Storyline Building Process

The aim of the storyline is to get the user invested emotionally into the game. It aims to bring a brief introduction into the ancient Atlantis world and get the player started off.

To start off the story, we built upon elements of the game that were already known, such as:

• Atlantis, ancient city
• Main character
• Enemies
• Crystal

Each of these elements then needed to be somehow introduced to the story. Initially, this is what we had:

1 – First storyline – basic intro

“Atlantis is sinking! The crystal is what gives powers our city… We are a centaur character that can move around and fight enemies who are trying to take out civilisation… Enemies are creatures that appear in the night – a crab and a snake…”

2 – Storyline expansion – give depth

“Atlantis, a prospering city that has lived in peace for the last 200 years. Now, an enemy is attempting to steal the crystal and sink the city. The boss was once an upstanding citizen of Atlantis; however, his desire for power was great and he tried to take the crystal for himself and be the sole ruler of Atlantis – which would result in catastrophe. The centaur (main character) was successful in driving him and his army of crabs out. He has now returned with his newfound power with new snake-like creatures by his side, attempting to take the crystal and wipe out civilisation as we know it.”

3 – Storyline expansion #2 – give further depth

“Atlantis, a prospering city powered by an ancient crystal that [what’s it do?]. After enjoying 200 years of peace, a power-hungry enemy has emerged and is trying to take the crystal and its power for himself, resulting in the ultimate demise of Atlantis and its people. This [boss name] was once himself a citizen of Atlantis, but his power-hungry mind and desire to rule drove him mad as he turned on his people and attempted to steal the crystal. A noble hero emerged, [the centaur?], and managed to drive [the boss] and his pirate crabs out. As [the boss] was unsuccessful in his endeavour the first time, he sought out allies, to aid him on his quest to conquer Atlantis. Thus, he formed an alliance with the electric eels [what’s their problem?]. With the help of his pirate crabs and the eels, he now commands a force powerful enough to mount an attack on the city. During each night, the monsters come out and attempt to breach the walls of Atlantis [are they repelled by the centaur?], hoping to reach the crystal and wipe out civilisation as we know it.” The above text was the groundworks for our story, which we then expanded on with more details that gave more backstory and overall depth.

4 - This then became further improved into:

“Atlantis, a prospering city powered by an ancient crystal, Ilios. Ilios was a gift from the gods themselves, a source of eternal power and resources. After enjoying 200 years of peace, a power-hungry enemy has emerged and is trying to take the crystal and its power for himself, resulting in the ultimate demise of Atlantis and its people. The monster goes by many names, some call him Typhon. Typhon was known to be a descendant of the royal bloodline exiled from Atlantis after committing multiple heinous crimes against its people and his greed to rule Atlantis under a redefined world order. Typhon's power-hungry mind and desire to rule drove him mad as he turned on his people and attempted to steal the crystal. A noble hero emerged, Chiron, and managed to drive Typhon and his pirate crabs out. As Typhon was unsuccessful in his endeavour the first time, he sought out allies to aid him on his quest to conquer Atlantis. Thus, he formed an alliance with the electric eels, creatures that were banished into the sea by the gods themselves and a common enemy to the Atlantians. With the help of his pirate crabs and the eels, he now commands a force powerful enough to mount an attack on the city. Each night, the monsters come out and attempt to breach the walls of Atlantis and get past the tower defences and traps set up by Chiros. They come back every night hoping to reach the crystal and wipe out civilization as we know it. The Atlantians fear the full moon day when Typhon and his army reach their full strength and capabilities. The dreaded night is creeping closer and closer as the full moon strikes in 4 more days.”

This introduced Typhon as the main antagonist as well as Chiron as the main protagonist of the game. It gives backstory into both characters, making their upcoming battle in the game more meaningful. Story established, now how to convey it in a meaningful way?

Panel Design

3 Possible Ways to Design & Convey the Storyline

1. Whole storyline, in text, on a single screen slide.

• very basic but allows for detailed storyline introduction
• not very user friendly as there will be a lot of text on single screen
• not very engaging as it is read only

2. MANY slides with 1 line of text max and using only single image to provide visual cue

• does not over complicate story
• could also be annoying if player not initially interested in storyline (implement skips)
• could be done with fewer slides.

