Programmer & Technical Designer
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Designed and developed a game in which players solve puzzles by switching between orthogonal and perspective views.
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Wrote a tooning shader to stylize the game by customizing multiple render features such as outlines, shadows and specular highlights.
Introduction Video
Game Concept
This game uses many different sound effects to design intricate puzzles and encourages players to explore freely with fewer hints. Players can go back and forth in different rooms, collecting and using a variety of sounds to find the final exit. The game also employs a small amount of visual transfiguration between two perspectives (2D and 2.5D) as the key to some puzzles.
Sounds as Elements
SOUNDS are intangible objects without constent forms.
If we follow the concept of Zelda, except that all elements are represented by a SOUND and that SOUND needs to be collected from elements or materials.
This game uses many different sound effects to design intricate puzzles, and encourages players to explore freely with fewer hints. Players can go back and forth in different rooms, collecting and using a variety of sounds to find the final exit.
Obstacles as Power
The protagonist of the game is a person suffering from phantom hearing symptoms. This lustrous and dazzling world is the superposition of the protagonist's realistic memories and hallucinations. All the clues needed to solve the puzzle come from the protagonist’s hallucinations.
The Rabbit, as the healer, comes to find the critical cause to heal the patient. It is also the self, at peace with the sounds in her head, to gain re-awareness and self-healing.
Eventually, the sounds that were once an obstacle becomes magical power to self-salvation.
Download a test demo for level 01 here:
Concept Art
Game Visual
This game encourages players to explore freely with fewer hints to the player. Players can go back and forth in different rooms, collecting and using a variety of sounds to find the final exit.
Story Board
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Dad was an alcoholic, mom left home, and I was the reason for it.
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At school, I was a joke.
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I hear many, many voices growing up with me.
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Several years later.
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My condition kept getting worse, and I was admitted to a sanatorium.
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I receive treatment.
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I started to look back at my life.
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There's a rabbit.
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Everything seems to be the same as in the past, yet completely different……
Game Mechanics
Acousma is a puzzle game that uses the interaction between sounds to solve puzzles.
Mechanics #1
Sound Interactions
Rule 1: Sound has the characteristics of the element it represents
Sounds, as elements, can produce specific effects to interact with other materials, and these effects are usually based on real-world rules (plus a little imagination).
For example, the sound of fire represents fire, and the sound of snoring represents... something as loud as thunder!
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Rule 2: Objects can be transformed by sound.
Objects, as materials, can be affected by sounds, and these effects are also based on real-world rules (and also need to add a little imagination!).
For example, wood can be burned by the sound of fire.
Rule 1 + Rule 2 = Puzzles
Find the Right Reaction Chain to Pass a Level!
Each level is a closed space made up of several rooms. By collecting different sounds and interacting with different objects with these sounds, finally you find your way out of this space.
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Mechanics #2
Phantom Hearing as puzzles solving clues
I have written a complete script for this game. This script is a recitation that appears continuously in the game. It can be interpreted as a hallucinatory symptom that has plagued the protagonist since childhood. From another perspective, it may be a monologue of the protagonist as he undergoes therapy and looks back on his past.
(Take the first level as an example to illustrate.)
PASS POINT
Wake Up the Giant
Wake up the giant with the sound of the train whistle, the giant gets up and leaves, the player can escape from the gap in the wall, the level passed.
START POINT
Clues from Phantom Hearing
“Maybe it's time to try to wake up your dad.
Maybe it's the only way to escape the maze of childhood.”
Collect Sound of Fire
Clues from Phantom Hearing
“Mom burned the birthday card you gave her before she left…… But that didn't stop the fireplace from burning brightly, spewing out bright flames, and waiting for an opportunity……”
Clues from Phantom Hearing
“A secret. If it's left anything in you, it's rage and heartbreak. Put it on ice, put it on ice and never uncover it.”
Melt the Iceberg
Use the sound of fire to melt the iceberg. When the iceberg melts into water, the raft frozen in the iceberg surfaces and players can take the raft to the other side.
Collect Sound of Water
Clues from Phantom Hearing
“The bear is the silent watcher. He knows how to get the train moving again. At least, *what's behind him* knows.”
Collect the Sound of Electricity
Grow the Vine
Use the sound of water to grow the vine. When the huge vine grows out, players can follow it to climb high to collect the sound of electricity.
Clues from Phantom Hearing
“When Mom left, it was the first time you saw a train, and the train whistle sounded like a patient with asthma.”
Grow the Vine
It's a giant toy train! Didn't expect that! Use the sound of electricity to start the train. Collect the train whistle when the train is started.
Collect the Train Whisle
Mechanics #3
Perspective Switching
The game also employs a small amount of visual transfiguration between two perspectives (2D and 2.5D) as the key to some puzzles.
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Players can't reach the wires behind the bears.
players need to switch to 2d mode in order to climb up the table and vines
Level Design
(to be continued)
Level Design
Character
Rabbit is the healer, coming to find the root cause to heal the patient.
It is also the self, at peace with the voice to gain re-awareness, and self-healing.
In the phrase "going down the rabbit hole" or "falling down the rabbit hole", a rabbit hole is a metaphor for something that takes someone into a fantastic (or disturbing) surreal state or situation.
Right
Front
Top
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Ears pricked up when collecting sound.
Ear drops when not collecting sound.
Walking Motion
UI
Collect Bar
The rabbit can only have one kind of sound in its ears, and the last collected sound must be used up before collecting the next one. The progress bar represents the amount of that sound stored.
Collect Range
Rabbits can only collect sounds made by items within a certain range, or use sound to interact with items.
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Magic Circle
Players must find and stand on the magic circle until the progress bar representing the magic circle is pulled full, then they can make a perspective change.