Don`t Be Afraid - Andrew Ho`s Works

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Don’t Be Afraid
Modeling Social Anxiety in Games
Digital Media Master's Project
by
Andrew Ho
In partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements for the Degree
Master of Science in Digital Media in the
School of Literature, Culture and Communication
Georgia Institute of Technology
May, 2012
Committee Members
Celia Pearce, Chair
Ian Bogost, Reader
Janet Murray, Reader
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Table of Contents
● Acknowledgments (p.3)
● Abstract (p.4)
● Introduction (p.5)
○ The Problem (p.5)
○ Why We Should Care (p.6)
○ Proposed Solutions (p.7)
● Relevant Work (p.7)
○ Modeling Complex Emotions in Games (p.7)
○ Social Anxiety Disorder Training (p.8)
● Games in the Horror Genre (p.9)
○ Silent Hill Series (p.9)
○ The 7th Guest (p.12)
● Experiments with Emotion (p.13)
○ Elude (p.13 )
○ Train (p.14)
○ Gravitation (p.16)
● Production (p.18)
○ Initial Concept, Evolution and Implementation (p.18)
○ Engine and Tools (p.18)
○ Prototyping and Playtesting (p.19)
○ Changed Elements (p.19)
● Game Overview (p.20)
○ Introduction (p.20)
○ Story Summary (p.20)
○ Game Design Document (p.20)
■ Gameplay Flow (p.20)
■ Controls (p.21)
■ Art Style (p.21)
■ Interface (p.21)
■ Game Time (p.22)
■ NPCs (p.22)
■ Outcomes (p.24)
■ Walkthrough (p.24)
● Conclusions (p.36)
○ Contributions to the Field (p.36)
○ Shortcomings (p.36)
○ Further Work (p.36)
Works Cited(p.37)
Games Cited(p.40)
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Acknowledgments
I would like to thank my committee chair Celia Pearce, and committee members
Ian Bogost and Janet Murray.
Thanks to help with research:
Doris Rusch
Clara Fernandez-Vara
Mario Lehenbauer
Thanks to everyone who tested my project:
Ben Ho
Christine Wu
Colton Spross
Bobby Blackburn
Patrick Coursey
Sadie Joodaki
Thanks to those who helped with my design document:
Chris DeLeon
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Abstract
My project is a game prototype that aims to model the feeling of shyness and social anxiety,
depicting the experience through a metaphorical approach. This project was created as an
expressive work, using game mechanics and atmosphere to contribute to the narrative. The
game represents the intimidating feelings that those with strong social anxiety hold towards
being in social situations, and furthers the metaphor by creating social encounters within the
narrative that serve to create awkward, unsure interactions even for players without social
anxiety issues.
Development of the game prototype went through a number of stages, initially intended as a
therapeutic simulation for players with social anxiety issues, then as a platform game, before
finally becoming a visual novel with an exploratory narrative. The project is designed to be
played at a slower pace through text and encounters with the in-game characters which
require puzzle-solving elements.
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Introduction
The Problem
Prevalence of Social Anxiety Disorder
Social anxiety, which is any sort of emotional discomfort or fear of social situations, is
common to some degree in nearly every person. While the level of anxiety experienced differs
from person to person, repeated exposure to social situations and life development often
reduces the feelings of apprehension before and after social interactions, whether it is a
gathering of friends or public speaking (Turk, Heimberg and Magee 2001).
Social anxiety disorder, sometimes referred to as social phobia, is an intense and chronic fear
of social situations which can impair one’s ability to function in a society. This condition has
been documented by the American Psychiatric Association as a mental disorder by the mid
1990s, and can range in intensity from physiological changes like sweating, trembling and
blushing, up to severe panic attacks and chronic substance abuse. While statistics vary from
country to country, a report by the United Stated Surgeon General on the state of mental
health has found that the disorder occurs more frequently in women than men by a two-toone ratio and had a one-year population prevalence of 3%, meaning that in 1999 (the year of
the study) with a national population of roughly 279 million citizens, 8.37 million people
would be suffering from this disorder (Surgeon General 1999).
Current methods of treating social anxiety disorder include medication and cognitive
behavioral therapy (CBT). The latter method consists of several methods of speaking therapy,
where the patient will speak with a psychiatrist, or even work in groups in tightly-structured
and brief sessions (Turk, Heimberg and Magee 2001). Methods of CBT are being developed to
be self-driven and/or run remotely, often structured around specific phobias such as fear of
public speaking or social anxiety disorder in younger children (Botella, Hofmann, Moscovitch
2004). These digital alternatives tend to be designed around simulations of specific scenarios
as stated previously, sometimes with game-like mechanics incorporated into them such as
scoring, achievements and simple logic puzzles (Lehenbauer 2011).
Modeling Emotion in Games
Traditionally, the majority of commercial video games have had difficulty conveying complex
emotions to the players (Murray 1997). Often these larger titles rely on more epic, sweeping
narratives that allow the player to take on the role of one or more characters, which then are
placed within a highly-structured, linear narrative or more open-world, open-ended settings.
Much work and progress has been made in creating more detailed visuals, complicated
gameplay schemes and controls, but many commercial games tend to play toward the more
basic emotions that humans experience, particularly triumph, excitement and fear. These are
most prevalent in competitive or violent games such as Halo for the Xbox, Everquest on the
PC and Mario Kart Double Dash for the GameCube (Lazzaro 2004). Games with a stronger
tilt towards puzzle-solving and strategy rely less on violence, but can often sacrifice story
against game involvement. While larger game development studios are capable of creating
games that are grand in scale, the nature of a large team working on a game often dilutes any
artistic or expressive vision (Bearman 2009). Meanwhile, independent game developers and
teams have recently begun to become more well-known for works of simpler, but more
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expressive quality, such as thatgamecompany's Flower and Jonathan Blow's Braid.
