Back in the heart of Monster Island
After a few month break, I return once more to Monster Heart
I took a few months off after releasing two games in a row last year, mostly to clear my head but also to work on some novels (and finish editing one for publication…Glass House, a haunted house/cosmic horror novel coming out from Underland Press later this year). Now that I have most of that stuff done, I’m able to return to the video game with renewed vigor, and with a fresh eye at everything I’ve done so far.
I’m glad I took some time away to recalibrate, coming back in I was able to spot some issues and lower the scope of the main world map. I was also able to streamline a lot of the design of the island, making it simpler for players (and making it harder to get lost). I want this island to have a good sense of place in the player’s mind, to feel like somewhere they’ve actually visited in real life when they’re done.
Some of my favorite games still stay resident in my mind, and the memory of playing them feel like the memory of real places. The first Zelda game, for example. Or, Ultima:Exodus for the NES…or Solstice for the NES. All of these games had a very specific sense of place, that triggered the memory recall in some way, where, when I remember it later, I felt a sense of nostalgia for them. I feel like I captured this same feeling with my first game, Emberglass. Whenever I return to it, I feel like I’m returning to some place I’d visited long ago, it triggers that same memory sensation, somehow.
There is an art to designing maps like that. I think one of the key ways to do this is in a room by room approach. Somehow, I think this makes the details stand out more in your mind, it feels like it’s more real, in a way. I’m not going to use this approach for Monster Heart, which means I’m going to have to use other techniques to make this feel like a real place, a place that makes you feel nostalgic for it. Maybe even as you play it for the first time, you feel like you’ve been there before.
There is something magical to that. I was thinking about how, some days, where you go on vacation, let’s say, to a place you’ve never been to before. And you spend maybe a day or two or a week there, and it feels like your home rather quickly. You acclimate to it, build memories inside of it. When you leave it feels like a dream of a memory, yet it stays with you, changed.
I want Monster Heart to have this feeling. One of the techniques I’m using is basing it on places I’ve been, on memories of my own childhood, teenage years, and early twenty somethings. Those times in my life when I travelled a lot, and would spend only a day or two in some place, and yet it would stick to me.
Another technique is to base it on places I’ve dreamt about. I have a dream house and a dream amusement park I keep returning to. They don’t exist in real life, and yet, in my dreams they are very real, and I keep coming back to them across various nights throughout my life.
Anyway, it feels good to be back in and working on this game. I’ve missed it, and it’s like coming home yet again. I’ll probably have another newsletter next week in this digital devlog, the next one talking about the conversation engine I’m building for the game, and how the story is going to work, using grouped storylets and delayed choice results. It’s going to be really cool stuff, adding replayability into a very story heavy game.
Until next time, happy gaming!