Game Design Pillars – worksheet

Define Game’s Intention

• I want players to think about the topic of generational relationship by showing local story of one family.
• I want players to experience melancholy, loneliness and isolation by exploring limited space with focus on concerned theme.
• I want to show relation of art and memories by navigating through topic of art conservation/restoration.

Identify the Essential Experience and build pillars

• What emotion or behaviour is essential to that experience?

Melancholy, deep reflection state, theraupetic experience about generational conflict trauma .

• How might the player encounter it during play?

Letting player feel connection between them and player – aka memories recall from main character; finding a link between main character and audience (his son can be a possible self interpretation for player that can build emotional attachement), provoke strong feelings (possibly negative) to revert perspective in the middle of story. Providing agency to “fix” main character or let player reflect about personal experience.

• What does this emotion look like in your world (colour, tone, sound, movement)?

I want to describe three main feeling by three ways

Melancholy – locations in the game are fixed, the character often returns to the same location but in different time stamps. The current time – more calm, cool subdued colors, promoting “neutral” or apathetic feelings. The past is warm, rich colors, but in places has a burnt effect to convey the loss of time. The elements connecting the two time segments should be strongly contrasted in both time segments.

Loneliness and Isolation – Both these states are synonymous. Achieve this feeling by having the main character surrounded by a minimum number of other characters, or talking to them he must through certain barriers. Communication with clients as an artist is limited, through letters (for example). The only second character the main character will talk to must contrast strongly with his image in order to evoke a feeling of alienation in the communication, and the most important moments of the story actually develop in the hero’s head, his memories

The design of space should also be important. I still can’t decide whether to use large and even empty spaces in the game or vice versa, resort to Hoarding disorder phenomenon in real life, which is characteristic for elderly and lonely people.
An attempt to convey the general mood through the aesthetics of the golden age of Russian literature is the most important solution that sets the tone of the game.

“Why?”

I want players to think about topic of generational relationship because this is theme common for every person, and it provoke empathy in the player.

I want player to experience melancholy, loneliness and isolation, because these states complement each other’s emotional background well, enhancing the perception of each of them individually.

I want to show relation of art and memories, because the beauty of art is in the way how it tell story about history and personalities. Visual language is the easiest to comprehend, feel, and it is one of the main communication in games. Metaphor of art and memory relation is a great way to show the story, not to tell.

Elemental Tetrad