House Of Evil
Introduction
For this project, I want to make a level where I focus on 3 pillars of game design, which are player agency, puzzle-solving, and environmental storytelling. A non-linear puzzle mystery game inspired by Detective Conan and the Blue Prince, I decided to make a mansion where the player can explore, solve puzzle and piece together the story at their own pace.
This piece involves primary puzzle design in the gameplay, where I have to work a lot with play testing and experiment with different types of puzzles and how to make them clear yet rewarding for the player to solve. And also balancing the difficulty, clarity, and guides. That is why I also decided to keep the level at an Alpha stage with minimal set dressing so that I can focus on building the puzzles.
5 Weeks/4h a day of development
Unreal
Alpha Stage
Focus area:
Puzzle design & player agency
Project details
Tools & Assets
Blockout tools
Blender
UV light template
Polypizza
free sounds
Trailer
Summary
An old mansion filled with tragedies and forgotten stories hides a treasure beneath its decaying walls. You are a struggling detective who accepts a mysterious commission to uncover the mystery inside. Armed with only an UV light, you must follow the traces by solving the mansion’s puzzles. Your goal is to reveal the truth hidden within before the mansion reveals its own secrets to you.
Content
Level overview
First floor
Second floor
Inspiration
I like to start my projects by thinking:
What type of story I want to make.
How can I translate it into a game?
What haven’t I worked with before?
I decided to go with a mystery puzzle game where i can focus on the puzzle design and the narrative. I began with looking for inspiration from Detective Conan and found an episode I thought could work in a game. Initially I wanted to make this project a lore heavy game, but with the resourses and time I have in my hands I thought it would be better to keep the story as brief as possible to then expand later on during the development.
Iterative work process it’s what made my level develop the most. By receiving feedback from the early stages of the development, I was able to bring my level to life. Since this project emphasizes player agency, I took a inspiration from The Blue Prince giving the player that freedom the moment they step inside the mansion.
Level design process
Problems
After I decided what type of game I wanted to make, I started by doing some sketching of the mansion. I wanted the mansion to not be too big just to keep the scope as low as possible but at the same time feels spacious. Also because I will only have 3-4 puzzles it so having bigger mansion will only create unnecessary rooms and long hallways with no purpose.
I started creating my level blockout by doing a 1-1 recreation from my top-down sketch. I quickly realized the mansion felt too cramped. The player could reach the other side of the mansion in just a few seconds. This could jeopardise any tension and exploration.
The first changes I made other than making the rooms slightly bigger, were to add more hallways. It made a significant positive impact, it felt more spacious while simultaneously encouraging the player to explore more. I also decreased the player’s walking speed to slow down the pace and make the experience feel more realistic.
Solution
But something still felt off while traversing around the mansion. After a few playtests and feedback sessions, I figured what was missing was elevation. After adding some elevation the space felt more dynamic and was more interesting to walk in.
Puzzle Design Breakdown!
The chalice Puzzle:
Objective: Collect 3 Bottles and put them in the correct spot according to where the Uv light revealed.
Location: Bar
The player has to use the UV light and flash it on the counter, revealing 3 different shapes.
To complete this puzzle, the player has to find flask that matches the shapes on the counter. When all the bottles are collected, a secret door will open and reveal the Chalice.
The oval Flask is located in the bar.
The square flask is in the office.
The round flask is in the library
The Knight Puzzle:
Objective: Move the statues to their correct position on the mat.
Location: Living room.
The player has 2 clues to solve this puzzle.
by flashing UV light on the statues.
By looking at the chessboard. Then the player finishes the puzzle by pushing the statues to the correct position.
The King Puzzle:
Objective: Collect 2 crows and put them on the shelf, then rotate them to their correct position.
Location: Library
One crow can be found in the same room in the drawer, and one can be found in the library.
The Bedroom Key puzzle:
Objective: Turn the clock hands to the correct position.
Location: Exhibition
Align the statue of a man with a stick to the correct place to reveal the clock hand position using the UV light.
Full playthrough
More in-depth showcase on how the puzzles work together with the level. I tried to imitate how the play testers usually behave during their playtesting.
Click to read! →
Guiding the player
UV Light
I wanted to encourage and reward the player for exploring the mansion. This made me land on the UV-light as a main mechanic. Using the UV-light allowed me to merge environmental storytelling and gameplay seamlessly while also acting as a diegetic UI-element that indicates interactable objects.
To use the Uv light as a guidance, I made blood trail act as a breadcrumb guiding the players to different parts of the mansion.
I used finger and hand prints as a Signifier and deictic element to show the player what object are pickable and interactble.
Notes and recorder
Taking inspiration from Blue Prince, I decided to script a simple system to helop with onboarding the narrative of the game. Scattering notes around the mansion for to player to slowly but effectively reveal the lore of the mansion.
Narrative and Gameplay
Other than using the to blood trails and fingerprints. I also placed foot prints as a hint for the player that there is a puzzle infront of them. To communicate this even more clearly. I used story element to support my gameplay. I wrote a testament and and highlighter the word “footprint” some players understood the hint without even reading the testament
Reflections
If I had the opportunity to redesign this piece in another way, then I would approach the puzzle design differently compared to previous ideas. I also spent a lot of time trying my best to make the story and the puzzle as close to my inspiration as possible, but that simply didn't work that well, so I had to stray away from the source either way.
If I had more time, I would have wanted to create and expand the size of the mansion and have more scripted events along the way. Most importantly there is things that I could’ve done better with guiding the player. I should’ve placed more obvious hints with more blood trails, fingerprint to guide the players eyes towards a specific point. I also spent more time than I should on brainstorming the narrative design and the game design overall when I should’ve put more time polishing the level itself.
Still I think this project can act as a good prototype to showcase a game idea, if I could make this into an actual game I would add more story element to it because it was initially supposed to be a lore heavy experience.