3. Storyline spread through a few slides

• most likely ideal to avoid over complication of story
• provides brief introduction and engages user
• could be annoying if player not initially interested in storyline
• few images and 2-3 lines of text for visual cue

Possible images to include:

• Image of Atlantis city - introducing the city as a whole
• Image of the crystal - introducing the crystal
• Image of enemy (dark outline, to be revealed later) - introducing enemy
• Typhon attempting to steal crystal image
• Image of Chiron, the main character
• Typhon and electric eels forming alliance
• Image of the full enemy force (pirate crabs left, Typhon middle, eels right)
• Image of Chiron defending the city against pirate crabs & eels

Exploring Panel Design

We initially split up the text into 5 different sections, each of which would represent a slide, with a text box dialogue and a visual introduction (in the form of character, crystal, enemy image etc.).

Suhas & Rohan initial paper sketches:

These sketches gave us a general idea and direction for the designs.

Design Inspirations

Initial Basic Designs – exploring overall look

Improving the storyline – Changes to amount of dialogue

Although we received positive reviews for the storyline overall, such as that the story feels complete and exciting, people were concerned that it is too in-depth. The user would not be interested in spending too much time reading about the story. Therefore, we decided to cut down the number of words and have a maximum of 2 short sentences per slide that would take no more than a few seconds to read. To maximize the information that we want to convey, we came up with this:

“Atlantis, a city powered by Ilios, an ancient crystal gifted by the gods. 200 years of peace have come to an end at the hand of Typhon, a monster, a descendant of the royal bloodline who once tried to steal the crystal for his own. The noble hero Chiron succeeded in stopping Typhon which resulted in his exile. He has returned with new allies, the electric eels, to conquer Atlantis once again.”

BACKGROUND - Then, we split the above text into 4 different sections:

The above 4 images are the basic building blocks for our 4 slides. Each slide includes the text box with a simple dialogue that introduces different parts of the game. Slide 1 introduces Atlantis as a whole, including the crystal. Slide 2 introduces Typhon, the main antagonist of the game. Slide 3 introduces our main character, Chiron. Slide 4 introduces the main

Exploring Pixel Art for slides - drafts

Exploring Slide 1 - how to introduce Atlantis - DRAFTS

First Night Design

First Night Story

The first Night is a very vital stage for the user playing the game. The First Night is where the user first encounters enemies. The aim for the First Night screen is to inform the user about the enemies and provide them information on respawning as well as protecting the crustal. Furthermore, also informing the user about the enemy’s difficulty. The night screen begins by telling the user about the night approaching. We warn the player about enemies attacking the crystal from any direction from the sea. We advise the player to collect their resources. Tell them about using the resources to prepare their defenses to survive the night. The player is informed about how if the main character loses health, they are able to respawn within a time period. Guiding the user to protect the crystal from being destroyed in order to win. Warning the player about how every upcoming night the player will face harder difficulty enemies. The user is also informed of the Final boss during the last/full moon night.

Design

We wanted the player get an insight on how the night time looks and how the enemy’s spawn. We designed a background screen inspired by the game itself for the user to get more context. We initially made some paper sketches to see how the First Night screen would look.

Textbox design

To achieve a consistent design guideline, we followed up with textbox used in the prologue screens.

Final Design

We finally ended up with the final design for the First Night screen for the storyline

FINAL STORYLINE DESIGNS (Prologue)

Notice that there are some changes to text in these high fidelity designs below, this change is accounted for as the text was reframed once again after user testing to match the words to the actual screen design. The change is also to better the continuation and flow of the story between the slides

Storyline Slide #1 – Introduction to Atlantis & the Crystal

This slide is the very first slide to the story – the user is informed of the city of Atlantis surrounded by water and its power resource in the form of an ancient crystal called Ilios.

Storyline Slide #2 - Introduction to antagonist Typhon

This slide expands the story by introducing the boss Typhon and providing a brief backstory in order to make the user emotionally invested.

Storyline Slide #3 - Introduction to protagonist Chiron and added depth to Typhon

This slide shows Chiron succeed in driving Typhon away and thus exiling him. This creates tension between the two characters.

Storyline Slide #4 - Return of enemies & beginning of story at current time

This slide tells the player that one of his objectives will be to fight Typhon and his army.