Ideas in Depth
As the idea have already been established, I am going to pull all three ideas I took forwards here with the artworks I did for my presentation as well as mention the visuals/ examples I did to show off how each game would work. None of them have official names or working title ones, so they are still ideas 1,2 and 3.
Idea 1:
With idea one, it's still very much about experiencing trauma, but it's more like 'being in the body of a person with trauma or trauma related disorders'. The closest thing I can relate it to, is BPD (as I've been researching into it behind the scenes as well as other personality disorders (I have a poster I made).
This visuals would be very visual novel-like. Having it be like you are from the point of view of that character who is experiencing these problems. The idea above shows the idea of going through a panic attack. The visuals are to show some of the thoughts- it's hard to sometimes explain these ideas or feelings, but this is just a small example anyway and can be developed overtime.
To help with gameplay ideas, I also did a Twine example of how this could go (just a snippet). I have uploaded the example into a Microsoft Teams folder as it will not let me upload it onto here. Regardless, I have photo examples of what it looked like:
This wasn't meant to be a big example, just something short that I could get across when it came to doing it for the presentation. The red is to show how the inner thoughts work, this idea of it being intrusive and intense. With this idea, I didn't want to shy away from the fact that the main character has had problems with self-harm or other thoughts. It is meant to raise awareness of how these thoughts and trauma can effect someone. The end goal would maybe have them asking for help/ have a page that shows the best places to ask for help (UK based).
This still needs to be developed and I would very much like to have a cleaner and nicer art style if I do indeed go forward with this idea.
Idea 2:
The second idea is one of my favourites out of all the ones I had made, With the premise being on a train around those you having their own trauma that you can see, I ended up doing two artworks to really bring across this idea, and I feel like I was able to get it across fairly well. The image above shows a rough idea of what the character may look like and how to fully show that fact that you would be a ghost within this experience. I was also inspired by colour pallets like Omori and it's environments of HEADSPACE and used that for the background. It was fun to draw as I felt like the image really conveyed the idea and explain it visually to others when it came to my presentation. I will admit, I do with I had done some more images or spent some more time on it (as it was a first draft kind of thing), since the splash art could've looked a bit more professional and clean.
Now, onto the mechanic idea:
Originally, I wasn't sure what to do in regards to mechanics. But then in a lesson, I was shown the game Florence. This game had a very unique display on how to interreact with the game and its story- thus giving me the inspiration to do a similar example with my own game. In the image above, using a style similar to Florence, I showed an example of where, while the main character is on the train, they get their Trauma triggered. You would then need to do a QTE, like event to get the character to calm down. If I had the time, I would've animated the effects, to really get across the idea of mechanics, but I think the image does enough for the current process I am in in development.
Overall, this was my favourite idea out of the three and if I do end up taking any idea forward, I would definitely go with this one and hope to develop it more to make it even better.
Idea 3:
This is the visual that I did for my final idea. As it has a main character made out of chalk, I decided to show it visually in the main concept. I also wanted to show the idea of how you would have to collect pages out of a diary, so I had fluttering pages about.
I do have a qualm with the backgrounds as it's not my best work, but since I was running out of time before the presentation, I had to cut a few corners.
Regardless, I think that it does convey the themes of my idea as well as the vibe of loneliness and the want to break free.
Now, onto my visuals to explain the main mechanic of the game.
As I was really running out of time, I did a really rough sketch up of the visuals. Point and click games are quite common and I thought that kind of style would suit this game idea very well. If you think of games like The Cat Lady, that is the mechanical style that I want to replicate.
In this visual example I made, the idea is that you move around the main character through the manor and there would be indications towards the pages you would need to collect (maybe even sound ques).
While I think this idea is interesting, out of the three it is the one that I like the least. I like this style of game telling, but I feel like the other two ideas can bring across the message I am trying to sell in a much better way.
I am still happy I was able to create visuals that will go towards my presentation, as I can use these to show my classmates how my games could work, so they can get a better idea of which one to vote for, though all art is not the final product and can be up to redesigns.