“Designing a game can be like a Japanese garden. It's not what you put in, but how much you
take away .” says Chen on designing games using simple mechanics and little to no plot to
create emotional conent. (Bearman 2009).
As with many narrative forms, games often attempt to convey meaning beyond the narrative
points of the game, using motif, allegory and other literary techniques. The effectiveness of
their use varies from title to title, but video games are often viewed by critics from other fields
as inferior in their expressive capacity (Ebert April 2010). It is worth noting however
arguments to this point have been vocally opposed by academia and professionals in the game
design field (Santiago 2010), forcing either clarification or retraction of such criticisms (Ebert
July 2010).
Why Should We Care
Raising awareness of social anxiety disorder and associated health problems might result in
those suffering from this mental disorder being less stigmatized and hence less inclined to
hide their condition. Fear of being labeled as having a psychological illness can deter those
seeking treatment and reduce treatment effectiveness. For those who do not suffer from
mental illness, studies show that the general label of mental illness, when ignorant of other
information, creates a sense of perceived dangerousness and reduced humanity.
(Martinez,Piff, Mendoza-Denton, Hinshaw 2011).
While the creative direction of commercial games are often driven by market forces as much
as most other widely-consumed media such as music, cinema and television, it is often the
smaller or independent game developers that work towards creating games to convey different
emotions or ideas. Academics and developers such as John Romero, Ian Bogost, John Sharp,
Eric Zimmerman, Brenda Brathwaite, Jason Rohrer and others gathered at the Art History of
Games (http://arthistoryofgames.com/) symposium in 2010 to address the question of
looking at games as an expressive art form. IndieCade (http://www.indiecade.com/ ), the
premier festival of independent games since 2008, brings judges together annually to
determine which games hold significant cultural value or expressive capacity, with both an
exhibition and conference exploring the expressive power of games. There are also a number
of exhibitions within larger events designed to present and curate work being done in
independent, academic and alternative game design, such as DiGRA conferences
(http://gamesconference.hku.nl/), Independent Games Festival
(http://www.igf.com/index.html), and The Sandbox at SIGGRAPH
(http://www.siggraph.org/s2011/for_attendees/sandbox ). The advancement of games as an
expressive medium is a problem that has demonstrated relevance in the game design field.
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Proposed Solution to the Problems
The purpose of my project is to either utilize mechanics unique to games to express complex
emotion, specifically that of social anxiety. While I cannot claim a deep background in
psychiatry and would be unqualified to create a project on my own that is therapeutic to
people with social anxiety disorder, my personal experiences with extreme introversion
provides inspiration for attempting to express the feeling to others. My project has been
designed to be an expressive design experiment rather than a therapeutic game, attempting to
convey a specific emotion to users who may not have experienced it before. Through use of
atmosphere, narrative and gameplay mechanics, this project will display the sense of tension
in seemingly unwelcoming environments and awkwardness in social interactions.
Relevant Work
There has been a great deal of development and experimentation in creating emotions in
games in the past decade or so, with notable independent designers including Jonathan Blow,
Jenova Chen and Jason Rohrer. Researchers in game studies have also written numerous
works that I discovered, though some seemed more relevant to the development of my project
than others. Nicole Lazzaro's 'Four Keys' to developing more emotion in a game without the
use of extra story had several important ideas that could have been used toward developing
my project, but I found it wasn't as effective in my particularly story-driven project (Lazzaro
2004).
I have collected and summarized several writings or projects which I found most useful in
developing my project, followed by games from commercial and independent game
developers which influenced my design decisions.
Modeling Complex Emotions in Games
The design and writing of Doris Rusch addresses the complexity of creating games based on
emotional and conceptual topics such as drug addition, jealousy and depression, saying that
the process is inherently difficult due to the lack of readily-observable elements and
mechanisms (Rusch 2010). Rusch’s methodology in designing metaphorical games rests upon
three strategies: tangibility, procedurality, and play. Tangibility refers to adding substance to
an intangible idea, whether it is done through mechanics, narrative or other features.
Procedurality deals with “exploring the systemic nature of an abstract concept before turning
it into a game”, which seems to bear some similarity to the procedural trait that Murray
attributes to digital artifacts (Murray 1997). Play is placed between these previous two
strategies in that it takes both the substance of the concept, and the form that it will be
modeled into in order to create something that is playable (Rusch 2010).
Brenda Brathwaite, notable game designer and academic, has been working since February
2008 on a series of non-digital games entitled ‘The Mechanic is the Message’. The three games
that are currently finished are
● The New World - designed to teach her daughter about the American slave trade
● Síochán leat - focused on Irish heritage and the history of Ireland around the time of
the Cromwellian Invasion.
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● Train - expressed the transportation of Jews in Nazi Germany to concentration camps,
garnered the most attention.
The other three games have yet to be finished, but the clear point of the games is to try and
model difficult subjects through the gameplay mechanics rather than any stated artwork or
rules (Deam 2009).
Brathwaite states that designing a game about tragedy or tragic topics is a deeply personal
experience, based often on an event or story that disturbs the designer. “The game already
exists there,” she said in her talk at the Art History of Games Symposium in 2010. Through
researching the details, space and people involved in a particular event, such as the Trail of
Tears or Holocaust, she finds that game mechanics of the system itself are revealed to her as
these topics are considered. She also states that human-induced tragedy is rarely accidental,
and so systems are often put into work in order to facilitate tragedies such as those previously
mentioned, whether they are administrative or pragmatic systems. The complicity of players
is also a key factor in designing these games, making the player responsible for this minor recreation of a human tragedy. Feelings of guilt are rarely experienced in many games
considering their general purpose of being fun, but this adds to the impact of the game
mechanics as the players consider their given roles and actions (Brathwaite 2010).
