Introduction
Monstre was made by 3 Game Designers and 3 Game Artists in Rubika Supinfogame in Valenciennes, France.
This game is a Procedural Interactive Fiction, with the objective to make a functional mobile game for a Playstore release. In the group, my role was System Designer, Game Designer and UX Designer.
The project took place during the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic.
(Monster behaviours in card form)
Purpose of the game
Monstre take place in a 1920s post-war Paris. The player embodies a monster in a world mainly dominated by scientific ideas and a rational mindset. The monster is the only one of his species, so he has to integrate human society or destruct it. Having no means of speaking, the monster communicates using its behaviour.
The game purpose is to make your own story by being accepted or hated by communities. The player can do a massacre too, so the game has many endings. However, the dialog and character diversity of the game give to the player a new story each time they start a new game.
Game Presentation
The player has many monster behaviours in card form, that they need to select one to continue the dialog. The played behaviour is interpreted differently by the interlocutor and according to the situation. At the beginning, the player doesn’t have every behaviour, but they can learn other behaviours later in the game.
The interlocutors belong to communities, and they have influence over them. So, the behaviour interpretation influences the community’s vision about the monster. Moreover, some communities do not appreciate each other, therefore their influences evolve in opposite ways.
Each character has a dialog set, and at the dialog’s beginning, it is chosen at procedurally depending to the community’s point of view compared to the monster.
Roles within the Project
During this project, I participated in designing the game and its systems, how the different mechanics works together, how they coexist and what repercussions they have on each other. I also wrote the GDD (Game Design Document) in Wiki form and worked on the UX (User Experience) of the game.
Conclusion
UX Design
This project was the first project where I really had to consider the UX and adapt it for smartphone specifically. The beginning was not easy, and I have not obtained a satisfactory result. After all, I have learned a lot about UX with this project.
Game Design and UX Design
The interlocutor’s community and links between communities are obscure or hidden. We have made the choice to hide information in the background to keep the player immersed. However, there was insufficient time to find an effective solution to keep a balance between immersion and clear information.
Game Design
Working for a smartphone release permitted me to design otherwise. That forced me to consider external parameters, conditions of play, game time etc…
System Design
The game doesn’t have a complex system, so they were not difficult to coordinate. All its mechanics have is place and exchanged information between them.
(Dialog Screen)