This game begins in a quiet, dark world, filled with suspended toxic sludge and floating trash that filters out the light from above. The player character is an intrepid little explorer who cuts through the floating muck with a shining searchlight right on his forehead and a glowing pack strapped to his back. The goal of the game, stated at the beginning through a radio transmission from the character’s offscreen crew, is to clear all of the sludge with the suction power of the pack.
As the player advances on, the explorer begins to find “shinies,” bright, twinkling treasures that drift across his field of view. Be careful though. If you gather too many shinies you’ll get heavy, and the lamp on your head, powered by movement, will begin to flicker out.
You don’t want to be in the dark for too long. There’s a soft thumping in the distance.
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Enough with the suspense! I’m really excited about this concept. I want it to address pollution in a very roundabout, metaphorical way- the environment is supposed to make you think of the ocean, space, a polluted forest, anything- although I do think it would be cool with some sort of altered gravity. There would be a sort of “dark zone” too, where there is a whole lot of treasure in a very dark space and the player has to decide if they want the treasure or if they want to have the light. I would love for the ominous thumping and for the crew to both remain offscreen so that while there is the illusion of their presence in actuality the player is alone with the character at all times. I am not sure exactly what to have the explorer do with the treasure other than collect it- maybe he has the choice to keep it in his bag until it gets too heavy, drop it, or hand it off down along the lifeline trailing behind him. I would also like to introduce a powerful element of hope in there too, maybe through music, the character’s choices, a surprise ending- I don’t want the player to get stuck in that dark cycle forever!
Also, it would be a real twist to have the character turn on the player if the player refuses to let him gather any treasure at all in an effort to keep the game environment clean. If there were some programmed scenes where he would take over and snatch treasure regardless of what the player did, that would be really interesting. Maybe it’s a bit of a dark look at the environment as well as at the psyche- who knows?
I would love to make the layers of junk by hand- maybe painted, maybe constructed, maybe a bit of both, while the background is digitally painted with as depth as I can give it. A balance between mysterious and warm, magical lighting is something I would also love to play with, both physically and digitally. I also think that some sparkling textures would be really exciting. Here’s a sample below of what it might feel like!
References: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/news/orbital_debris.html
https://www.nrdc.org/stories/ocean-pollution-dirty-facts
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20130114-are-we-naturally-good-or-bad
I have linked a drive below with an animatic and early concepts!
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1aRujwWfWA9eShnZbZP4Gc9zQ0ZBpn2tr?usp=sharing
