RAF: “The Damaged”

• Game about a damaged world, with six major cities/areas/rooms, in a medieval setting.
• World is populated by 6 categories of evil (drug addicts, gluttony, alcoholism, violence, greed, laziness, etc) like Shadow of the colossus.
• Each city has a “boss”.
• Some regular people, some “damaged” characters, with a vice/problem.
• Dynamic between these 2 types of people.
• Main character half-god?
• Through exploration, see who you hate the most, begin killing off the damaged people.
• You are an omnipotent-style character. You start killing one type of
• people in this world but the other types take over the space previously occupied by the types you just killed (cannot actually kill them all) you must make a choice: try and fail or join the ranks (needs some expansion/clarification)

The look:

• Creepy characters, rich, dark, grungy atmosphere
• Like some old great civilization that has fallen, now inhabited by useless, broken people.
• Medieval, fantasy, horror theme

Game genre/mechanics?

• First person style game play.
• No levels, just exploration. Medieval GTA
• Not sure about the ending of the game, needs help with the development (ex: what is the motivation to go on the quest?).

STEPHEN: Idea #1 “Ohme”

• Prefers to explore mechanics over sound or storyline. He can do design, does also graphics and programming.
• A side-scrolling game populated with cute, unique characters, doing what they do. Ex: road crew drives around fixing holes. Ex: crazy science dude mixing chemicals and burning holes in the ground.
• Possible forest setting.
• Example: Raccoons! With some industrial guy wanting to kill the forest, you would have this guy going around trying to make things right.
• So, dynamic solutions to puzzles by interacting with the different characters.
• Dialogue: you can pick stuff up and use items, like feed road crewà they follow you around and help you (creative, procedural dynamic stuff, creative problem solving)

Idea #2: “Noir”

• Interested in accessible games: to people with disabilities (difficulty holding a controller, visually impaired)… Using senses other than vision to solve a puzzle game.

Inspiration: Pit

• Wants to extend this into more of a puzzle game; can’t get a sense of the space around you; compact space.
• Somehow you get into a “spot of bother”
• Adventure game, figure out a way to escape…
• Setting could be a detective who is thrown into a basement and has to figure a way out of that space by using his other senses to navigate around and figure out puzzles to get out. Example: he could try and crack a safe by listening to the mechanical ticks of the safe dial to get to the items inside.
• Short game, not many rooms

Things you can do:

• Try to listen to noises…
• Drips of water/puddle to see yourself…
• Can feel along walls…

Idea: Wii controllers—use vibrations for some feedback for example.

He needs good level design, and good sound design!

MAX: “Battleschool”

• Multi-player first person shooter based on the book “Enders game”
• Zero gravity, 2 teams on opposite sides of a cubic room.
• Can’t just get from A to B, have to jump around—movement is important, starting and stopping is tricky.
• Sliding gate to get into the cube.
• Randomly appearing smaller cubes could provide cover.
• players are kids. Shooting someone shoots a (tagging?) beam so when a specific limb of your body gets shot, that limb looses hit-points.
• Limbs are unusable when their respective hit-points reach 0. Not being able to use limbs, like legs, can affect movement or, if arms are affected, aiming.

• To win, eliminate all opposing players or capture the flag-like goal.
• Possible other mechanics like hooks to swing around in 0 gravity and a “golden snitch” mechanic for an alternative method to winning

For next week:

-       If you haven’t yet, post your name, skills, what you’re interested in on the blog in the section “Who We Are”

-       Next meeting, we will be discussing our goals.

-       Concrete teams should be forming now, pre-production finished by the end of the semester, with design document.

Sorry it took a while to get this out.

The most important things that came up during the meeting are in the email I sent to the group; if you did not get it/have a crazy filter and don’t even know it’s lost in a sea of emails (you know who you are),  I will reiterate. Or just copy+paste.

