PARANOIA is a 3D stealth survival game set in a Panopticon, where the player must try not to succumb to their own stress in trying not to be seen. Inspired by Five Nights at Freddy’s, Metal Gear Solid, and Portal, the player must traverse up a mazelike tower while avoiding/destroying the cameras and circumventing trapped rooms, all in an attempt to kill the one at the helm of this Panopticon and escape.
Pitch:
Evade cameras and climb a tower to destroy the Panopticon in which you are trapped.
Story Overview:
The story revolves around the player, who wakes alone from a mysterious test chamber among dozens of others to a room with no power; the cameras in the building switched off. Clues hidden about the room allude to the player having to ascend the tower, destroy the “Watcher”, and most importantly of all, DO NOT BE SEEN.
With the guidance of a single map, the player must comply with this – climbing the tower broken up into 5 levels. But when they eventually get to the top and kill the Watcher, they find they must become the thing they were trying to escape when they are tethered to the monitor room. And when they look at the hidden camera viewing the test tubes, the next person has been released. Now while the player must find an escape from the tower, they must also ensure the next person doesn’t come along to misguidedly kill them.
Core Mechanics:
THE WATCHED:
- Evasion: avoid cameras so the Watcher doesn’t know your position, and so can’t reroute the tower’s rooms to lure you into a trap. Players can do this via blind spots, vents, and disabling power sources to briefly turn off the cameras.
- Vertical Progression: the tower is split into levels, with each level marked clearly with a short elevator ride to encourage player progression.
THE WATCHER:
- Redirection: once you spot someone, move the tower’s maze to lure them into a trapped room.
- Detachment: complete a series of tasks to remove the TV from your head
Gameplay Experience:
I want the players to feel a sense of paranoia over whether they are being watched, or whether they are being snuck up on.
Player Motivation:
The player motivation is the need to remain unseen while in such a hostile environment.
Platform:
The game should be available on PC to target the main base of horror players, and because the point and click controls in phase 2 cannot easily be synced to controller playing.
Target Audience
Due to the mild horror themes, but no explicit gore, the game should be able to appeal to both teens and adults. A PEGI-16 rating should apply due to disturbing imagery.
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