"I was invited by Jim Ashilevi, one of the game's writers — there are nine writers in total," he said, noting that Ashilevi was involved in the voiceover work for ZA/UM's previous game "Disco Elysium" and wanted to share the responsibility this time. "He chose me for that, fortunately, and I was very happy. We've been doing it together."

The game work primarily involves directing and guiding actors, Toom notes. "The tools are the same in film, theatre, and video games — the medium is just very different and much more demanding. You have a nonlinear story with an enormous amount of text, the actor is alone in the studio, and the whole world must come alive quickly through voice and imagination," he said.

Several Estonian actors also participate. "Sergo Vares plays one character — he even had to use a stronger accent so it would sound like an Estonian accent. Jim does some smaller roles, and I do one myself."

Toom compared the text volume of "Zero Parades" to "The Lord of the Rings". "There are 700,000 words of text — if you take all the "Lord of the Rings" books and add "The Hobbit", that's just under 600,000 words," he said, adding that the massive text comes from the game's nonlinear structure. "Every scene can exist in multiple versions. The player's earlier choices change what the character knows, wants, or feels."

There is no single, fixed script to hand to actors during recording.

"It's constantly like: now we jump back ten seconds in time, where after the line you were told something completely different, and now you react differently," he explained, emphasizing that the volume is enormous because the game must offer players many different possibilities.

"You should play this game at least two or three times — actually even more — because there are endless variations in how you can design the story for yourself."

Work on the new game began in August last year. "The game was released on 21 May, 2026 and we recorded the last texts a week before that. Now we're doing a shorter, one‑month recording period because a free update is coming, with further developed side‑story lines," he said, adding that the work has been intense and daily.

"What was incredibly cool about this project is that the text is unbelievably good — what nine different writers have managed to create is very witty and fits together beautifully," he said, adding that as a director, you don't need to rescue the material — your job is to open it.

"Good text makes the director's life both easier and more demanding: easier because the material carries itself, but more demanding because you don't want to ruin it," Toom said.

At the moment, Toom is also working on two film projects. "These are two full‑length feature films. The first is an original script by an Estonian writer, which we're developing at Allfilm together with Ivo Felt. The project is still in development, so I don't want to reveal too much, but I can say it's a very distinctive Estonian genre film with excellent dialogue, a strong world, and dark humor — the kind of material you read and think: we haven't had a film like this in Estonia before," he explained.

The second project, Toom said, is "Operation Jungle". "It's a Cold War spy thriller inspired by true events, set right after World War II. It tells the story of an MI6 intelligence operation in which Baltic refugees were trained as agents and sent back to their homelands to coordinate resistance movements and provide the British with information about the Soviets," he said, adding that the tragedy was that the Soviets knew about the operation from the very beginning. "I only learned about this story a few years ago, and most people know nothing about it."

"There are other ideas too, but I'm actively working on these two projects," Toom said, adding that a director must always have several projects in motion. "When one reaches the stage where filming begins, you set the other aside for a moment — but the question is always whether and when you reach production. You need several irons in the fire."

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