Written 28.11.2008 - Uploaded 09.05.2009 - PDF (contains entire design document)
These design notes, along with other parts of the design document, were written for a course project at the university. This design was ultimately turned into a prototype, implemented as a Half-Life 2 mod. I have no idea about the mods availability, but we got pretty high marks from the course (4 out of 5). Remnants of Reality is a horror game that focuses around sound.
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This section contains various notes about designing the game and how it is intended to turn out. The approach is relatively ideal, and most of what is described here won't be visible in the first demo of the game.
Design philosophy
Ever since we decided to do a horror game, it was clear that we'd have to avoid certain aspects typical to the genre. For instance, while there are guns in the game, it's definitely not intended to be an action game, and this should be reflected all over the game very clearly. The focus is clearly on adventure where the player proceeds slowly and carefully through uncertain environments, having to rely much more on his hearing than his vision. I wanted the game to be more problem-solving oriented than your usual horror game in way that each encounter is a challenge of its own, usually containing multiple solutions. The player's advantage in this game is detection and it has to be put to good use as the adversaries are faster, stronger and often more durable than the hero. Just like a detective, the player needs wits and careful inspection to survive.
Look and feel
Fear is at the core of every horror game worth its salt and it's always strongly affected by the atmosphere and the environment of the game. Our hero, Vincent, is facing invisible enemies which he can only detect by some disturbing noise signals inside his head. That alone though is only a start. The game's primary focus is to capture the feeling of being hunted on an alien ground. The player moves around slowly, trying to pinpoint the location of his hunters, while hiding his own presence from them. This is the tension we're aiming for, thrilling slowness and finally sudden bursts of panic when the player is detected.
To further underline the sheer danger the monsters represent, the environment needs to reflect their brutality, as well as their otherworldly nature. For example in the demo episode, the ship is designed to look like as it had been sunken for several decades as a result of the dimensional shift that occurred there. Rotten wood, dampness and rusted metal fill up the place. Yet somehow people have survived, only to be eaten by the otherworldly predators, and what remains of them can be found littered all over the ship. Even more mystically some equipment is still functioning as if haunted. Overall, inspiration for how the places will look like could be sought from photos of results of various kinds of destruction from fires to earthquakes to atomic weapons.
Storyline
In the background of the story is the cause for everything. It's described in more detail in the next section, but I'd like to say a few words about it here, too. I wanted the Big Bad in this game to be not unlike predatory animals. There simply is no grand design, no evil plot, no conspiracy, no nothing. The monsters come to our world with no sinister purpose, they are simply living in the only way they know. They have their own ecosystem which dictates all of their behavior and the hapless victims are just that, victims of chance.
The story of the game focuses around Vincent's character and its development. He is a tragic hero from the film noir style, a detective no less. Other key people in the game are the dreamers and much of the game's plot tension is built around the conflict between them and Vincent. In the beginning, Vincent is chosen by random chance, gifted with powers to detect the otherworldly enemy. He is confused and only looks for a way to survive and get off the boat. However, after he has escaped, some time later he's drawn to another similar scene. No matter how much he fights, in the end he'll always find himself on a yet another scene, trying to investigate it. At first he cares about the dreamers, looking for a way to save them. Later on, as he becomes more and more frustrated, he is simply driven on by curiosity although he has no idea what is it that he wants to learn, but it always seems to be just one site away.