Submissions by aidan.fox6298 tagged atmosphere

In Restoration you take on the role of one of Mother Nature's servants, a mountain giant (mountain in physical appearance and size) and it is your duty since birth to restore the land and clean up after the battles between humans.

As the game progresses, humans start more wars simultaneously and technology advances, therefore destroying the land at a much faster pace. As much as it may infuriate you to watch your world perish at the hands of humankind, you must remain a passive entity and wait for them to eliminate their own population and simply repair the land they destroy.

As a servant of nature, you will cease to live if the greenery is destroyed, therefore resulting in a game over screen if the player fails to repair the world fast enough.

Obstacles:

  • Mountains – you might represent a mountain in appearance, however you aren't the most agile giant, and therefore mountains are the standard immovable obstacle of which the player must navigate around instead of over or through.
  • Bodies of water – although you are mountainous in scale, you cannot pass through large bodies of water in a single step, and therefore passing through a lake will lower your movement speed.
  • Volcanoes – similar to bodies of water, your movement slow is decreased even further, and some of the trees on your back, grown for the purpose of restoration, will get burnt by the lava – it is recommended for the player to avoid volcanoes unless very necessary.
  • Radiated zones – once the game progresses to the stage of nuclear war, some areas will be left uninhabitable and therefore unable to support flora and fauna – these areas will take a certain amount of time become inhabitable again, but until then represent a hindrance.

End game: The human race eventually wipe themselves out removing the greatest source of damage to nature, or the human race starts another cycle, beginning from natural resources and less feuds.

Intended for either mainstream platforms or mobile devices


Reference video:

TheMountainKing from Brandon Wu on Vimeo.

Inspired by the story of Lonesome George. George passed away in 2012 and in his last few years was known as the rarest creature in the world, he was believed to be the last of a subspecies of Galápagos tortoise.

In SHELL, the player will take control of the last living tortoise and navigate through a vast range of random environments committing to an adventure to find another tortoise (spoilers: there aren't any others). Similar aesthetic to Journey (PS3), Shelter (PC) and Ori and the Blind Forest (PC/Xbox One), pleasant colour palettes and seemingly simple character design contrasted by powerful, atmospheric environments.

Purpose:

Immerse the player into a visual experience ranging from the spirit of adventure to eternal solitude. Upon the way varying dangers will present themselves, from dangerous terrain (mudslides, quicksand, precarious rock formations) to aggressive predators. As the player you can do two things, direct movement (turn and "sprint") and hide in your shell. Along the way the tortoise will occasionally stumble upon strange formations that represent the silhouette of a tortoise, when this happens the player controls will be temporarily disabled and cause the tortoise to interact with the objects.

Mechanics:

  • Constant slow movement pace, although player can temporarily increase speed by "sprinting" (which is a slightly faster walking pace) and can alter the moving direction.
  • In regards to hiding in your shell, the tortoise can protect itself from certain danger, but in turn is restricted by a close barrier of fog to represent the tortoise's vision, however ripples representing noise can appear in the fog - implying danger still lurks nearby.
  • Presented as a glorified walking simulator with some interaction, as it is primarily meant as a visual experience – main game inspiration being Journey.

Features:

  • 3rd Person "walking simulator"
  • Immersive and elegant art style
  • Dynamic soundtrack, switching between adventure and danger.
  • Customisable tortoise name
  • Potential for procedural generation
  • Raise awareness for animal conservation
Intended for PC, Xbox One and Play Station 4.

Main inspirations: Journey, Shelter, Shelter 2 and Ori and the Blind Forest.


Reference Image: "Tortoise Mountain" by Tami Wicinas