Social Anxiety Disorder Training
In addition to games that express emotions, some attempts have also been made to create
games to support those with social anxiety in developing new social skills. CBT is the most
common treatment method for social anxiety disorder, but I looked at a few examples where
researchers attempted to create social training scenarios in a digital environment. One
involved an internet-based system to help patients get over a fear of public speaking (Botella,
Hofmann, Moscovitch 2004), while another was focused on recreating group therapy through
use of the internet (Andersson, Carlbring, Holmstrom, Sparthan, Furmark, Nilsson-Ihrfelt,
Buhrman, Ekselius 2006).
Mario Lehenbauer of the University of Vienna recently presented findings from a prototype of
an internet-based social skills training program at the 2011 European Games for Health
Conference in Amsterdam (Lehenbauer, 2011). The purpose of this project was to provide
online therapy to adolescents suffering from social anxiety disorder and extreme shyness.
There was an ‘online’ group which used only the online training program. The online training
sections consisted mostly of quiz-based sections, asking users how to react to certain situation
with a combination of textual queries along with portraits/pictures of actors in social
situations. Game-like elements, such as role-playing and providing an avatar as the online
‘trainer’ were introduced to reduce drop-out rates among the subjects. The ‘offline’ group
attended 14 50-minute lectures, consisting of psychoeducation, social skills training, relapse
prevention, and body relaxation methods.
Access to the training program and its results are mostly confidential at this point, as the
results are part of evaluation phase for Lehenbauer’s PhD thesis. However the results that
presented revealed that there was a significant drop in social anxiety among subjects, as
measured by scores in the Liebowitz social anxiety scale (LSAS), the Social Phobia Inventory
(SPIN), and Social Interaction Anxiety Scale (SIAS). There were significant differences
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between control group and offline group, and the control group and online group, but no
significant differences between the online and offline group. Lehenbauer has determined that
online training for social anxiety disorder can be effective, but stated that the online training
tool had relied too heavily on text and resembled a quiz, and wanted to make more of a game
out of the tool to reduce drop-out rates and increase user engagement (Lehenbauer, 2011).
Games in the Horror Genre
Silent Hill Series
Figure 1: Screenshot from Silent Hill
A very notable example of a commercial game that possesses strong capacity to express
complex emotions and concepts through its design atmosphere is the Silent Hill series,
starting with the first Silent Hill in 1999. For the purposes of argument I will draw examples
from the first three games due to similarities in their themes, methods and settings, as later
games in the Silent Hill series have been substantially different in several respects. Silent Hill
4 for instance takes place outside of the Silent Hill location and features differing mechanics
like limited inventory space and invincible enemies. Silent Hill Homecoming also has the
main character already possessing combat experience unlike previous protagonists, and
contains narrative references to the Silent Hill film directed by Christophe Gans that differ
from previous iterations of the games.
The series is set squarely in the survival-horror genre, with all three games being noted as
commercial and critical successes, with Silent Hill holding an 86 Metacritic rating and having
sold 2 million copies (Sato 2006), Silent Hill 2 rated at 89 on Metacritic with over 2 million
copies sold (IGN 2001), and Silent Hill 3 being rated at 85 on Metacritic while 58,000 copies
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were sold within three weeks in Japan (Fahey 2003). The series has also provoked academic
consideration, such as the second book of the Landmark Video Games series, Silent Hill: The
Terror Engine by Bernard Perron of the Universite de Montreal. All three revolve around
normal, everyday characters trapped within the titular town of Silent Hill, being caught up in
the twisted plans of a cult and encountering terrible creatures born from troubled minds.
Through the convoluted plots, themes that arise throughout the series include sexual
frustration, survivor’s guilt, parental abuse, perspectives on religion, which find their way into
the atmosphere through the monsters and environmental props encountered throughout.
As the first Silent Hill game was released shortly after the first Resident Evil game, at least one
critic referred to it as a 'shameless, but slick Resident Evil clone' (Fatt 2000), but others
praised the suspenseful atmosphere, effective use of camera angles and ambient music
(Baldric 1999)(Fielder 1999). The following two sequels further cemented the Silent Hill
brand's status as a survival-horror classic. Silent Hill 2 was described as 'an adventure that's
scary in a disturbing, eerie fashion. The game's mechanics show an attempt to improve the
genre's general failings, and more importantly don't get in the way of the game or the story
itself.' (Perry 2001), or generally improved upon the first game. Criticism revolved around the
voice acting and sometimes awkward camera angles, but the game been listed as eleventh on
Wired's list of most influential games of the decade (Pierce 2009), and one of the best
videogame stories ever told by Gamesrader (Gamesradar 2008) due to its focus on
psychological horror and haunting topics that few games had ever covered at the time.
While I have noted earlier that fear is an emotion that is easier to invoke in video games, the
degrees and frequency one experiences this particular emotion can vary. The Silent Hill series
invokes fear as a visceral and intense experience, taking to heart the following phrase from
H.P Lovecraft. “As may naturally be expected of a form so closely connected with primal
emotion, the horror-tale is as old as human thought and speech themselves” (Lovecraft, 1973).
Anxiety can come in many forms, and is generally a lesser, if more constant degree of fear,
which occurs almost continuously while playing the Silent Hill games.
