Narrative Game 08

This week we pitched our game to the class and gained important feedback on our game thus far. One issue I pointed out during the pitch was the number of scenes our prototype would have - we initially had out shed scene (soley for cutscene), inside mansion and an auction house. I had lost sight that the final outcome after 13 weeks would be a PROTOTYPE and not a fully fledged game.

With this in mind I cut down the number of scenes, game mechanics to implement and the number of cutscenes. It was also pointed out that our story was going back and forth and ended up being confusing to our audience so we went back to the brainstorm and discussed together as a team what areas need tweaking.

Since we hadn't started on making our cutscenes yet it meant we didn't have to scrap work already done for the game. We ended up deciding on implementing the start of Act 2: where Markus is sneaking into the mansion. We then cut out the dramatic reveal scene and decided on Markus getting inside the mansion, going to Ophelia's study and hiding when she and her aide enter. They discuss a land deed and mention Markus's family which makes Markus peer out of his hiding spot and notice Ophelia's necklace - which is when he has the flashback. This flowed better and made more sense.

Now that the story has been tweaked and finalised, I planned the cutscene and what parts would be implemented. The events would go as follows:

• Gameplay outside of ophelia's mansion - player must sneak in

• Player is inside mansion and makes it to study - cutscene plays

• Markus looks around the room and investigates his surroundings, he searches for a hiding place when he hears footsteps approach and hides (inside a wardrobe, behind shelves).

• He hides just as Ophelia and her aide (now named Fred) enter and discuss a land deed of some kind. Zoom to Markus Face as he turns towards them from his hiding spot to get a good look at the people who entered. Pan down Ophelia to her necklace and cut back to Markus's face - his eyes growing wide.

• At this point it would cut to the shed scene, to a young markus watching his house burn down crying and falling to his knees - helpless. At the end of the flashback, cut's back to Markus in the present holding his head in panic and knocks into a shelf. A book falls out and the noise draws the attention of Ophelia and Fred.

• Who slowly and causiously approach the source of the sound, cuts back to Markus holding his breath. While the two get closer, an attendant knocks letting Ophelia know she needs to greet her guests, the two exit the scene with a cut to Markus exhaling a sigh of relief.

I now needed to model two new characters:

• Child version of Markus

• Fred

I began modelling Fred first - as I already had Adult Markus as a base, and was able to complete his model before the end of the workshop: