The Proposal. . .

Dissertation: Project Proposal

Project Phobia; How To Create An Immersive Player Experience In A Horror Game

Brief Outline of Work

Throughout this dissertation I hope to achieve certain things. The project itself involves exploring ‘how to create an immersive experience in a horror game’. The game will be made in Unity and will involve the player exploring an abandoned hotel for their ‘love interest’. The player will pick up notes that have been dropped by said love interest, guiding the player through the building to certain rooms and areas. Each of these rooms and areas will trigger horror events which the player must deal with without being hurt. The core element I am exploring in this dissertation project is how to create an immersive but unsettling experience for the player. Using a combination of sounds, environments and mechanics I am looking to make an efficient but effective survival horror game. Mike Birkhead recently released an article on Gamasutra stating “. . .there is a general lack of quality scary games.” With his reading outlining the general flaws of modern horror games it will be possible to make a game of a high standard.

Rationale

Since starting the course at UCS I have managed to build my skills in games design through learning coding, 3D modelling, how to successfully design games etc. This dissertation project allows me to harness all of these abilities and correctly balance them to create a good game. Throughout the course I have wanted to test my abilities as a designer, and feel that I there is plenty I can prove in this project. Horror games have always been a genre I enjoy and with a recent influx of indie horror games on the market, there have been some very interesting ideas from a design point of view. Design is an area I am mostly interested in, but have not really explored as deeply as I would like. With this project, I can learn more thoroughly about the stages of iteration and playtesting with digital games, which I feel are areas that have been somewhat neglected and ultimately let me down in the past. In industry, good design in games is hugely important, and can often be overlooked by flashy aesthetics or in-depth storylines. To have a better understanding of making the core gameplay of games fun will benefit me in chasing future careers with companies such as Bethesda Softworks or Rockstar Games, whose websites advertise position vacancies in design oriented jobs. With a greater experience of design in this horror game, I can successfully learn some valuable lessons about designing core gameplay elements, which shape the overall ‘feel’ of games, regardless of how nice the graphics, stories or even sounds might be. It will also make for a valuable portfolio piece, ensuring potential employers that I have the skills to prioritise important elements in making a successful game. This project is to help me learn what it takes to make a good, fun and hopefully scary game.

Annotated Bibliography

Trefry, G., 2010.Casual Game Design. Morgan Kauffman publications.
This book is a fantastic source of detailed information on players experiences, building them and deciding the best routes to go down regarding puzzle, risk and other relevant mechanics. Potential mechanics in the game like battery life for the torch etc, can be justified and analyzed better as an idea by Trefrys readings. We have used this book for a variety of readings on styles of gameplay so this will surely be a good source of knowledge and reference.

Strauss, B., 2011. Online at (http://www.industrygamers.com/news/be-yourself-or-not-bioshock/)

This interview with Ken Levine, Creative lead for triple A game ‘Bioshock’ will be a valuable reference. In the interview, Levine talks about immersion in games, which is the core element of my dissertation. Not only will the interview help me explore professional opinion but will also serve as a basis of which I can (in combination with my other sources) ‘fine tune’ player experience in my game to create the scariest possible result.

Birkhead, M., 2011. Online at (http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/37075/Opinion_How_To_Make_A_Scary_Game.php#.UJbLp2dtm7y)

This article on popular website Gamasutra will be a useful source as it covers areas of gameplay in survival horror games. The in-depth descriptions of immersive gameplay and building up realistic and effective environments, coupled with player choice and option will allow me to create a more thorough experience for the player. Birkhead describes different styles of horror and horror gameplay, so that I can provoke the correct reactions for the correct situations. All in all, this reading will help me efficiently build up an immersive gameplay experience.

Parsec Productions, 2012. Online at (http://slendergame.com/game.php)

This game has been a huge inspiration to me in the creation of my own dissertation project. The game shows the efficiency of invoking fear using little in the way of mechanics, story or even art. The gameplay keeps the player frightened, using sounds and a simple means of being followed as a particularly terrifying medium. Even playing this game, I can draw upon the experience to build up a scary situation for my own game.

Ahearn, L., 2009. 3D Game Textures. Focal Press

This book is a very impressive collection on meaningful texturing techniques and tutorials which will help me shape the hotel environments aesthetics. As this is a horror game, I can learn and gain an advantage of furthering how to make the player feel uneasy and unsettled when it comes to interacting with the setting. Using a variety of maps such a bump and specular, I can create realistic and scary levels for my game.

Castillo, T and Novak, J., 2008. Game Level Design. Delmar Cencage Learning.

This book will serve as a great help in putting my levels together. Of course the core question of this project is ‘how to make an immersive gameplay experience in a horror game’ and this book will help me find the best ways to build up my levels so that even the structure of their movement will unease them. Using correctly ‘moulded’ settings I can frighten the player via the actions they must perform in these spaces, which further enhances my understand of how to create a more authentic gameplay experience.

Yin, W., 2010. Impeccable Scene Design. Cypi Press.

This book will compliment the last, in terms of setting up effective environments. This book speaks about lighting and atmosphere etc, more about the ‘feel’ of the location which is obviously hugely important in setting the mood for my game. The players experience will be quite affected by the areas they are exploring, and if this book can help me ‘stage’ the levels properly, then the gameplay experience will be majorly enhanced for the player.

Project Timeline and Milestone Deliverables

For this project I have already blogged about starting ‘tests’ which will validate a lot of basic gameplay elements. I expect these will take 2-3 weeks to implement, experiment with and finally publish. It will take maybe 3-4 weeks to model and texture all the required assets for the project. I am unsure of how realistic these deliverables are, but will blog frequently to let my tutors and project specialists know how far along the work is coming.

Milestone deliverables include:

            - Completing Unity ‘tests’

            - Implementing said ‘tests’ into the game

            - Completing the models for the 1^st/tutorial level

            - Completing the tutorial level