Figure 2: Screenshot from Silent Hill 2
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A strong example of Silent Hill's use of this growing sense of dread instead of the foggy
environment and dark corridors can be seen in the narrative of Silent Hill 2. While playing as
protagonist James Sunderland often finds vague of paradoxical clues that hint that his wife,
who is somewhere in the town of Silent Hill, is actually dead. Worse yet, these hints grow in
clarity over time to further suggest that James is the one that killed her. The player begins to
suspect over time that James is not actually a unsuspecting soul accidentally drawn to the
town, but that the environments, monsters and even characters are fragments of his
nightmares and frustrations. The constant undercurrent of dread comes to a climax when
James and the player discovers the truth behind his presence in Silent Hill and the actions
that drove him there. It is this sense of anxiety about the truth that makes the game haunting
to play, as much as the terrifying monsters and hellish landscapes.
While the Silent Hill series has drawn inspiration from films and novels such as Twin Peaks,
Jacob’s Ladder, and The Shining for its foreboding atmosphere, it introduced several ambient
features and gameplay mechanics which profoundly impacted the mechanics of inducing fear.
Silent Hill also effectively draws on elements from older media, particularly the use of
controlled camera angles and impossible spaces, both of which can unnerve the player
without disorientating them to the point of confusion.
The pervasive fog that shrouds the outdoor areas in the games began as a simple technical
limitation, so as to reduce draw distances outside, but served to heighten the players’ anxiety
as monsters and other hazards lurked within the mists. The flashlight which allows the player
to see ahead in the dark forces the player to strain just as hard as the player character to take
note, enhancing immersion as when a monster or frightening prop appears in the light, it is
the player that is spooked, enacting the experience as the player character. The handset radio
prevalent in these three games doesn’t only provide another means by which the player can
detect nearby monsters, but heightens anxiety since the white noise that is generated is nondirectional and can give off false positives.
Figure 3: Screenshot from Silent Hill 3
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The 7th Guest
Figure 4: Screenshot from The 7th Guest
Another iconic point in horror game history, with mechanics and atmosphere somewhat
similar to my project, would be The 7th Guest, released in 1993 by Trilobyte. This example is
an adventure game with heavy emphasis on puzzle-solving and use of interactive movies,
noted at the time for being one of the first games to use CDs due to the size of the movies.
As an adventure game, the player clicks around the environment in order to explore the
haunted mansion the player character is trapped in. Logic puzzles must be solved in order to
progress, and the story is told through numerous videos. Critics have praised the graphics and
soundtrack, which increase the haunting ambiance of the game during exploration. The layout
and styling of the puzzles are equally intriguing, as often there are no rules offered for the
puzzles, leaving the player to figure it out entirely on their own unless they utilize a ‘Book of
Hints’ which can be found in the library of the mansion.
There are some weaknesses that critics and general audiences pointed out in the narrative
structure of the game however as Phillip Jong points out, “The 7th Guest has difficulty in
convening a succinct story. The multiple disjointed videos played between puzzles are
confusing, leading to an even more confusing ending that is frankly anticlimactic. The puzzles
are not well integrated into the story,” (Jong, 1997). Paul Murphy of Dragon magazine also
stated “The Seventh Guest suffers from an incurable case of confusion about what it is trying
to be. It's either a collection of puzzles encumbered by an unnecessary horror setting and story
—or it's a horror story and setting encumbered by an unnecessary collection of puzzles,”
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(Rolston, Murphy 1994). The 7th Guest succeeds in creating the desired atmosphere of a
haunted mansion, but doesn’t utilize any unique game mechanics to enhance the storytelling,
instead relying on the older medium of video to try and convey the plot and other emotions.
Experiments with Emotion
Elude
Figure 5: Screenshot from Elude
Though this example is more of a prototype than a full-fledged game, it is due some
examination due to its use of metaphor as a means of modeling a complex emotion or topic.
Created in the Gambit Game Lab at MIT and designed primarily by Doris C. Rusch, the aim of
Elude was to raise awareness of depression by attempting to portray the feeling of being
depressed against ‘normal’ and ‘happy’ mood states. The intent is “to raise awareness for
depression and to inform about this dangerous illness. It is specifically intended to be used in
a clinical context as part of a psycho-education package to enhance friends' and relatives'
understanding of people suffering from depression about what their loved ones are going
through.” (Rusch 2010)
This platform game written in Adobe Flash begins simply,, though the music and artwork set
an eerie and somber tone. The colors consist of dark green and black for the most part, though
the silhouettes in the opening screen transition to simple, but more colorful artwork when the
game begins. The player character is a habitually-hunched boy navigating through a fairly
gloomy forest filled with gnarled branches that lead upwards, along with white songbirds at
rest scattered around. The player ‘resonates’, or emits a brief aura in order to give these birds
color and movement, which in turns allows the player to jump even higher along the branches
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until they penetrate the canopy. At this point the music takes a softly-gleeful turn and the
lighting is sunny, while falling leaves and flowers allow the player to jump and bounce even
higher into the sky. These would be the ‘normal’ and ‘happy’ moods that are being expressed,
though both are difficult, if not impossible to maintain. If the player doesn’t move quickly
enough through the ‘normal’ mood however, an unsettling mass of tentacles swells from the
ground to grasp the player and pull them down into a dark, subterranean space which can
only be the ‘depression’ zone. All efforts to escape only bring the player into deeper and small
underground spaces, until hitting ‘rock-bottom’ and allowing for a gradual return to the
‘normal’ space.
A key mechanic in this game is the birds, to which the player sings, representing objects of
passion or interest which allow the player to ascend into the happy mood state, along with the
temporary nature of each mood state. The player isn’t ever really trapped or able to stay above
the canopy forever, as the game returns them to the equilibrium of the normal mood state at
some point.
The simplistic gameplay and lack of deeper gameplay mechanics can likely be attributed to
this being a demo, but I feel that the seriousness of depression is expressed clearly in the
game.
Train
Figure 6: Photo of Train board and pieces
Designed by Brenda Brathwaite, Train is a non-digital art game that consists of yellow
wooden pegs, which are put into toy trains to be transported from one side of the game board
to the other via miniature train. The train tracks are set upon a window which is part of the
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game installation, with the very abrupt rules stating that a player should break the glass with a
hammer before starting the game. Along with cards that have the names of German places
written upon them, there is little to indicate the context of the game until either a player
postulates their meaning or it is explained that the names are those of concentration camps,
and that Nazi soldiers used to break windows of houses to indicate that the residents were
Jews to be transported.
Depending on the players, more insight and care is taken in considering the game mechanics
before or after the context is revealed. Having played the game and experienced this myself,
the most common reaction was awkward amusement and mild embarrassment, though some
players have had more emotional reactions upon the revelation. To ‘win’ in this game means
being the player that has transported the most wooden pegs to their destination, while
infrequently players find the ‘losing’ condition in that no pegs are transported on their train.
Though lacking any complex graphics or mechanics, Train manages to create mechanics that
have a deep impact on the players when coupled with the tragic context of the game. Here, it
makes players feel to a small degree responsible for something horrifying, but from a safe
standpoint that allows them to further reflect on the actual event.
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Gravitation
Figure 7: Screenshot from Gravitation
Gravitation is the fourth game developed by independent game designer Jason Rohrer. The
game is free and built entirely using free software from the GNU GPL. It is an incredibly
simple game that is drawn in 8-bit sprites and set within a 640x480 screen resolution,
requiring roughly 10 minutes to play through. Without any sort of introduction or exposition,
the game starts with a pixelated man in a room, featuring a furnace and a child throwing a ball
at him. The visible screen space however is very small, and the only controls are to move
around and jump. As the man touches the ball and bounces it back to the child however, the
visible screen size begins to increase as does his ability to jump, allowing him to hop through
the aperture at the top of the room. The environment also grows brighter, the background
image becomes less pixelated and the music swells with notes and enthusiastic tones.
Leaving the room allows him to collect stars on higher platforms that fall to the ground, but
create ice blocks in the first room that keep the child from throwing the ball. If the player
leaves for too long, the child will become trapped or leave the room entirely. Despite the
simplicity of the graphics and gameplay mechanics, there is a deep message that varies only
slightly from player to player. Rohrer declines to offer an in-depth explanation for
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Gravitation, beyond “success, and creative leaps, and mania, and mood cycles, and the
aftermath.” (Rohrer, 2008). There is also the fact that he modeled a very simple 8-bit
rendition of himself and his son in the game, along with his notes that make it clearer that the
game is about pursuing creative interests while keeping track of one’s family at home. The
play with the child offers more color and visibility to the world around the player character,
allowing him to soar higher with inspiration (noted by the ‘fire’ effect that engulfs the man’s
head). Yet it is hard to go too high as the screen and jump height recedes, and too many of the
‘ideas’ that are gathered makes it harder to maintain things back home.
Gravitation’s emphasis on metaphor over graphics, along with a simple, but effective set of
gameplay mechanics creates another great example of how a game can model and express
complex emotions to the player.
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Production
Initial Concept, Evolution and Implementation
The initial concept of this project was to create a game prototype which simulated awkward
social situations, creating a virtual game space where users who suffered from social anxiety
disorder could interact with while remaining in a safe environment. This involved creating
scenarios such as a first date, dining out with friends, or public speaking that would react to
user choices and data. Another early idea at the time was to use biometric data from the user
to modify the scenario, using colors and sounds to either calm the user down when they were
showing signs of stress, and to occasionally excite or incite stress when the user is showing no
signs of difficulty. Ultimately the scope of the project was too ambitious after evaluating my
initial research into treatment of social anxiety disorder, requiring a higher degree of
advanced expertise in psychology in order to fully implement as originally envisioned.
The design of the project then changed to a game prototype simulating and expressing social
anxiety and shyness through the use of metaphor, story and gameplay mechanics, inspired by
games such as Elude that try to model a psychological disorder for people who do not suffer
from it. After extensive consideration, the haunted house setting was chosen because it
provided a suitable metaphor for being in a socially awkward environment, and supported
mechanics associated with adventure games such as exploration and social interactions.
Several gameplay mechanics were considered during this stage, including a Flash-based
platformer.
Ultimately the design was scoped to use the Ren ‘Py engine, which supported a story-based,
adventure game style mechanic, and with which I was already familiar, requiring a
manageable level of art and programming while still providing a game space capable of
expressing the desired experience.
Engine and Tools
The choice of the Ren ‘Py engine was in part to facilitate a simpler development cycle, focused
more on my strengths of writing and game design while working within the constraints of
mostly static art and simpler programming. Ren ‘Py (www.renpy.org) is an engine used to
design visual novels, a genre of interactive fiction games similar to Adventureland and Zork,
though more popular in Japan due to its use of anime-like graphics and use of video footage.
Often these games have a branching narrative centered around the player interacting with
other characters, as in a romance-simulation or Japanese-style roleplaying game. Moving
towards gameplay mechanics found in visual novels rather than an adventure game helped
create a sense of atmosphere, a more in-depth character backstory, motivating players to
discover more about the NPCs and the game space.
