Over the past few weeks my game has felt rather laborious. Having had my computer crash and delete the majority of my art assets, set up, and nearly every ounce of data on my computer I honestly felt scared and awful going into game night. However, while my technical problems did impede some progress, I have some major notes that I received during both the state of game and game night. Another major setback came when I attempted to get the primary controller for the altar to work. Still to this moment I have yet to get it to work and little progress has been made. I think this comes from a bit of a misunderstanding of coding and going outside the immediate tech box. On a different note, a major advance in design occurred recently in the overall map design and layout. Most people responded positively to the overall art and feel of the game. Reportedly, the game moved well and had a good pace for the size of the map.
Honestly, the game’s intent still keeps the project very alive for me. Being a radical game and having such a remarkably central and brutal mechanic, I just keep wanting to improve and finish said mechanic and really see it work and affect people. In addition, playing some other games with simple mechanics has really informed much of my approach. Recently, I watched a video that critiqued the game Yookulele. In the video, H.bomberguy (the critique) addressed the game’s use of transitions and abstract/impossible space to experiment with game design. It intentionally worked within the limitations of loading small areas of map in order to create a world that felt fast to move between and massive in scope. The video honestly reaffirmed much of my design and made me remember the importance of simplicity in mechanics and how limitation can easily lead to a great game and concept.
My main question going into State of Game was whether or not the art read properly? As the main mechanic had yet to work or be implemented in any tangible way, I felt that using the state of the game as a chance to hear about art and the legibility of each asset and character would prove useful. In addition, I wondered specifically if the altar pop up menu actually read well enough as things to be given up from the surrounding world. I was pleasantly surprised when a few people remarked “Oh, that little symbol is meant to represent the Old Man!” in a mix of horror and surprise. It honestly shocked me a little at first that people would have as expressive a reaction to my game as they did.
Throughout State of Game many classmates mentioned that the art seemed troubling in that the main tile didn’t provide many transitions between areas. In order to remedy this a main thing I’ll be adding to my change list is to add other tiles to delineate space a bit better. In addition, the colour palette, while it does keep everything coherent, it causes a major disturbance in that it blurs many of the assets together and obscures things in a bad way. In a future rendering of the art I will adjust the art to stand out a bit more and not blur together as much.
I try to push my player from calculation when they choose an option on the main altar. I wanted to take each and every decision to a logical extreme. For instance losing your legs would result in the player being unable to move at all, effectively creating an end state in which they’d just have to be immobile for the duration of play. This, when reloading the game would make the player think twice about what they chose to give up and how to play the game. This will proceed to offer more choice and conflict in the game. In addition, I aim to add some more conflict and choice into dealings with the Old Man and with the other characters on the island. In order to develop a more full game, I need to apply more choice in the interactions with not only minor characters but also objects. For instance, the well has no real interaction planned for it and I received a note that perhaps the player should be able to choose to go into it. One area that I also felt should never have choice is in the primary outcome of the game. I thought that the game should really only have debilitating outcomes as the game aims to parallel the medical industry which tends to amount to a no win scenario.
Best,
Christopher Haehnel
