Degree Project: Project Narrative Concept

In my haste to start my project, coding the main mechanics and creating a base game to work off of I have neglected to mention anything about the scenario, narrative and story concepts for my game, which is equally as important.

My game is based off of idea one from an earlier blog, which can be found here: https://spikedmd.blogspot.com/2024/09/degree-project-initial-ideas.html

The story/ narrative/ scenario was more difficult to almost come up with in a sense because the main gimmicks of the game (Disappearing/ moving geometry and sets of platforms)  is a fairly abstract concept so I couldn't really have a very grounded scenario with that in mind.

Initially I wanted something like being stuck in a simulation and having to escape it but that idea was too similar I think to my independent project from last year; Invasion of the Gibbies which already did the whole escape the simulation thing with its secret level escapes. In short, it felt uninspired and unoriginal. Been there, done that.

I retooled that idea actually after thinking on the game's main mechanic of the two sets of platforms and the first idea that came to me was the two halves of a whole that you can't have in a whole, which led me to the idea of the two hemispheres of the brain, thus the name of the working title of my project "Hemisphere" and the idea of them being "Desynced" or something to that effect as the two halves wouldn't be able to communicate. This then led me to the idea of instead having to try and escape a simulation, using the simulation to perhaps relieve some kind injury or impairment in some sci-fi futuristic scenario.

This narrative would mainly be unveiled through intermission segments between the platfrom/ puzzle intensive platforming segments, invloving switching between the two sets of platforms" with slower "dream" sections where the story would slowly be revealled as you progress through the level.

This is as far as I have gotten in terms of story so far but I am happy to proceed with it for now because the details can be worked out later and it's just good to have a planned starting point.

With all that being said, now I know the direction I am going to take the visuals and narrative I should look at other cultural concepts to use perhaps inspiration to develop these concepts.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Degree Project Digital Media Analysis

  Today we were shown a process of analysing Media to better understand the why and how of it all. Here are two examples, one was of my own choice, the other a given example. Both are very different but the framework can be used to analyse both. My choice: Gears of War, EPIC Games   https://www.xbox.com/en-US/play/games/gears-of-war-ultimate-edition/BQT21VXFS52F   (2006, 2017) 1. What type of media is it? A 3rd-Person cover Shooter developed primarily for Xbox 360 2. What initial promise/s does it give? A single/ two player set of detailed levels full of set pieces and various encounters as well as a 6V6 online multiplayer mode with various arenas and characters to play with 3. What is its purpose & function? A 3rd person shooter game designed to always be played with others, with or against. 4. What are its unique/unexpected qualities & ideas? One team will always play as subterranean monsters 'Locust' one team will always play as humans. On the surface it is made to s
Read more

Degree Project: Brand Touchpoint Matrix

Image
  https://brandtouchpointmatrix.com/ Yesterday, we were introduced to the Brand Touchpoint Matrix which is essentially a tool that maps properties of different user experiences and the user journey with a brand in all of its aspects From advertising/ Introduction, to customer service, to the service itself and also perhaps the surrounding community of a brand too. The two Axes for this graph are the length of an interaction vs how personal an engagement is so a short, impersonal engagement could be just seeing a social media ad for a brand where as a more personal and lengthy interaction could be using a brand product or service that was advertised or engaging with a community. https://brandtouchpointmatrix.com/ I thought it would be helpful to attempt this myself for a game, which is my chosen medium for my degree project, with the aspects of the brand I am making, I'd mark out the desired customer path with a specific user scenario I had in mind, keep in mind that this Matrix is
Read more

Degree Project Initial ideas

 For my degree project I have 3 initial ideas: 1.  A first-person puzzle platformer game developed in Unreal Engine 5, the main mechanic would be the player having the ability to switch out a set of platforms with another which the player would use to progress through the level. There would probably be 3 levels and a hub world to connect each level with each level setting a different type of challenge to the player, going beyond just a change to the layout of obstacles, i.e. with my current plan I would have a level to get the player more familiar with the mechanics such as the switching platforms mechanic if I can implement it, platforms that appear and disappear on a timer, platforms and other terrain that have their gravity activate when the player touches them which should be fairly easy to implement because of "setenablegravity" which could be tied to collision with the player. the game would be similar to Portal (2007) and Portal 2 (2011) too I think which is one of its
Read more