Game Design Document

Game Design Document for [Haven’t decided the name of the game yet]

Essential Experience

“My idea is to have a game based solely around the experience of exploring the wilderness at night. Going off course is all part of the experience, find new plant/wildlife to discover, new locations or landmarks, and then map down your experience before heading off to a new location.”

Core Gameplay Experiences

Gameplay loops

Gameplay loops inputted by other members of the course that were chosen as they fit the basic motivations and outcomes for the player and the gameplay experience.

Storyboard for Main Gameplay Experience

Specialist Foci

Environment Design

The look of the environments in the game has a basic, geometric appeal to them, whilst also implementing a level of complexity to its rendering output and hidden details. Early sketches of the design for the game’s aesthetic involved looking a lot at different ways to show the natural environment that you would want to go through on an expedition of any sorts. Studies of different plant life in different states was necessary for figuring out how the game would look in its entirety.

The plan is to also implement hidden areas in the locations full of abstract scenery and plant/wildlife, the idea is that they aren’t visible to the outside world and can only be found when wondering alone.

3D Modelling

The focus of the modelling process is to limit subdivisions where possible but to output as much detail as possible. These examples may even have a lot of subdivisions but the look of the objects seem very polygon and plastic-like.

Concept Art

Most of the concept design came from the initial storyboard, all the other drawings would have stemmed from that first stage and escalated whilst keeping the same aesthetic all the way.

Game Overview

UIX

The User Interface for the game is meant to look minimalistic to give more priority to the look of the environment. The field of view is also set to a wide angle to allow more of the surroundings to be visible to the player. Alterations to the FOV will be possible to allow for desirable distances from the player in the centre and to bring smaller focuses on the screen, closer to the display.

Gameplay ratings and Intended Audience

This game is set to E for Everyone on the ESRB rating, the reasoning for this comes from the fact that the game is set to be a relaxing game more for it’s scenic environment with moderate interaction that includes walking, going through menus and interacting with the plant/wildlife in the game.
The intended audience is also aimed at everyone for the aforementioned reasons, no violence whatsoever, as well as the use of vibrant, saturated colours for the visual experience.

Gameplay Features

There won’t be too many features for the actual gameplay experience developed as the main focus is the experience itself. There will be some interactions you can make with the character and the elements around you, but it will mostly be limited with the extra menu options as well.

Controls

The game will mainly play with Mouse & Keyboard, since there aren’t too many controls to the game, controllers could also be used to map the commands to its buttons for use of that as well.

Map Interface

Opening the map you find more noted aspects to look at on your expeditions:
The map updates based on where you have been, it also shows areas you have seen from afar but smaller landmarks don’t get added until you go there
The route is already displayed with a marked line but this doesn’t mean you have to stick to it, the game gives you the freedom of all the space around it

Observational Notes/Sketches Interface

Opening the Notes/Sketch book lets you record information and a sketch of the wild/plantlife you find in the game:
Clicking on an item of focus in this menu fills the 2 pages in the book on everything about the thing you find (Name, Description etc.)
Different notebooks are used for every expedition but you can choose to look through an older book if necessary.

Character Design

Various references from my storyboard, as well as a basic chart for explaining customization of body type for player choice

Initially the design was sketched from scratch for the storyboard, the design was stuck with to help with simplicity.

With the basic idea of what the character will look like, here is the character sheet of the character on their own with various different items they will have on their person in the game.

The design was kept simple to help me in allocating more time to the proper development of the game assets. The game will be a 3rd person 3D game so the character will have to at least have some redeeming qualities to the player.

Poster design with the character to show the finished look of the final outcome

Marketing Material

Logo Design

As of writing this, the game doesn’t have a name yet, so the design of the logo is purely based on the aesthetic of the game.

The way the logo is designed, is to have a design ethic similar to how Scouts badges are designed: Imagery of the activity, simple design as if it were stitched, either a square or circle shape.

In this final iteration, all the main design aspects are in this design for the badge logo. The sign is a clear indication of the type of activity the player will undertake, the boot shows that you will be apart of this experience, the moon shows that the game will be set in the dark, and the tree and grass are to show what kind of environment you will be traversing through.