The scripting language used in Ren ‘Py is heavily based on Python and can run Python code
within the game, allowing the designer to create characters, write dialogue and choice menus,
and import audiovisual assets with very flexible results. The program is entirely free to use
and most games do no require a licensing agreement except for commercial works. I was
already familiar with creating games in this engine, which further influenced its selection for
this project.
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Almost all of the artwork was created in the GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP), using
photos that I shot at a local landmark/restaurant The Wrecking Bar as well as creative
commons-licensed photos. Some photos used were altered heavily enough to fall under fair
use, in addition to being used for a noncommercial educational work. Sounds were
downloaded from the Freesound Project (www.freesound.org) and then edited using
Audacity, all of which also are creative commons licensed recordings that are being used in a
noncommercial educational work.
Prototyping and Playtesting
After setting up a very basic Ren ‘Py game consisting of three rooms, a simple inventory
system, and the first NPC encounter, I shared this prototype with testers including my
advisor. Based on the user feedback, I was able to improve the art, create longer and more
complex NPC encounters and create a coherent game space.
I held one final round of playtesting after finishing the ending of the game to get feedback
from a wider group of testers including university faculty. Changes made at this point mostly
involved bug fixes and polishing artwork, clarifying encounters.
Removed and Changed Elements
Due to time and technical constraints, features that I had hoped to implement into the final
product were either changed or dropped. The NPCs that the user interacts with were originally
going to be part of a mini-game to simulate social interactions, using colored auras and
corresponding actions. The NPCs also had a great deal less backstory and character at the
time, simply being unnamed enemy characters. The NPCs currently are part of a more
complex backstory that explains their presence and motivations.
20
Project Overview
Introduction
This project is a game prototype focused on creating an unnerving atmosphere for the user
while forcing them to explore the game space and confront uncomfortable, but not outright
hostile NPC encounters. The gameplay is similar to text and point-and-click adventure games,
as the player makes choices to explore the game space and interact with NPCs. Items can be
found within the game space and are utilized with an unseen inventory system, and all items
found affect the story progress. Dialogue with the NPCs are made through menu choices, and
can be affected by possessing certain items or having completed previous encounters.
Story Summary
The story of the game takes place from the perspective of a grade-school age girl who is
socially awkward around her peers. She is invited to a slumber party by other girls her age,
who end up teasing her there and testing her resolve to be ‘popular,’ coercing her to sneak out
with them to see a nearby abandoned house that is supposedly haunted. They dare her to take
a step inside the old house, and almost immediately the front door closes and locks her in. The
girl, who is the player character, must explore the house for another way out and in doing so
encounters a tragic tale of the previous residents, who still reside in the house as ghosts. In
order to escape the house, she must talk to the NPCs, each of whom is ridden with emotional
conflicts such as loneliness, anger, and fear, and convince them to help her leave the house
along with departing the house. Unlike other horror games where the objective of
encountering hostile or frightening NPCs is to battle them or run away, the player character
has to help or comfort them in order to succeed. There is only one ending at this point, which
is to successfully escape the house and put the ghosts to rest.
Game Design Document
Gameplay Flow
The game begins with a brief textual introduction to explain who the player character is and
how she ends up in the house. The user then begins in the entrance hall, with three choices to
make in navigating the house from there. If the player chooses to move upstairs or into the
den first, they are notified that it is too dark to see anything, and therefore the player moves
back to the entrance hallway. These temporary ‘dead ends’ were put in to help guide the player
along the narrative, without making the other options unavailable in the menu choices. This
way the user knows that they are able to explore other areas, but must find an item or way to
look around.
The pace of the game is meant to be fairly slow, requiring roughly twenty minutes to play due
to the heavy use of text. There are only several rooms/movements between the introduction
and the player encountering the first NPC. The first NPC sets a very simple encounter that
allows the player to adjust to interacting with them, and in order to win, the user must choose
dialogue choices that either comfort or help the ghost. If the user fails the encounter by
choosing the wrong dialogue options, which lowers a ‘mood’ variable attached to the ghost,
21
the user is sent back downstairs and must repeat the encounter, though without consequence
at this point.
Exploration of the house also exposes backstory of the NPCs and game space, through finding
journals and papers. New information gathered from these sources, along with items found
throughout the house, aids the player in calming the other NPCs. Additionally, took
inspiration from The 7th Guest by avoiding the critique of a disconnect between story and
puzzles. Items that are found in the game which affect exploration and NPC interaction are
directly related to the story, and items such as the candle and key work metaphorically as
elements that help the player overcome their anxiety about their surroundings, as well as
gaining the courage to interact with a new NPC. The game ends when the player reconciles the
conflict between the “ghosts” and finds a way out of the house. The game currently has no lose
conditions.
Controls
Space Bar or Left Mouse-click: Progress to next screen/text lines
Art Style
The art style was developed to leverage my strengths as a photographer, as well as
accommodating my lack of experience with hand-drawn and digital art. I chose a very simple
art style using heavily processed static photographs. All background images in the game were
either photographed by myself or taken from online sources, altered heavily to try and fit the
theme of the game. Background images have had their brightness decreased and desaturated
to remove the colors. Colored filters were added to enhance the dark effects, and some
light/day time photographs had to be changed drastically to reflect the night time setting. The
background images then had the ‘Oilfy’ filter applied to them within the GIMP program.
Different versions of the same background image were used in some cases to reflect the player
being in near total darkness, and then having a light source later. The background images are
all sized at 800x600 pixels.
The character art consists of silhouettes that I traced from photographs in GIMP. After
creating a shadow of a person, I then blurred the image and changed the color to reflect
certain moods. For instance, the first NPC is a ghost that is extremely lonely and sad, so her
eyes have a bluish color while her outline is a dark violet. The angry NPC has a black shape,
with red eyes to reflect his emotional state. The standard size for the character pieces is
391x600, with the exception of the child character, which is sized slightly smaller.
