(1) New Message Post Mortem

Have you ever been in love? Was it a mistake?

Roles: Narrative Designer/Writer, Artist, Programmer

Made for: Wordplay 2020

Game Description:

Have you ever been in love? Did it work out? Was the person good to you? Because not everyone will be.

(1) New Message is a text based narrative adventure between the player and their partner. Follow the course of their relationship from beginning to end, making decisions to determine how this relationship develops. The game features a branching narrative path with multiple endings based on these decisions.

TL;DR - Highlights

• Commissioned by the Handeye Society to make a game for Wordplay 2020 under the theme 'Empty Words'
• Conceptualized and pitched a decision-based game told through text messages about an unhealthy relationship
• Fleshed out and wrote (1) New Message while juggling school and self-managing
• Did the art myself, gathered play testers and tested myself
• Result available free on itch.io

Post Mortem

Making the Game

The Hand Eye Society is a Toronto not-for-profit dedicated to supporting and showcasing videogames made primarily as a form of creative expression. They have an annual event called wordplay, which showcases games and talks centered around narrative games. In 2020, they decided to commission three designers to make games for Wordplay based around the themes 'Empty Words'. I was chosen as one of those three.

I started by pitching my game idea - a decision based branching narrative following the course of a relationship as it becomes less and less healthy. The player's decisions will determine whether or not they remain in this toxic relationship. The more they cater to the needs of their partner while neglecting their own, the more dependent the player becomes on their partner, and the harder it becomes to leave the relationship.

Once the idea had been approved, I did some research on manipulative and toxic behavior. It was extremely important to me that I take this issue seriously and portray it accurately, so as not to make light of such a serious topic. With this information in mind, I plotted out the story beats, considering where to input different choices and the effect that they would have. I only had two months to make this entire game, so I kept it as simple as I could while keeping the focus on the narrative. Because of this, I chose to make the game using twine, with the story being told through text messages.

After getting some help from a friend to learn how to code the text message formatting into the game, I began making the story in twine. I was still a student while working on this project, and was working on my capstone project as well, and so I chipped away at this project gradually.

When the story was done, I made a few images to use as the player's partner's icons in the game. I also toyed a bit with the aesthetic design and colour scheme until I found one I was happy with.

Once everything was done, I playtested with a few close friends. They helped to point out typos and bugs that I had missed, which I was then able to fix. They also critiqued my colour scheme, as was difficult for some of them to read, and I was able to adjust that was well.

Finally, I submitted the finished product to the Hand Eye Society and uploaded it onto my itch.io page, where it can be played for free.

What Worked

My biggest pride in this project was that I took a serious topic, did the research required to handle it properly, and produced what I feel is an accurate narrative around it. Some of the scenes I was most worried to write, as I feared it might come across as played up or insensitive, were the ones which got the best responses.

I'm also so glad that I wasn't afraid to ask for help. There were quite a few things that I didn't know how to do going into this project, such as how to code the game to look like text messages. I reached out to a friend with more twine experience, and he was able to share some resources and help me out when I had more specific questions.

What Didn't Work

As I mentioned, I was in school working on my capstone project while I was working on this game. It was draining on me at times to juggle classes, working on my capstone project, major assignments, and working on this game. Some days, I simply didn't have the time or energy to work on this. As a result, my last few days of working on this got fairly busy, though I only had to 'crunch' for one night, thanks to my foresight to scope the game realistically. I didn't have to make any cuts, either.

The Results

Ultimately, I'm super proud of myself for making this game. I nearly didn't even apply for the commission, since I knew a few other extremely talented people who were applying and figured I didn't stand a chance, but I decided at the last second that it was worth at least trying, and I rushed to apply. I'm so glad that I did, as it resulted in me pushing myself to tell a very different story from the ones I'm used to, and picking up new and helpful skills along the way. Not to mention, I got a pretty cool game out of it.