Narrative Design

Urban Legends: Hoia Baciu Forest
Student Group Project


Credits:
Damian Nicolae Roman - Narrative Design, Producer
Chez Alexander - Gameplay Design
Reece Gardner - Website Design
Josh Craig - Artist
Dylan Kirk - Environment Design

Inspired by media such as Outlast and The Blair Witch Project, the project my team envisioned is a part atmospheric and part visual horror game. This "would be" Hoia Baciu Forest game puts the urban legend of one the world's most haunted forests in the spotlight. Play as detective Pavel Baciu as you're tasked to find a girl who vanished in the Hoia Baciu woods. Discover clues and uncover the mysteries of the forest, if you can survive.

As Narrative Designer, I took care of the plot and created a structure which allowed he team to further develop the project with gameplay ideas and visuals. This gave me the freedom to take inspiration from and promote local Romanian folklore (legends, creatures like werewolves and ghosts), alien sightings, as well as real life events that took place in the Hoia Baciu Forest, such as the disappereance of a girl for 5 years, with no recollection of the events that had happened to her. The flowchart I created presents the narrative structure of the game and the game flow, showcasing the player's freedom of choice and the brutal chances at a truly good ending. All coloured paths have their own narrative arc which showcases the aforementioned elements of folklore, sci-fi and real events through different storytelling approaches (e.g. using visual signs, auditive hints, manipulating the UI).

GDD base game.pdf

Dawn's Requiem: A Coward's Game
Student Group Project


Credits:
Damian Nicolae Roman - Narrative Design and Gameplay Design
Martin Taylor - Artist
Josh Craig - Artist and Gameplay Design
Max Roberts - Sound
Giuseppe Tonon - Producer, Artist


In this Souls-like, run and gun, 2.5D side scrolling platformer-Action RPG, you play as a cowardly prince who finds himself trapped in the future with nightmarish monsters without anyone to help him... At least, no one alive. With a unique cowardice mechanic and a fully customisable loadout, you’ll be able to play as anything from a scared barbarian to a reckless mage.

This project focused entirely on the beginning stages of game creation, game conceptualization. My roles included mainly Narrative Design, but also working on fitting character traits (name, personality, etc.) with gameplay, such as with ability mechanics and their denominations.

As with any narrative concept, the bulk of my work stood in worldbuilding a new universe in which the game would be set, which in turn led to a time travelling Bildungsroman about a cowardly prince who must save the world by visiting the future. The focus of the team and myself was for a perfect blend of storytelling and gameplay, which meant an introduction of an unique mechanic, Cowardice, a stat that would be affected by the player's choices through combat style. Characters in turn would respond differently to the player based on their Cowardice, and the endings of the game would depend mainly on Cowardice as well. Throughout the project, I wrote and developed several characters with unique backstories and personalities who would represent the classes available to the player, a protagonist, many lines of dialogue as well as a tutorial section, three endings, a world map and abilities.

Example of Dialogue Lines

Worldbuilding: A High Fantasy World, Diversum

Personal Project
Damian Nicolae Roman
Alexandru-Luca Barbu
Liam Alexander Nilsson

Created by myself and two of my best friends, Diversum has been a personal passion project ongoing ever since high school. The way it works is quite simple, any three of us can add anything to the world, including using each other's creations, which then has to be approved by the other two. For complete transparency, besides a general introduction to the world, I will present the worldbuilding elements that belong only to me, including world maps, races, magic, religion, culture, wars, etc.


The World Map of Diversum - Most of my Work Focuses on the Central Continent, Votumia

Diversum - Origin and Gods

Diversum was a blank slate planet that was presented as a prize during the Celestial Blade Tournament, a spectale of power between the Gods of the Universe. The eventual winner, Antyr the Aedifex, had a simple goal in mind for the planet: he would create a gigantic Crystal Tower and put it in the centre of the world. Anybody who would climb it, either by force or by wit, would become a Maker, a demigod, and would be granted a single wish. Along with the Tower, Antyr created the firstborn race of Diversum, the Votum, intelligent immortals, fanatics of the Aedifex, who lived to serve and climb. Eventually, other races, such as the Nepheshi, Sunfallen, Dwarves and Dragons would emerge to power, and some of them would climb the tower too. Each Maker's wish proved critical to the world: the Votum lost their immortality, the Nepheshi became free from slavery and a full cycle of nature was introduced, along with it's beauty and dangers.

Immersive yourself into the world of Diversum!
(W.I.P.)

The Votum and the Dwarves

The Votum are the firstborn race of Diversum. Their skin is blue, in the image of Antyr himself, and they have been devoted to their God ever since they first walked the plains of Votumia. Placed by hand next to the Tower, the Votum took advantage of many things, but perhaps the most important is Arcana. The crystals from the Tower had magical attributes and, once some of them began falling into the ground, they created trees, whose "fruit", a smaller crystal, could be harvested and provide the mysterious Arcana to anyone. The Votum became the first mages of the world, draining these smaller crystals of Arcana and casting incredible spells to help them evolve as a civilization. This magic helped builders when constructing the Capital of Ancora and even slavers, who'd use Arcana to force the Nepheshi into submission. There have been many great leaders and tyrants of the Votum: Caesar the Founder, who united all the Votum Houses; Patrokle, the First Tyrant and the Two Kings, Khyree of the Red Drakes and Aguris of the Celestial Sea. The Votum have always had issues with other races, such as Nepheshi or Dragons, due to their superiority complex, but, recently, after the death of the Last Tyrant Kaero, the three races have begun to see eye to eye, and threats bigger than all of them have helped keep relationships intact.

The Dwarves of Fire's Wrath were not always Dwarves. In fact, they were golems, made out of lava rock and magma, brutal but not mindless. Curiosity, this time, did not kill anybody, but, in fact, created a new civilization. The golems saw an increasing amount of Votum parties, out on hunts, and easily managed to capture a few. Instead of killing them, they begged the Votum to let them learn their languague and their ways. In the end, the golems crafted themselves a humanoid body, but, due to lack of skill and rudimentary tools, their perfect bodies ended up smaller than intended. Truly ageless beings, the Dwarves reside in the mountains north of Votumia and have become perhaps the Votum's greatest allies. Not only do they keep a check on the dangers of Fire's Wrath, but they are great mercenaries. The only thing stopping the Dwarves from being a threat is that it takes decades to craft a single new Dwarf, as the three Elder Crafters take their job a little too seriously. The most known Dwarf of all, however, is Harald Bexton, the first Dwarf to leave the mountains and explore the world, becoming a friend and protector of all, who still lingers around, either teaching younglings or attending ambassador business.