GAME OVERVIEW :
PLATFORM : PC
GENRE : Puzzle, Adventure
THEMATIC SETTING : Temple Exploration, Mystical Spirits
TARGET AGE : 12+
OTHER : 2 Player CO-OP only
1st PERSON CAMERA
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Student Project
SHOW ME THE WAY (2018 Version)
Lead Game Designer - Narrative Designer - Level Designer
March - April 2018 | Puzzle / Adventure coop Crossplatform PC - Androïd
WORK FEATURE
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Crossplatform communication design
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Asymmetrical coop puzzle design
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Motion gaming on mobile
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World building
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Storyboard & cut-scenes
Show Me the Way is a 2-player coop puzzle / adventure crossplay game on PC and Androïd.
Lost in an Inca temple, an explorer and his guide will have to solve puzzles together in order to get away from it and discover the fate of this famous extincted civilization.
GAME OVERVIEW
GAME OVERVIEW :
PLATFORM : PC
GENRE : Puzzle, Adventure
THEMATIC SETTING : Treasure hunting, Temple exploration
South american ancient culture
TARGET : 7+, players who loves coop and adventure games
NUMBER OF PLAYERS : 2 only
Two archeologists try to break the mysteries of a Temple in the clouds. Separated at the entrance, they have to co-operate remotely.
GAME STRUCTURE
Before defining how the platforms (PC an mobile) would communicate, I needed to define what kind of rooms and interaction would be present in the game.
Then, the temple has been separated in two kind of rooms :
- puzzle rooms, used to challenge the players
- narrative rooms, used to reward them
Each time the PC players would enter in a new zone in the temple, the mobile players would have a new screen on their phone telling them that their friends were needing some help.
The progression screen on the Mobile shows how many rooms have to be cleared
Vea is a flying orb that only the PC player can see. Working as a key, it is the link that ties the two players interactions.
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Vea, in the first room of the game
Design Goals :
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Create some consistancy : Vea has to be placed in Pillar mechanisms to activate the communication between the PC and the Mobile. I
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Add some magic in a "god" temple
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Creating a common point between the players: Vea can sometimes be seen on mobile (and even be controlled!)
You can see here the progression screen on the mobile after the first puzzle having an alert and turning to the "puzzle 2" screen when the PC player activates the Vea Pillar.
PUZZLE DESIGN
The puzzles of the game depends on communication and asymmetry of information.
Design Goals :
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Push the players to communicate on many subjects that can be hard to describe (unusual forms, colors, sounds, motion, timing...)
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Create understandable feedbacks that the players can communicate
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Having a gameplay that uses the mobile platform at its best (touch screen, gyroscope...)
Exemple of puzzle : the SLABS.
The PC players have to walk on the right slabs in order to progress in the room and open the door.
Each on the slab range next to it. All the solutions are written on the mobile screen but have to be found by touching the screen and illuminate the scroll displayed. Pillars have an associated Slab
The players have to communicate what they see on their own screens to know which one is the right one.
The mobile view and the PC view in the SLABS room
The phone view without censorship
One GDD page about the puzzle
Inspiration :
- the invisible ink on treasure maps that has to be warmed up to be seen
- Symbols from the Inca culture to count (bottom ones)
- Representations of things like Inca Gods (challenging to describe due to their geometries)
NARRATIVE DESIGN HIGHLIGHTS
For Show Me The Way, I worked on the Setting of the story and the introduction cinematic.
For the setting, we've choosen to do a story happening in the real world, based on true events. I did a lot of researches about treasure hunting, read many books or watched movies about it. The lost City of Z, the gold-bug from Edgar Poe...
Finally, I found the story about Gordon Cooper, the spaceman who did many treasure maps from space, thanks to a series called "Cooper's treasure". This story helped us creating a game set where we wanted (here, the Inca territory) and expand the game with the location of our choices with some fantasies such as the Lost City of Atlantide for exemple.
This is the cinematic introducing the game. I did the storyboard of this cinematic and created it with some images on photoshop. I've done the montage directly in Unity !
One exemple of narrative room
"Telling the story" mechanic for the "guide" player. In each narrative room, the guide has a text associated with a fresco on the wall, telling the story about the temple. He has to read it to the other player. Pierre-Alexandre wrote most of these stories.
This feature isn't necessary to finish the game but was really appreciated by some players. Especially a father had a lot of fun telling these stories to his young son while playing the game during the Japan Touch Haru 2018.
OTHERS
We did 2 events with Show me the Way :
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the Japan Touch Haru 2018
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the Student Game Show 2018
We also did two interviews on radios. You can listen to one here ! (in French, sorry !)
MEET THE TEAM
DORIAN MONTAVID
PRODUCER / LEAD TECH
Dorian was in charge of the tech aspect of the game. Thanks to him the game was connected ! He also did a great job as a producer for a small team.
VALENTIN PEREIRA
ART DIRECTOR / LEVEL DESIGNER
Valentin worked on the artistic side of the project and did a lot of research about what an Inca Temple could look like. He also designed the Temple circulation.
AXEL ARNAUD
TECH /UX DESIGNER
Axel worked mainly on the Androïd app and did a lot to make it connected with the PC.
MATHIEU SIBOULOTTE
LEAD GAME DESIGNER / NARRATIVE DESIGNER
Well, it's just me ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
LUCAS LECANTE
3D ARTIST, UNITY INTEGRATOR
Lucas created many assets for the game and made sure that everything was well integrated.
P.-A. GERBET
NARRATIVE DESIGNER
P.-A. worked closely with me to create the narrative content around the game. He wrote all the narrative rooms and peer reviewed every work I did.