Welcome to Empty Road

Project Breakdown

Welcome to Empty Road was the Twine prototype which Blind Spot was built from. It is a horror interactive fiction short piece where the player plays as Emily, a girl who has to retrieve her missing brother in a post-apocalyptic setting. It features simple resource management and puzzles, three different endings, as well as sound design and illustrative images.

The project was proposed as an academic activity during my Digital Games degree and is available solely in Brazilian Portuguese.

Check it out! (PT-BR)

Team

In this project, I was mainly responsible for game design, writing and producing. Being an academic project, I also counted with a programmer (Gabriel Teixeira) and an artist (Eduardo Pereira) for this project. The good nature and organization of this small team garanteed an easy-going project that achieved its proposed goals of laying the narrative path for a 3D demo.

Project Goals

The academic goals behind this project was to make a quick prototype that was capable of reporting any unforseen problems with the proposed narrative before jumping head-first into developing a 3D demo. We were also able to test Twine's capabilities as an engine for interactive fiction and easily try ideas on the actual gameplay through text.

Responsabilities:

Create design documentation
Design and balance resource management, puzzles and different endings
Writing characters, dialogues and narrative

Propose solutions to unforseen engine and skill constraints
Develop a solid narrative in a short deadline
Develop characters' personalities and backstories
Provide support to other team members

Characters

Developing Welcome to Empty Road also included a lot of behind the scenes work into character development and worldbuilding. I wanted to make sure all characters were consistent and recognizable during their appearances.

Emily: a 15 year-old adventurous and curious girl. Her skills with tools are far better than her strenght in combat, leading her to find creative solutions instead of confronting enemies. Emily is fascinated by maps and geography, and knows various cities layouts really well.

Jake: a 19 year-old strong and caring boy. His top priority is always his sister Emily's safety. He is good at handling guns and will frequently go out on expeditions to find resources for their survival.

Creatures: animals infected by a mysterious disease spread through biting. They are slowly consumed by a black fluid that covers their entire bodies. They become aggressive and unpredictable in just a few days after being bitten. Bitten humans will remain with their original bodies, but their eyes become black and just as insane as the animals. Symptoms include constantly hearing a maddening song.

Some characters would never appear on the actual text-based fiction or on the 3D demo, but were developed for a full narrative with side quests and more scenarios.

Sophia: a clever girl that may appear more innocent than she really is. She lives by the road with her dog Daisy and an old man, Ralph. No one knows how or if she is related to him at all, but they seem to care for each other.

Ralph: a war veteran, too old to fight anything these days. He is slow and doesn't appreciate visitors to his road-side property.

Daisy: a mixed breed dog, gifted to Sophia by her parents. She used to have useful ears and nose, but these days she seems to prefer hanging out in the balcony and bark at anything that comes near the house.

Jenny: easily frightened, she is incapable of fully trusting anyone and prefers to live by herself in the roads. She is like a ghost and will run and hide if she sees anyone or anything. Laying low is her survival strategy. If she ever asks for help, it really is her last hope.

Vultures: road militia of dangerous criminals. They will rob survivors of their gas and ammo. They haven't been seen in a while, though copycats will try to get away with it often.

Resource Management

I wanted Welcome to Empty Roads to be more than just mindlessly making choices. For this, I designed resource management based on the player's use of ammo and gas, as well as how they guided Jake through using his ammo. Exploration and clever thinking is rewarded with resources, while carelessness and impatience is punished with wasting it.

Puzzle

Looking for a text-based solution to a puzzle, without beng too heavy on programming, I came up with a lockpicking puzzle based on degrees and noise. By making it so the player is helping another character through a walkie-talkie, they rely solely on their description of what they see and hear, which created an interesting experience.

Endings

When creating various endings for Welcome to Empty Roads, I wanted to make sure they felt like a reward for the player's clever solutions and good resource management, or a punishment for their carelessness. I also didn't want a black and white "good" and "bad" ending; "bad" endings should feel bittersweet.

New Horizons: both the player and their brother escape the city safely.

Conditions:

(1) The player has gas and ammo, but their brother has no ammo. The player shoots the creature. OR

(2) The player has ammo, but no gas. The player shoots the creature through the window. OR

(3) The player has gas and their brother has ammo.

Cruel Destiny: both the player and their brother escape the city, but the player is bitten.

Conditions:

(1) The player has no gas, but their brother has ammo. The player screams through the window. OR

(2) he player has no gas, but has a crowbar. The player screams through the window.

Evacuation: the player escapes the city, but their brother is left behind.

Conditions:

(1) Neither the player nor their brother have ammo. The player escapes when their brother is attacked.

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