1- We will be having a second Pitch Day next Monday night at 6:00pm (11th floor, same room 11.707):

• This is for anyone who was unable to make it last week, or who just joined.
• There will be no re-pitching of pitches. If you’ve pitched, you’re done!
• On that note, anyone who did pitch an idea, make sure you’ve written up a summary/saved a slide show/whatever for those who were not present last week.

2- There will be a new section on the blog for both a) “who we are” and b) “the answer to your question”:

a) When you have a chance this week, you should add a small blurb about yourself to the “who we are”,
i.e. your name, what you do, what you’re interested in, what program you’re in.

b) If you’ve pitched an idea, or have already been thinking about it, we are trying to get people to post “the answer to your question”.
What does that mean? Well, what question are you answering with your project?
More specifically, what is it you are saying with your project, and what is it a response to?
It would be great if we can get used to explaining our intentions, especially if your group would like to show the end product, or are applying for grants!

**web people, does everyone in the group have permission to edit the blog?

3- The deadline for applying for special projects grant with FASA is this Friday the 12th, at midnight!
I attached the form to this email–if you would like it, feel free to email me–you also have to write up a separate detailed budget and project description.

4- Finally, and most importantly:
Although there were no koalas present, we did get attacked by a bunch of huge birds flying out of the wall, and then got really bored.

———————————————————-

Now for the notes:

After a giant, cheesy round of intros,  we went over the pitches from last week. If you missed them, here is another (really) short summary:

Ramy’s concept:  perspectives

• Think of the tent in Harry Potter 4….

Moh: creepy creatures

• Ugly, obnoxious, but you want to empathise with them
• Surreal, deformed, no blood/obvious horror, but scary in their own right.
• Merging idea with Ramy’s environment

Samir: sound

• Using it as a core element of a game, used to summon objects
• Sound effects created by people
• Mix between Drawn to Life and Scribblenauts (but in 3D)
• User calls in objects, the game recognizes them

Peter: growing a planet

• Create vegetation, flowers, trees, planet grows itself, kind of a sim thing, but take out the chore aspects, more of an experience (sand box)
• Will make a small prototype first
• Sean will write a story/gameplay
• Alexis will work on the programming
• (see emails for more info!)

Brian: interactive game for mobile phones (see emails for more info!)

• Make use of player’s geographical area as a playing ground (multi-pl)
• GPS tracking, marker recognition, augmented reality
• Work with a server application to take care of the tracking of GPS
• GPS tag visible to anyone else within range, can tag them
• Have data, properties associated with them
• See Urbanambush.com

Pedro: 2 ideas

1-small fear of light, controls the basic human function, the body

• control the sphere inside the human body-basic stuff…
• MUST EMAIL/POST HIS PRESENTATION

2-“panel kill” imagine if a bunch of comic books scattered on the floor, jump into each other’s stories

• interact with other characters & their stories/worlds

Nancy: “Tuesday” 4 friends at a bar

• Hardware hacking: use a remote as a breathalyzer
• Wario war-type games to keep it interesting
• Explore 2D flash with live video
• World changes as the alc level goes up
• Applying for a grant!
• Concept of how ppl go into different personas when drinking

Jonathan: 2 ideas

1-zombie game, take drugs to stop from becoming a zombie, otherwise ppl seem tastier

• Playing with ppl’s perception with the game world

2-platforming with fighting, merged!

(Nancy’s stickman zombie stumbling off a platform)

———————————————————-

WHAT WE ARE TRYING TO ACCOMPLISH IN NEXT MEETING:

• What is possible?
• What are the goals for the summer?

———————————————————-

More on scheduling:

Our production cycle is one year.

Winter semester: design document (due April)–how the game will play, sketches, references, tests, etc
N.B.: ONCE DESIGN DOCUMENT IS DONE, IT’S A SHUT CASE

Summer semester: production!

Fall semester: (December) is the end! + drinking!!

Pacing is important!

PITCH DAY NUMBER 2!! Next week.

