Playtesting

In the early version of our game which has only 1 level, we sent copies to our volunteers to feel the atmosphere and basic movement. The basic movement has slight problems like the dialogue scroll’s trigger box is a little bit bigger than expected.

And the real problem is not about the movement. First is unclear indicators. Because I build our level with free assets, it does not contain certain item showing different layers of the ground. Volunteer like my partner told me she did not understand what the main character was doing. The animation of digging is missing, so I used attack animation to replace it. It made players confused. And this problem can be fixed when the pixel art asset is ready.

Another problem during our first playtest is the lack of goal. I, as a designer, presumed player are familiar with the mining action and goal to find the jewel. But in fact, most of them are not aware of it. I tried to solve this by writing in the scroll by the wall. But only the experienced player will try to read it first. Players like my partner did not even try to read the scroll. And the solution is to put a tutorial at the beginning of the game. Show the goal loud and clear and make sure most player would understand. Also, the item inside the game should remind players to reach the goal. This can be fixed by arts and texts update.

In our final version of Trapped, unfortunately, we do not have sufficient to playtest it in a wide range. We will playtest it during development by ourselves. After submission, we will send copies and try to fix problems.

Experimentation

Metafictional element

In Trapped, we try to show players that the protagonist is trapped inside the mine as well as the game program. And each load player made, can cause a soulless protagonist’s born and death. This concept will only convey to players once they first went through the game. They will know that each load action will have a cost. And they will try to have a new game plus without load even once.

I’m not very sure if the new game plus mode would work as expected like in One Shot. If the levels are too long, the player would get tired of playing for the second time. But if it is too short, the feeling to sympathize protagonist might not raise that high. And it needs more playtesting.

Trapped has 2 endings, one for normal play like Neutral Route in Undertale. And one for a metafictional ending like True Pacifist Route and the Genocide Route. The first ending will trigger when the player ever loads the game. Loading the game in Trapped means a world will be created as no one to control the protagonist. And of course in that world, there is no function like loading, and the protagonist can only wait to die. That is why the bloodstain and skeleton exist – they are all dead protagonists. Game is created to amuse players, but they are hardly aware that character might have feelings and they might not have God’s ability – Save and load to the best ending.

The second ending is triggered when the player does not load even once. First, the protagonist will thank the player for not create more of them just for pleasure. And then he will mock the useless gems. The goal in every game might seem meaningful but to characters, they might be useless. There is no happy ending from gems and collectables. That is an indicator only meaningful to players.

In environmental storytelling, we tried scene change like in Layer of Fear. And a jump scare will be set in the middle of the gameplay. A heavy atmosphere can raise player’s curiosity about the truth. And hopefully, once they know about the truth, they will choose not to let the character suffer again.

In detailed graphic design, I tried bloodstain, crack on the wall, skeleton. Each of these will have its function. Blood can carry messages like letters or words. Skeleton can show how many corpses were left here. A crack on the wall will push the plot forward and a little jump scare.