Interface
The interface in the game is very much like other visual novels and has not been modified
greatly from the stock settings available in Ren ‘Py. The text appears in a box at the bottom of
the screen unless otherwise specified in cases like reading through a diary. At the end of
nearly all of these text portions is a menu, which appears in the middle of the screen to ask the
user for their choice. Upon clicking these choices, different reactions will occur depending on
the context. If a choice is clicked on while navigating the house, the player character will
22
either move or attempt to perform the chosen action, usually with a change of background
image.
Encounters with the NPC occur automatically, depending on certain conditions such as items
having been found or previous encounters. The menu system works similarly, except that
choosing a menu item will affect the NPC’s mood and response.
Different game, graphical and sound options are available through the Ren ‘Py engine, such as
setting volume levels, enabling fast-scrolling through text and so on. A feature that has been
disabled from the stock Ren ‘Py settings is the ‘scrollback’ feature, which allows users to use
their mouse wheel to move backward in the game.
Save and load features are available for the user to use. A quick-save and quick-load system
are also available, and these can be found along with game options at the opening screen or
along the bottom of the screen during gameplay.
Game Time
While this varies from player to player, the average playthrough time is around 20 minutes.
NPCs
General NPC Information
There are three unique NPCs in the game, all of whom are ghosts that used to live in the house
when alive, and now haunt it in afterlife. These three NPCs are family members, consisting of
a husband, wife and their young son. They would have been alive during the early 20th
century and for several reasons, did not get along well as a family unit.
While each of these NPCs have their own character flaw that leads to their ultimate demise, I
intended the house to have a sense of ‘wrongness’, similar to locations such as the titular town
in Silent Hill or the Overlook Hotel in Stephen King’s The Shining. While the house wasn’t
designed to be sentient or actively malicious, it does play upon their emotions.
Below is a summary of the NPCs, followed by a detailed backstory leading up to the events in
the game.
Henry Mason
● Patriarch of the Mason family
● Stern man, strict father
● Prone to anger and irritability
● Highly traditional, believes his son’s behavior to be ‘acting out’
● By the time of the game, suffers from guilt issues which are expressed through anger
Cheryl Mason
● Wife to Henry Mason
● Very passive, allows Henry to make decisions in the household
● More open to new ideas, but is intimidated by Henry
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● Feels trapped by inability to help her son’s behavior
● Slides further into depression after son’s death and Henry’s escalating temper.
Theodore Mason
● Young boy, son of the Mason family
● Prone to erratic behavior, hiding in places and scaring people
● Highly attached to his toys
● Likely autistic or suffering from a developmental disorder
● Frightened of his father
As Theodore exhibits behavior that is not entirely understood at this point in the early 20th
century, his father believes that he is misbehaving and punishes him according to his
traditional background and parenting principles of the time. Cheryl believes however that
taking him to a mental hospital will help, but the treatment is ineffective due to the growing,
but immature understanding of mental disorders in that time period. Henry punishes
Theodore by taking away his toy soldiers, his most valued possession, which causes Theodore
to hide again.
Theodore finds a crawl space in the back of the house which leads down to the basement,
which was never completed by Henry and was sealed off. He is unable to escape from the
entrance due to being too short to reach it, and attempts to bang the walls, call for help and
otherwise inform others of his presence. When Theodore has gone missing, authorities and
helpers search a much wider area. Henry at some point hears something under the house, but
convinces himself that he is hearing things. Several weeks later, Cheryl hears her son’s voice
inexplicably coming from under the house and informs the authorities. When they arrive and
knock a hole down into the basement, Theodore is found to have starved to death, having
been dead for several days before his discovery.
Henry feels intensely guilty for not having found his son, and for possibly having caused him
to hide away. He doesn’t reveal this to anyone, but expresses his guilt and despair through
rage, further fraying his marriage with the already-depressed Cheryl. Eventually Cheryl
commits suicide after a violent encounter with her husband, and repeated instances where she
senses her son’s presence in the house. Henry is tormented with grief and moves into his son’s
room, secluding himself from the world and losing his grip on sanity. He too takes his own life
afterwards, and the house becomes abandoned after no one wants to buy it due to its morbid
history.
It is through this storyline and its characters that I attempt to generate tangibility to the idea
of a shy character that encounters these highly emotional and sometimes hostile personalities,
procedurality through her interactions with them, and play in the ways that she attempts to
communicate and mollify the NPCs. (Rusch, 2010)
NPC Interactions
Each NPC, as stated before, is associated with a particular negative emotion.
Henry - Anger
Cheryl - Sadness
Theodore - Fear
24
Their initial encounters will correspond to this, as Cheryl will seek the player character out,
while Henry will be irritated by her presence, and Theodore is constantly hiding and running
from the player character until he can be lured out. Each NPC has a hidden ‘mood’ variable
that will rise or fall in value depending on the user’s dialogue choices.
Some dialogue choices will only be available if certain items have been found or other
conditions have been met. This makes it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to succeed in
some NPC encounters until the player explores around the house. Offering the correct
responses or giving the NPCs an important item to help reassure or placate them will
essentially ‘unlock’ the help that the player needs from the NPC. After this, the NPC will offer
words of advice before disappearing to allow the player character to further explore the house.
Outcomes
The only outcome at this point is that the player character escapes the house, using the same
aperture that Theodore discovered upon exploring the basement crawl space.
Walkthough
The game begins with some exposition, telling the user who he/she is playing as and how they
ended up in the house.
25
The door has slammed shut, and almost immediately the residents of the house make their
presence known.