OUR GOALS:

• Make not only the fun game aspect, but look into things like ex: motion capture
• Are we creating games for festivals & get hired at existing companies, or make our own mark? What does it mean in the market, etc in Post-production. But it might be helpful to ask these questions now… Who are we designing them for? What is it that makes game fun? Wake-up call: what do we want to achieve??
• Tip: only ask the question you need to ask.

–>For this week, answer the question! Put it up on the blog, organized by project.

Miscellaneous info:
-Can maybe use motion capture at a lab at McGill: physics-based animation (talk to Shahin)
-Club members (again) please put down your name, program of study, what you do, and what you’re interested in doing  :)

Mohannad – ART DIRECTION PITCH
- Very washed out, no obvious horror elements, grayscale
- Story Ideas; “Nature’s Evolution”. Humans are parasites feeding off the planet. Nature’s way to fix it is to slowly mutate our DNA to be closer to more valuable creatures/animals. People start developing weird deformations.
- “Consequences”. Wheelchair guy develops joints and bones to deal with his condition
- GAMEPLAY IDEAS: 4D painting that you can go into and live in. Static environment and characters except for minor animation cycles (eyes, water drips, etc.). Like modern warfare 2 ending “the museum”; acting out action scenes in “boxes”. Quiet other players, only bother you if you bother them.

Nancy – Tuesday: a tale of being terrible  http://netownsend.net/ccgd/

Pedro – PANEL KILL/BODY EXPLORATION
- Comic book exploration, like a choose your own adventure book.
- You can mix and match your characters ie: put Calvin and Hobbes into “Watchmen”. Mixing genres make the story more entertaining. Like exploring a comic book, moving panel to panel.
- GAME IDEA2: You are a ball of lights that “fixes” the body, repair dead cells, eliminate disease etc.
- Full 3dimensional space: locate yourself, control the white sphere and learn new movements with it. Collect points to get new abilities. Precise surgical tasks, like sewing arteries.
- Reference: Trauma Center Series, movements like flower.

KODAMA (Japanese for spirit)
- Grow your own planet. One flower into many, many trees, roots combine in the middle area
- Cute little white blog character. A specific happy/cutesy feeling, you are creating your own ecosystem.
- Little due holds a cloud like a kite and walks around to make things grow. Every time you restart, you make a new world.
- THERE ARE NO THREATS

Jonathan
- You are on the verge of becoming a zombie, you must take drugs.

Samir
- Playing with sound

EVERYONE WHO HAD A GAME IDEA, PLEASE POST IT TO THE GROUP!!

Meeting notes for Sunday August 8th general meeting.

-Changes to the game are being applied: The story is being fleshed and along comes things to be worked on: Crowd interaction, monorail systems, ideas of grey and white sky, dead nature, sense of abandonment (personal note: ala GreenPunk maybe?)

-Sahar and Charlotte have started to model the characters and will also do a generic crowd person

-Cassandra made an excellent reference point, we should check out immortel by enki bilal, here are  youtube links: link1 link2

-Samir will be working on water effects using realflow

-Character controls will be finalized, Bump mapping will continue to be worked on.

r.d.

2.
Everybody add everybody on msn or whatever chat program please. This will make it easier to ask quick questions since I, for example, have no life and am always online . This information should be added and retrieved from the google doc: “CART CGD CONTACT LIST”. Make sure everyone has access. Here’s the list cuz i’m so nice:

Scott Philip
email/ google talk: montrealmusic/gmail.com
MSN: scottyp_404/hotmail.com

Nancy Elizabeth Townsend:
email: townsend.e.nancy/gmail.com
MSN: nancy_e_townsend/hotmail.com

Xavier Lapointe:
email: lapointe.xavier/gmail.com

Alexis Morin
email/google Talk : carignan.boy/gmail.com
msn : carignan_boy/hotmail.com

