BA7 - Theory

I haven't discussed my initial ideas for this project, much of my thought process or discussed my written reflective journal entries. So, now i shall! I'll talk more in-depth about my research for my game idea as well as include selected scans from my journal.  I also have a name for this game idea, i'm still not sure of it bur for now its called 'My Tale: Rose'.

When coming up with 'My Tale: Rose', i had been playing the 'Year Walk' and the 'Rule of Rose' which heavily influenced and inspired me.  The setting, ambiance created and visuals from the 'Year Walk' is what i want to capture in 'My Tale: Rose', as well as having an interesting UI system to navigate the location.  The ambiance, game mechanics and story in the 'Rule of Rose' is very deep and symbolic, the kind of games i love and i want to create a similar deep and creepy game.

I knew i wanted something deep and controversial like the 'Rule of Rose', set and based on something real like the 'Year Walk'.  My very first idea was to have someone that died to find out who they were and how they died; having the player take the journey with the main character to uncover the story.  So, i then went off and did some research on Egyptian Mythology, which has now formed the basis of 'My Tale: Rose' and world setting.

More information can be found here about Egyptian Mythology on the afterlife.

I wanted to use the Egyptians views on the afterlife as the structure of 'My Tale: Rose' where a soul has to pass a trail set by the Gods in order to move  on to the afterlife.  When reading about the soul having to have a physical identity by means of preserving the body an idea came to me - what if the main character died with their body being mutilated, so their soul didn't have an identity.  You went through the game as a shadow trying to figure out who you were/are, how you died and claim back your identity.  Here is a first initial sketch of this idea.  It was scrapped later on as i thought it would be too complicated.








In order to structure the the game, i wanted to also ground that on something real and have it in chapters/be episodic like in the 'Rule of Rose'; having the game episodic breaks up the flow game for the player, detaching the players experience from reality.  I was heavily inspired in the 'Rule of Rose' by the use of the stories, their illustrations, the meaning of the content of the stories and the objective for the player to find all the missing story book pages in order to progress through the game.  In 'My Tale: Rose', there will also be story books with stories where you have to collect the missing pages in order to progress.  The books structure and game structure is based around the 5 stages of loss and grief.  More information can be found here.

I then went and structured out the game (on the right).  Each stage of loss and grief is a story which is set in a location.  Ideas of the story titles and set locations are on the right.













And here is an example of one of the stories that is still being worked on:

I then went to look into different murder cases to possibly find something to add to the story.  At this point, i did decide that the main character would be a young girl called Rose, who had a best friend who was a toy Rabbit that would follow and help her in the game.  Looking up these different murder cases was pretty morbid, but i think it added some depth to the game idea.

I then went on to came up and finalize the game structure (left) as well as a possible ending and a sort of 'symbolism-inception' (right):

To add character to Rose, i thought about what made mine and others childhood.  Things like certain sweets, certain toys, family traditions etc. and then coming up with a list for what makes Rose's childhood:

I then decided on the platform 'My Tale: Rose' would be on (iPad iOS) and some possible mechanics to be used on the iPad.  On the left, i compare and contrast pros and cons of having the game on PC and iOS.  On the right, I think of possible mechanics to use on the iPad.