26
The player character can pick between going upstairs, into the den, or down the hallway.
The upstairs and den choice at this point are dead ends, both paths being too dark to navigate.
Choosing either will send the player character back to the entrance.
Going down the hallway will send the player character deeper into the house, but a source of
light can be seen in a nearby room.
If the player character goes further down the hall, they will literally bump into a dead end.
27
The player character enters the room to find it is a dining room. A single candle is
mysteriously lit upon the table.
The player character picks up the candle, which triggers soft sobbing. More of the house is
now explorable.
The player character can explore the kitchen. The first option brings about the discovery of
another door leading outside, but upon inspecting it, it is bolted shut.
28
Examining the pantry brings a surprise to the player character. Afterwards there is nothing
else to find in there.
The player character can then head back to the hallway they were originally in before the
dining room.
The light reveals a small closet in the hallway, the door missing and bare wood panelling on
the back. There is a keyhole in the panel, but you don’t have a key to open it yet.
Returning back to the entry way, the player character then explores the upstairs since the
candle provides light.
29
Upon reaching the top of the stairs however, a disembodied voice confronts the player
character, shortly after which the first NPC appears.
The ensuing conversation with Cheryl will either end with the player retreating downstairs or
talking her into leaving, mostly by offering to help find her family.
Cheryl departing will allow the player to explore the upstairs floor, with the option of either
going into the room immediately to the right or down the upstairs hallway.
Going into the room on the left reveals the dilapidated master bedroom, with options to
explore the night stand, dresser and bed.
30
Searching the remains of the bed uncovers a gold ring hidden beneath it, which the player
takes.
Searching the night stand will reveal a decaying journal, which reveals significant backstory
about the ghost that the player first encountered and important details on interacting with the
other ghosts.
Trying to open the dresser will simply make it crumble into rotten wood, without anything of
importance inside.
Moving out of the bedroom and into the upstairs hallway, something small and insubstantial
will brush by the player, running off away from them.
31
At the end of the upstairs hallway, the player will enter a child’s bedroom, with the options to
search the room, read some writing carved into the wall, or look inside a toy chest.
Searching the room doesn’t yield any significant clues, but reading the writing on the wall
reveals details about the last inhabitant’s unstable state of mind.
Looking into the toy chest, the player finds an aged newspaper article that gives more details
on the tragic past of the house and its residents.
Journeying back downstairs as there is nothing else to explore upstairs, the next place the
player can explore is the den.
32
Upon entering the den however, the player disturbs the second ghost, that of Henry Mason,
who is displeased by the player’s presence in his house.
Henry demands the player to leave, but the player can talk him down into helping them by
revealing some of the items and information that they’ve found upstairs.
Once he is placated, Henry leaves. Depending on how well the encounter went, he will offer
hints on what to do next.
Searching the fireplace shelf reveals a small box, and inside it is a rusting toy soldier. The
actual fireplace is filled with ash and dust, but also has a key hidden within.
The player can then return to the hallway closet and use the key to open the door within, and
is given one last chance to look around before going downstairs.
33
In the basement, there appears to be nothing there, but the player can sense something amiss.
The options at this point are to either head back upstairs, or call out to this presence.
If the player keeps trying to call out to it, nothing will happen. However if they show the toy
soldier they have, Theodore Mason will appear to try and claim it.
He seems more afraid of the player than anything else, and in order to put him at rest, the
player must convince him that his parents want to find him.
Upon successfully placating the spirit, he reveals to the player where he entered the basement
while he was alive before running upstairs to join his family.
34
The game ends with the player crawling through the hole, being just tall enough to reach it,
and leaving the house just as dawn rises over the horizon.
35
Conclusions
Contributions to the Field
This project shows that gameplay mechanics, story and atmosphere can be used in games to
convey complex emotions at a fairly low level of entry in terms of gameplay complexity and
cost. Feedback from playtests indicate that the testers find the atmosphere suitably unnerving,
while exploration and interaction with the NPCs is spooky at most, without being too
overwhelming. This demonstrates that well-designed narrative, atmosphere and gameplay
mechanics are more important to conveying complicated emotions and thoughts than detailed
graphics or overly complex systems.
Shortcomings
While this project was successful as an explorable narrative, further work could be done to
making the game more interactive or offer a greater variety of choices to lead to different
endings. A great deal of creative writing was invested into the game in its current state, but a
more intricate and lengthy storyline could greatly enhance the gameplay experience. The NPC
encounters, while mostly successful in making testers feel uncomfortable about interacting
with them, could have been scripted with more difficult choices and more visible feedback.
The NPCs themselves could be more autonomous or programmed to wander around the
house to provide more random encounters, instead of scripted interactions. The programming
and artistic limitations cut back the amount of complexity that I could put into the NPC
encounters, and may have limited their effectiveness as well.
Finally, the play space of the house could have been better laid out. There are ten rooms to
explore through the house and some testers said that having a larger area to cover would have
helped to enhance their gameplay experience.
Further Work
Since my project is a game prototype, this proof of concept could be further expanded into a
full game. As production of this project was accomplished in several months by myself, a
slightly larger team with additional time would be able to create a more detailed and
challenging game to expand the ideas put forth by this prototype.
I would like to recreate the the project as a side scrolling Flash game. This form would allow
the game to rely less on textual information and dialogue and focus more on game mechanics,
along with providing more agency in the form of visible character movement through the
game space, and visible feedback from their actions and exploration of the game space. I
would prototype the interaction mechanic between the player character and NPCs to
determine if it would have a similarly uncomfortable feel, and the artwork would have to
provide the same atmosphere as the current prototype.
36
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