Charlotte Fisher
email: charlotte.a.fisher/gmail.com

Jos
email: zeal.bearer/gmail.com

Mohannad Al-Khatib [Mo]
email: Psycho.Designs/gmail.com

Cassandra Lacombe
email: eternal01/gmail.com
msn: eternal_01/hotmail.com

[redacted]
[redacted]
[redacted]

Sahar Homami
email: s.h1364/gmail.com

Ramy Daghstani
email/gtalk: ramy.daghstani/gmail.com
msn: reality_is_shit/hotmail.com

Sean Braithwaite:
email: brapse/gmail.com

Samir Mesbah
email: sm.shado21/gmail.com

3.
SVN notes, here are the links we talked about:
download tortoiseSVN for win32:
http://downloads.sourceforge.net/tortoisesvn/TortoiseSVN-1.6.3.16613-win32-svn-1.6.3.msi?download
download tortoiseSVN for win64:
http://downloads.sourceforge.net/tortoisesvn/TortoiseSVN-1.6.3.16613-x64-svn-1.6.3.msi?download
download Scplugin for osX (it’s the mac equivalent of tortoiseSVN) :
http://scplugin.tigris.org/files/documents/1368/45964/SCPlugin-0.7.3q-SVN.1.4.6.dmg
instructions on how to install Scplugin:
http://scplugin.tigris.org/servlets/ProjectProcess?pageID=rgnEkt
video on how to use tortoiseSVN (the same applies to SCplugin, they are fairly the same) :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4sUYnEylvU0

Pro tips:

• do not merge binaries (executables)

• do not merge maya scene files (even .ma files)

• do not merge .mesh files

• update before committing

• don’t work on someone else’s stuff unless you are both clear that you are working on it

• commit small, incremental, changes to the server (in case something goes wrong, we don’t have to undo ALL the work previously done)

• comment your commits

the user name and password for the SVN server is: user: cartstudents pass: mongoose
the URL of the SVN server is: http://cartcgd.org/svn2009
we will begin making individual accounts for SVN access, that way you can lock a file (prevent others from working on it)
questions? Ramy.daghstani/gmail.com

4.
Artists should be able to start working on the young girl character with small changes to come (the collar). Everyone has work to do, there’s a prop list to get to and a clock tower to make, attachments to enable on the forum, and new technologies to build:
bumpmapping express: Moh+Ramy,
maya super exporter: Charlotte+Xavier,
water: the populace+Ramy.

5.
Jos is up to date vis a vis to the forums. There is a discrepancy of information on what Adam’s world is. So far nothing has been written down with respect to Adam’s perspective on things. This has to change. There has to be a discussion with some laid down concepts with respect to that. Concept art will then be churned and then the models can be changed. Any action before a common source is written down should not be taken. If you want to get started on what Adam’s world looks like (in more specific terms than “endlessly tall buildings”, it needs to start either in the forum or in an artists meeting.

6.
Since water will be a big deal in the game, we have discussed what can help us build good water effects for the game. Glowing rain is possible, so is snow with very low impact on the game. Uncharted’s water effect wasn’t all that good, that’s why you died when you fell in the water (apparently, I never played it, but JOS DID!). In any case, the effect described sounds like this:
texture bend: cheap and totally realizable with a very simple texture bend for “ripples”. Has no transparency, so when an object moves in the water, the fake reflection will get rippled, but you won’t see the object through the water, because it is not transparent.
Texture transparency: your typical low poly water effect. Flat texture with semi transparent blue “wavy texture applied to it. It’s the typical stuff you see in games like WoW.

The water fountain has different approaches which depend on the level of interaction we intend to have with it, solutions include:
maya fluids / particle solution: may or may not be able to export to Ogre even though there is a particle exporter for OGRE.
baked mesh solution: includes baking a water render and exporting to Ogre and simply keying the vertex animation for it, we can also use RealFlow to create really good water effects, but these have setbacks as they can generate very high poly counts.
Video texture: just a simple texture that has a clip of water sprouting out. Very meh, but very easy on the processor.
A height map solution: this is good for water falls. (note: height maps are also good for mountainous terrain)

7.

