Sea Creeps Design Doc
Summary:
This is a show case for a short game I made for Dread XP's Dredge the Depths Game jam. It was made over 7 days using RPG Maker MV as the engine. I am the sole developer and handled all of the art, game design and writing. The game is a short horror game about a soviet era research team being terrorized by grotesque sea monsters. The tone however is very light due to my short deadline I opted to make the characters humorous to try and make them likeable for the brief amount of time you see them.
Characters:
Ivan
Ivan serves as the player character and is a skilled naval diver. He is a very quiet man and the newest member of the research team. He is responsible for the teams under water explorations. As it is his job to explore the darkest depths of the remote arctic he is a fitting protagonist for this horror game.
Sgt. Miroslav
Miroslav is the acting superior officer for the outpost. In the he game he is frustrated, sleep deprived, paranoid and scared. He feels this way because he's scared he won't be able to complete his orders not because of the monsters in the water.
Bogdan
Bogdan is a man of few words he serves as the outposts doctor and chef. It was cut for time but he originally was intended to be a quest giver for the player. He would request ingredients and fish in exchange for warm meals that would help restore the players sanity.
Yuri
Yuri is a comic relief character whose only job description was communications. He is very mischievous and playful compared to his counter parts. Though there it was cut for time he was intended to be very superstitious and begin escalating the fear in the game.
Randy
Randy is an American spy from Texas who has infiltrated the outpost. He has been able to remain hidden because of how likeable he is.
Gameplay:
The game starts with the player arriving to the base and meeting the crew they are then instructed to go and retrieve probes and survey sight at different locations on the map. The player can interact with objects to read Ivan respond or describe them.
The Map :
Once the player leaves a location they are taken to a map screen where they can decide where they want to go next. The original design was to have multiple points of interest that would cause text and images to appear on screen fleshing out the story. The map is a Skeuomorphism digital map. Mechanically this was a way to show where the player was travelling to. To give it a little personality Ivan has decorated it with a soviet military issued Hula Girl and left cigarettes on the dash.
Dives:
The dives were an exercise in atmosphere. In the first dive the player walks from a populated coral forest to a dead zone where they eventually end up at a giant monolith inside a trench. In the second Dive shadowy figures begin watching the player as they return to the sub marine. Nothing happens to the player in either dive but the backgrounds change and it helps cultivate a sense of dread.
Monster Design:
The monster was designed to resemble a crustacean and less of a traditional fish man monster. I wanted it to look like something from the bottom of the ocean that had been pulled to the surface far to quickly. The Sea Creep suffers from being one of the last things I made as the deadline closed in. Originally it was intended to be a minion of a larger sea monster that the player would be sacrificed too.
Packaging:
This is a mock up of a physical copy of the game with a mini poster.
Download Here:
