Primary Faculty Advisor
Sandra M. Leonard
Presentation Types
Individual Presentation
Description
Deathly Afraid's key concept is to scare the player and make them question their choices. I thought of different ideas and scenarios on how my game will present itself to the players. A constant theme in horror games is to make players choose a path of light or dark. The light side is when the player decides to be a hero, risks their life to save others and becomes the one to solve the mysterious evil that hunts the town or kills everybody. The dark side allows the player to explore the evil side by being the main villain and bringing chaos to the world. The video game Silent Hill 2 allows video game players to explore the idea of light and dark and makes the player question their motives.
The game Silent Hill 2 displays this trope of light and dark. James Sunderland, the main character of the game, is just a regular man battling against a dark, mysterious force. James faces off against monsters, an empty town covered in mist, and loses his sanity. He walks down a path of darkness, which he wants to avoid. The game Silent Hill 2 incorporates those paths, but instead of choosing to be a hero, James is reluctant hero. James is solving the clue for his missing wife. Unlike James, Vincent from Deathly Afraid needs to be talked into being a hero because he has a choice to let the monster control him. Deathly Afraid builds upon the idea of light and dark. The path Vincent chooses would save Vincent or kill him.
The game's plot is the player controlling Vincent, a young college student studying late at Rohrbach library for finals. A snow blizzard is going on. He walks there alone; a mysterious monster and man follows him. Vincent does not have powers. He is not badass. He is not the chosen one to slay the monster. The player job is to help Vincent survive by any means. The uses of first or second person won't be in the game. The game is presented in third person. In Deathly Afraid the players play as Vincent and seeing what he experiences. The path Vincent walks in the game will turn allies against him and allows him to meet an extraordinary person along the way. Playing Deathly Afraid, the choices the player makes with logic, not emotions. The player must be calm because the choices might kill Vincent instantly. The inspiration for the game came from other interactions. The Uncle Who Works For Nintendo provides a sense of dread.
The game's choices feel like death is knocking on the player's door. The player could not just pick a path and go straight to the end. It was a matter of thinking and planning what next move was going to be. This idea helps with Deathly Afraid not becoming a game where the player picks one path and keeps moving. The player are part of a bigger story with mystery and twists.
Designing the game, I wanted the game genre to be mysterious, dramatic, and suspenseful. The game provides mysteries for the player to solve, like where the monster comes from and what it wants with Vincent. Next, the drama will build up the sense of evil and dread for the player. I like the player to get nervous and figure out which ending is the real one, since there will be multiple endings, and only one ending is the true ending. Last, the suspense in the game will require the player to be ready and make choices because Vincent's life is on the line.
Recommended Citation
Brown, Jahliem, "Twine 6: Deathly Afraid" (2022). KUCC -- Kutztown University Composition Conference. 6.
https://research.library.kutztown.edu/compconf/2022/presentations/6
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.
Twine 6: Deathly Afraid
Deathly Afraid's key concept is to scare the player and make them question their choices. I thought of different ideas and scenarios on how my game will present itself to the players. A constant theme in horror games is to make players choose a path of light or dark. The light side is when the player decides to be a hero, risks their life to save others and becomes the one to solve the mysterious evil that hunts the town or kills everybody. The dark side allows the player to explore the evil side by being the main villain and bringing chaos to the world. The video game Silent Hill 2 allows video game players to explore the idea of light and dark and makes the player question their motives.
The game Silent Hill 2 displays this trope of light and dark. James Sunderland, the main character of the game, is just a regular man battling against a dark, mysterious force. James faces off against monsters, an empty town covered in mist, and loses his sanity. He walks down a path of darkness, which he wants to avoid. The game Silent Hill 2 incorporates those paths, but instead of choosing to be a hero, James is reluctant hero. James is solving the clue for his missing wife. Unlike James, Vincent from Deathly Afraid needs to be talked into being a hero because he has a choice to let the monster control him. Deathly Afraid builds upon the idea of light and dark. The path Vincent chooses would save Vincent or kill him.
The game's plot is the player controlling Vincent, a young college student studying late at Rohrbach library for finals. A snow blizzard is going on. He walks there alone; a mysterious monster and man follows him. Vincent does not have powers. He is not badass. He is not the chosen one to slay the monster. The player job is to help Vincent survive by any means. The uses of first or second person won't be in the game. The game is presented in third person. In Deathly Afraid the players play as Vincent and seeing what he experiences. The path Vincent walks in the game will turn allies against him and allows him to meet an extraordinary person along the way. Playing Deathly Afraid, the choices the player makes with logic, not emotions. The player must be calm because the choices might kill Vincent instantly. The inspiration for the game came from other interactions. The Uncle Who Works For Nintendo provides a sense of dread.
The game's choices feel like death is knocking on the player's door. The player could not just pick a path and go straight to the end. It was a matter of thinking and planning what next move was going to be. This idea helps with Deathly Afraid not becoming a game where the player picks one path and keeps moving. The player are part of a bigger story with mystery and twists.
Designing the game, I wanted the game genre to be mysterious, dramatic, and suspenseful. The game provides mysteries for the player to solve, like where the monster comes from and what it wants with Vincent. Next, the drama will build up the sense of evil and dread for the player. I like the player to get nervous and figure out which ending is the real one, since there will be multiple endings, and only one ending is the true ending. Last, the suspense in the game will require the player to be ready and make choices because Vincent's life is on the line.
