An underwater hide-and-seek game with a mystery at the end. Developed at the 2013 Centre for Digital Media Alumni Hack-a-thon.
Role: Writer and narrative designer
Read the game’s script.
September 2013
What I Changed?
What I Learned
This was my first game production crunch and, perhaps necessarily bluntly, I learned how those situations affect the core vision of the game and often its narrative as well, and it taught me some techniques to avoid crunch in the future–namely, that we can create less initially and then expand scope as features are implemented. By overscoping the level design and narrative (and the art and code, too), I learned how to avoid that mistake in the future.
The whole team also learned a lot about managing expectations under pressure and the importance of recognizing and respecting passion while still applying it into scope. It showed all members of the team the importance of Scrum best practices and specific Agile tools that could help take the overall collaborative principle we all shared and apply it even in difficult situations. In many ways, this project was the best possible introduction to the Centre for Digital Media program.
Finally, Into the Sea was my first experience telling stories with sound–something I have become increasingly passionate about since. Due to necessity, I filled in as a sound designer for the team and was able to use key sound effects to create a sense of depth and mystery, especially at the end of the game where conveying the correct atmosphere was essential.