Nancy needs help with some Zbrush stuff, maybe  Moh can help, Sahar still needs a working OgreExporter for mac and maya2008, Charlotte needs to get acquainted with a new breed of operating felines, and I need to murder SteveJobs.

All is well. Weee

I understand the need for an artistic director, I understand the importance of the position to the project and to the group, and how it will give some much needed focus to the game and be key to the success there of. And I want to be clear to everyone else that this is no small deal; Whoever is the artistic director will be making go/no-go decisions in an autocratic manner for the rest of the project. Some of us only have enough time to focus on 1 project over the summer and it’s this one, and when I say that I am thinking specifically about everyone who is not doing this for credit, who have a lot less to gain from this even from a potentially successful standpoint. This is why it’s important that the artistic director be able to generate really exciting ideas, so exciting that the rest of the team is excited to follow through and pave the concepts laid out by the artistic director.

Now, the crux of this post is here, so let me be clear: If I was at that meeting, this vote would not have happened. There are some things we can vote on, and there are other things we don’t. Nobody, I say again, NOBODY, is actually qualified to take on a position such as this. There are many risks associated to this project, success isn’t easy and after a month, we don’t have much to show for it in terms of a game. This project is a huge risk that we all share together, and willingly so. For one, there was no real point for me to read the 3 CV/portfolios posted earlier, and if you think about it, it’s ridiculous to even imagine that there would be such a thing involved in the project considering, secondly, that this project was never founded on a qualification basis, simply on a willingness basis.

Time is valuable for all of us and I need someone to put a strong lens and focus the ideas that have been floating around for a month now. Because if you didn’t notice, we don’t even have a game on paper, we have game elements floating around. More than focusing the project even, I need someone to manage and take care of the creative group because I can’t do it alone, I need a focal point for whom I can build this game engine for, and I can’t look after 2 extremely opposite points of production at the same time.

My job, as I see it, it to see to it that this project is successful by creating a game close to CART values and allow everyone involved to learn a significant amount about game production, management (self and/or others), working in a team, etc on the simple basis of “I want to learn X”. Oh, and write a game and game engine for it. When I started this I had this idea of a flat hierarchy with this very simple pipeline of production. That idea got shat on and has quite evidently changed meeting after meeting as different people in the group stepped into different directions. Although these are idealistic construct for a production team, they don’t happen to be realistic ones. But i digress.

Voting on such an important issue based on things that have absolutely nothing to do with what the project is about is all around pointless. I am calling for a no vote, and I am putting my foot down on this. Art direction is too important and I will not allow it to be deliberated on at the expense of success, to vote on irrelevant data that bears no meaning to what this project tries to accomplish: It’s not happening.

I know everyone in CCGD is excited to make a full fledged game, and the prospect of success is an extremely tangible career boost. The value that our collective effort makes is great, and I’m happy for that, but we are all a team and this decision will affect a very core group, one I can’t afford to loose in terms of cohesion. teams like that work like alchemy, and I can’t have that rely on a vote based on irrelevant data that could create scenarios we are not ready to deal with.

Concept Art show and tell:

Little girl – short hair, small barrette holding hair behind ears, orange/red hair, black tunic w/ lace slip, mandarin collar with lace on neck and sleeves, mary jane shoes, high socks, . Headphones,

Woman – (Gloria) Looney-long hair (past but), long black roots with brown hair, sweatshirt with collar cut off, fishnet stockings under flood pants.

Man – (think Edward Norton from fight club) geeky but strong. Suit and tie. Has an office pass around neck, nice sweater vest, watch, dress shoes black. Beige pants, blue plaid tie.

