Way With Words
a minimalistic platformer
Project length: 12 hours
What I Did:
Creative Lead
Level Design
Technologies:
GameMaker Studio
The Task
Way With Words was the result of a game jam where I was the creative lead and level designer. With a deadline of twelve hours, I designed a game that would be effective with only a few elements.
Level Design
Words in this game are both a platform space and narrative medium. They can have different characteristics depending on the meaning of the word.
Objects are represented by their words, which is both a limitation and source for creativity. By putting the words in context to their definition it takes advantage of a player’s own sense of imagination.
Inspiration
My initial creative spark came from so called ascii art. Art derived from limitations creates new possibilites that we might not have seen without those limitations. In the same way that ascii art only uses the characters available from the keyboard, I toyed with the idea of only using words as a “brush” to create objects. For example the word “trap” is written out just like all other words, but tricks the player by it’s own definiton.
The name Way With Words is also a definition of what the game is. The path that they walk on is also the text that they read, thus they are reading and running at the same time.
I took some inspirations from famous works such as The Matrix, The Shining and The Stanley Parable. The player is trapped in a simulation of a kafkaesque nightmare, where they navigate through a labyrinth of playful absurdity.
Lessons learned
The most valuable lesson in this project was for me to be confident in my creative vision. With this project I assumed a leading role to shape the game and gained my team members trust as I was confident in their abilities to execute it with excellence.