The Rescue Mission Postmortem

Introduction

The Project is to make an Interactive Fiction Game that tells an original story that set in an original fictional world. I constructed an alter version of Earth with fictional cultures and civilizations and wrote the story of the game based on it. My goal is to make an interactive fiction game that fits in the tactical military simulation genre. It is a tactical shooter game that provides a visual and tell its story through words and player control the character through choosing options the game provided to them.

What went right

I think I started with a successful world building for the stage where the story set in. I used imagination to illustrate two countries that has their unique cultures and combine them with real world examples like government structures to create a fictional history between them.

Due to the setting of the game, I did many research on real world military strategies and equipment that special forces and police forces would used in a similar situation that occur in the story of the game. I believe the research helped me to improve the immersion level of the game, so the players could feel like a professional while playing the game.  

Instead of making my game and describe every part of it like a traditional FPS game where players have the control to every movements of the character. I decided to provide the players strategic choices that would lead the character to a certain situation where they will act appropriately based on their settings (Jobs, skills, and experiences). I think I find a fine balance between a FPS game (which has a faster pace and stronger visual effects) and a word game where everything is described through words.

What went wrong

At the beginning stage of the game’s development. I was planning to use data storing system that would keep track on the characters’ equipment. So the player could have a more well-around control to the character and would more freedom on the management of the gadgets they have. That feature would help to increase the immersion of the game, but unfortunately, I wasn’t able to build this system and have to compromise during the process.

During the development of the game I was heavily relied on the knot function, which divided the story into different stages/sections. However, it makes the story script of the game very long and complex and gave me troubles to keep on track on the content of the script. There are few occasions where I connected the choices to a wrong knot and that breaks the logic of the story and decisions that players made.

Last, some choices weren’t so clear in terms of providing hint of the results they lead to. During the playtest, players often ends up in a situation that they weren’t expect although they pick the options that they think would lead them to a different place.

Reflection

Overall, I think the project is a good introduction for me to interactive fiction game and world building. I specially enjoy the process of building a world and write the story based on my imagination. However, the game itself still needs many improvements. For the problem of how options with unclear results I mentioned above, it is possible for me to improve it by adding dialogues from the main characters and the supporting characters to act as a hint for the result of those options. It also would give me the opportunity for character building in the game and make the game more immersive. I also learn it is important to do multiple play tests to find out the bugs and problems in the game.