the sheer mass of willing talent does somewhat counteract the first point, and I expect the passage of time will lead to greater willingness to go into game writing as opposed to the other areas (which are also infamously terrible in terms of pay and conditions).
There was a pretty decent amount of art school grads hopping into gamedev back in the 90's. Thing is that real artists demand autonomy, so if you start imposing a ton of top-down rules they'll rapidly jump ship, and your team of would-be auteurs is replaced by a bunch of video-game loving dorks who doodle orcs in their notebook (no offense). Never forget that Team Silent formed from a group of ne'erdowells whom Konami placed zero faith in because they floundered in that corporate structure.
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