ENVIRONMENT: The City of Gaud

HEART FOUNTAIN (see concept art)

Surrealist style but also composed of pieces from the past. Pieces of temples/churches embedded in the other buildings. ie: swings that have stained glass windows on the bottom.

The city is their ‘minds’. Its messed up (surrealist – they see what they think something should look like)and pieced together of things that used to be important from their past.

Artistic Director Votes – Send email for nominations. Will have poll vote on the forum.

Next meeting: Artists next week. General the week after next. Try to include JOS into artists meeting (set up new doodle).

Jos technical drawings. Comic style – realistically proportioned but “chunky” hair (that can have bones) and stylized faces.

South Park quotation of the day: “Are you sure?” “I’m HIV positive”.

ALEXIS’ NOTES

Finalize character design!

Charlotte drew the little girl.
Cute @ 1st, but mischeavous, skulls on the dress. All in black.

Nancy drew the girl in boys & girls clothing. The man has lots of accoutrements : buttons, happy faces on his tie.

Sean wants more lace. Sekcs.

Nic’s girl wears a tank top & a skirt. Also drew the crack addict. She is old, hairy lip, fat, sandals, shirt w/ “Hot Stuff”.

Sean : The girl walks you to the graveyard. Imagines her as introvert. Likes the idea of short hair.
Crack addict : failure of nature. Shit rots.

Crack addict : ~30s, she sees crazy shit.

Playground is about Dilly Dali-ing. City of Gaud.

Truck is an …. ambulance? tanker truck?

Nick: Shows comics examples. Brings up the ideal of surrealism. Real things get mangled ie: a lamppost vs. a twisted lamppost with veins.
• We enjoy complex toon/cell shading (think afro samurai, prince of Persia – the most recent). This works the best for all three characters.
• Can we, in ogre, get the black outline?

Moh: Wants a stylized reality. Real but something is off. Shows paintings – white and washed out.
• Materials look real, but angles are off, plus cell shaded outline.
• The style itself can have visual meaning, humans into endangered animals. It’s the environment’s way of adapting. We are the parasite and the circle of life is trying to bring us backwards.

Opening scene: The same event witnessed by all three characters. Ie: a truck crashing into a school
• Man: sees truck out of control crashing into school through window
• Child: a truck crashes into her school
• Woman: wandering through the street and CAUSES the truck to go out of control
• ALL: People scream, the sky goes dark suddenly. Even though it is midday.
This game has to end somehow. WRITER’s THOUGHTS?
• Different endings: all die or all take the truck and drive into the sunset.

Note: all these people are dying. City is crumbling all around them. Just try to avoid it, but can’t. Escaping the city = escaping death. Can you? Perhaps…(psst. Take the truck!)

Who would you statutory rape? Male: Kid who plays Jacob in Twilight? Female: Miley Cyrus – Alexis’ choice, minus the accent.

CHARACTER DETAILS:
Man:
• Typical, boring business man. Implied in his intro that something is off about him. Maybe he’s stealing from the company? Maybe he’s suicidal? Never know.
• Vision: everything is washed out white and grey. Certain key things are slightly more colorful.
• Otaku. Plain and pasty. Looks like he hasn’t slept in a while.
• SKILL: Stronger than the other characters. Can move things than the child and woman can’t.

Child:
• Little Girl is “gothic” and listening to headphones. Her entire scene she is listening to music no matter what horror happens. Avoid voice acting, yes!
• Vision: She sees things dark in more extremely colors of, for example, an warm palette of oranges, reds and blacks.
• Remember, she is around 8. So no extreme goth. She wouldn’t be wearing makeup or have dyed hair. Just looking like she is on her way there with dark clothes .
• A little overweight perhaps.
• BELIEVES IN VAMPIRES!
• Sees everything from a ‘looking-up’ perspective.
• SKILL: Tiny. Can get into places that the other characters can’t.

