Nesting Instinct

During an ongoing storm, you (a flying squirrel) and your babies have taken shelter in the nest. Although as the storm continues, your babies grow hungry. In order to feed them you must go outside into the storm.

Developed: April 2018 - May 2018

My Role: Project Lead, Designer

Type: University Project (team of 9)

DESIGN DECISIONS AND PROCESSES

Nesting Instinct, was a university group project based around the idea of home. The game presents home as a place of safety, yet requiring the player to leave their comfort zone in order to feed their flying-squirrel babies.

There are 2 distinct areas in the game. The nest and the outside. The nest is calm and warm, while outside is dark, cold and daunting. There were various different ways these 2 feelings were accomplished.

Nest

• Soft, orange colours to emphasise that this is a warm place.
• No ambient storm noises, just calm guitar music.

Outside

• No music, just ambient wind, rain and thunder noises.
• A dark purple atmosphere, with stark lighting.
• Dark fog covering the ground, with red eyes fading in and out to give the player a sense of being watched.
• An ominous, red moon.
• Snakes hiding in some trees, which puts the player on their toes.

Country Car

This is a remake of an old 1982 Atari game, Barnstorming, in the style of the famous American painter, Edward Hopper. You play as a car, driving out from the large city to your new country home. Avoid obstacles, while going through gas stations to get to your destination.

Developed: October 2017

My Role: Solo Development

Type: University Project

 

Design Decisions and Process

From early playtests, it was obvious that people did not know that they had to go through the gas stations to win the game. So to communicate this mechanic without directly telling them, a gas station was placed directly in-front of the player at the start of the game. This caused them to almost always go through it.

Re-creating Edward Hopper's realistic art style was something I struggled to figure out early on. Eventually though, I went with a low poly approach, theming it to the 1930's. This was done by making the textures less saturated and having an old-timely font. Overall, I believe that even though it doesn't feature realistic painted visuals, it still relates quite a bit to Edward Hopper.

The main correlations to the artist though, was done through the setting. All things Edward Hopper painted like trains, looking out of windows, countrysides, gas stations, etc, were implemented into the game. A main aspect of his paintings was looking out of windows, which the camera appears to do in-game. Lighting was another element Hopper fondly painted. In the game there are 3 levels, each with a different level of lighting and visual style. Dusk, Dawn and Midnight. This creates both a different visual style, as well as altering the game. At Dawn, there are more potholes and at Midnight, vision is limited. These small differences create distinguishable levels, for a project we only had a few weeks on.