Intro
Netease 2021 MiniGame
Theme: "Drama"
Genre: 2D interactive narrative game
Engine: Unity
Date: 2021.10
My Role: Game Designer, Programmer
Game Concept
An aging Kunqu ( a type of traditional Chinese opera) actress suffers from Alzheimer's disease and is confined to a wheelchair. She happens to hear a recording of her youthful debut and enters that memory of the stage, the spotlight and love story.
In the game, the actress' dance allows the lighting to change. The different lights around her can interact with the props on stage to advance the drama in memory. We present the story based on Emotinal Curve Theory and hope to evoke empathy for people with Alzheimer's disease in an interactive way
Inspiration
I watched a touching Youtube video of former ballerina Marta González, who has Alzheimer's disease. But when she heard the music of Swan Lake, she could still recall and act the dance moves.
One of the sad things I found when I talked to elders with Alzheimer's in my life is that their family members take care of them but rarely understand the situation from their perspective influenced by the disease.
Therefore, I was determined to create a game based on this story to evoke empathy for people with Alzheimer's.
The movie "The Father" inspired me to tell player what Alzheimer's patients see through visual elements design.
We are more familiar with the Chinese cultural background, so we chose Kunqu as the theme of our story
Kunqu is the predecessor of famous Peking Opera, in which the performers interpret traditional Chinese heroes and love stories through dance and poetic songs.
Gameplay Design
The actress has three basic dance moves, each of which can make Spotlight around her to change and interact with scene props in different ways. We created puzzles based on this gameplay to narrate her memories.
According to the research of National Center for Geriatrics and Gerontology, coloring practice can help improve cognition of Alzheimer's patients, So we have added the mechanism of coloring with light in the game.
Water sleeve dance symbolizes joyful emotions, so it matches with the mechanism of illuminating props using the spotlight around actress
Illuminate the dull interactable props
Fan dance represents the switching of emotions, so it can the color of the spotlight by absorbing color from other luminous props
Absorb colored light from luminous props
The two-handed dance often appears at the turning part in a play. It changes the size of the atress’ shadow in our game
Change the size of shadow to influence character
Light up the extinguished lightable prop
Absorb color from the luminous prop
Color other interactable props
Here you can match your shadow's size with the gate to enter the next part of the garden
Match your shadow's size with interactable props in background to trigger them
Interaction Design
In the game, the actress has three forms - a young dancer, an elderly woman in a wheelchair, and an oriole, each with different controls to allow the player to experience her emotions at different stages of life
Young Dancer
In most of the levels, the main character is a young dancer. She can move freely around the stage, interact with objects in the scene to advance the plot. This is a sweet memory of the protagonist performing on stage when she was young.
Elderly Woman in a WheelChair
But after that, the protagonist returns to reality. In reality, she suffers from Alzheimer's disease and is confined to a wheelchair.
But after that, the protagonist returns to reality. In reality, she suffers from Alzheimer's disease and is confined to a wheelchair.
In order to let the player feel her depression and limited mobility through interaction, I designed an unusual control method: the player has to pull a slider and then press the E button to move a small distance forward.
My father was in a wheelchair for a while because he had been slightly injured in a car accident before. I designed this interaction by observing him manipulating the wheelchair by holding the handle to build up force and then letting go to make the wheelchair move forward.
The player needs to go through tedious steps to get little feedback on the movement. This experience was certainly uncomfortable and in stark contrast to the free movement of the dancer in the previous levels. This is exactly the immersive experience of the actress' feeling when she returns to reality that we want to bring to players.
Oriole
Oriole guides the player at the very beginning of the game and is the first scene prop that the player colors. At the end of the game, the protagonist changes from an elderly woman to a young dancer, and finally to an oriole.
Players can control this bird to fly up to the sky at the end the whole story.
The control interaction of oriole is much eaisier and contains upward motion because the game's emotional curve reaches its highest point in this part.
Level Design
Tutorial Level
A common symptom of Alzheimer's disease is that the patient still remembers experiences from long ago, but tends to forget recent events
A common symptom of Alzheimer's disease is that the patient still remembers experiences from long ago, but tends to forget recent events
Emotion Curve
Technology Detail
Shadow Play Style Animation
I used 2D Skeletal Animation System of Unity to create a Chinese shadow puppet play style animation for the game. This system allows me to make bones and rig the different parts of the character from multilayered artwork.
In order to make the character animation both shadow play and Kunqu style, I spent a lot of time studying the dance movement of the shadow puppets and Kunqu actress to make keyframes.
Iteration Design
We had to design a narrative game related to kunqu dance around the aforementioned story.
Obviously, our gameplay couldn't only contain dance -or it sounds more like an action game or a music game, which would ruin the emotional experience for the player. So the game had to also have some dance-related stage elements.
A common symptom of Alzheimer's disease is that the patient still remembers experiences from long ago, but tends to forget recent events
My uncle is a stage lighting technician. While communicating with him, I learned that the lighting technician has to adjust the type and angle of the lights to match the dance of the actors during the performance.
According to a research conducted by National Center for Geriatrics and Gerontology