Woman:
• Vision: Multicolored, bright. Overexposed.
• Deterity is off. She trips and wobbles. You can’t control her sometimes.
• Asian junkie around 30 years old. Skinny (gaunt. Messy hair.
• Coke whore makeup perhaps? Over the lines lipstick in a gaudish pink
• SKILL: She’s a thief. Can pick locks and get into places the others can’t/ won’t. Like homes and cabinets.

ARCHITECTURE:
Think GAUDI. Think GIGER. Think Paris metro signs. This world is ‘art-deco’ composed mainly of organic shapes. This implies the city can be in the future, can be Barcelona-esque, can be alien. A see-saw for example will be a twisty curve instead of a straight bench linking the two seats.

Everybody please add their name, email and phone contact information of the google document CART CDG contacts list in google docs.

- New doodle with ‘yes, no or maybe’ for having a creative concept meeting. Must decide style so that artists can move forward. Concept art and examples should be posted to blog and/or forum.
*Can Nancy have access to modify/moderate forum? SHADI? All artists have to share their work to discuss specifics at a separate meeting.

- Programming team is done. All have libraries, just need to get things to start working. We can now have water, video textures for cut scenes are now possible (if pre-rendered – SHOULD be pre-rendered since it is easier).

Organization: start a mailing list for JUST the artists.

Moh shows concept art of wheelchair-fat man in Zbrush. Freaky!

Discussion INTERACTION?:
• Concept is so far very story intensive – like myst. Must develop interaction. Programmers will begin to design puzzle/interaction and the story will be written accordingly.
• We like the concept of scale (really big or really small – not necessarily physical size. Think being a general vs. being a random little foot soldier). Mix of action and puzzles, physical puzzles are of interest.
• Option of Interactive Cinema? No goal, just experience the world. Think Heavy Rain, think flower. Is this a good option?

Discussion: The game – adjusting the theme the address the issue of lack of game dynamics.
- We all like interactive cinema with focus on design and story with ONE really neat and interesting interactive twist.
Thought: Playing the same event, the same game, through the eyes of several different people. As individuals, you can change things. You can, perhaps, work together?
- Something is attacking is world. You never see it. It’s your mind, your world, crumbling.
- Something neat but almost impossible! – - You play the game as several characters and as you change characters, your original actions are recorded and you can watch, as this new character, the actions you have already done. See your deaths!

SINGLE PLAYER CO-OP : play as three characters, all within the same 4 blocks during a disaster, they see each other within each others . They all experience the world differently, they all have different goals: to find family members (parents/loved one), to survive, to save the world, to have fun in your last minutes? They all see a different threat: war, creatures, random breakdown of society within itself?

What is the disaster? Assume it is the apocalypse – the four horsemen. Mid-day, the world darkens, things explode with green fire etc. You have no idea. You’re mind is crumbling.

What is the goal? All three characters have interactions AND they can die at any time.
First person is important to be immersive. But third is needed cause you have to recognize the people later. Chosen 3rd person but with recognizable traits (can look down and see hands and body) AND a small introductory movie.
Three opening sets: School (for kid), Office/Homeless (for man), Starbucks (for woman). Non typical characters.

Joke of the day (South Park): “Do you like fish sticks?” “Yes…” “What are you, a gay fish?”

Gameplay: goal – to survive. Characters can help or hinder. The exact same situations can be solved differently ie: kids can get into smaller spaces (vents), the men is stronger and can push things, woman is both mid strong and mid small (?). Everything will be physical can carry things in hands to use or move one at a time. Puzzle will be solved through moving things, exploring things, avoiding things, breaking things.

Elements that are of use will be subtly highlighted by either sound or slightly lighter color – think Half Life (a creaking see-saw? A pile of bricks? Perhaps I could use them…). You can almost pick up everything. All will have mass stat. Need to break a window? Anything will heavy enough mass will work – note, all characters can handle different mass.
Think of puzzles that happen school, office, street, starbucks…a city. Level design is crucial.