Am I being realistic, should I start this project?

News & General Discussion
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I was playing around in Unity, and seeing how extremely quick it is to set up the basic idea, it got me thinking about actually making a game, I’ve always liked adventure games since I enjoy narratives and storytelling.

i got some experience with 3d modelling in Sketchup, but for creating static renders, so I am assuming I’ll have to work quite different when the models is to be rendered dynamically. I also know programming (though it looks like I’ll barely need to do any in Unity) , animation however, I got no clue, but I am assuming i can use someone elses work (for characters etc.) and modify it to my liking.

I am assuming that creating a standard adventure game (3d) should be pretty simple in Unity, seeing that the scenes are small (compared to something like GTA V etc.), the mechanics are simple (puzzles, inventory management … not much more really).

Or am I completely wrong?

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Can’t really say. Adventure game is not descriptive enough. Is it a proof of concept with a few scenes? Is it a full fledged multihour game?

Also you’ll definitely need to do some coding.

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Adventure games like the classics, more or less the same game mechanics, the old point and click.

It seems to me that the basic concept can be set up in a few days (propably a few hours if your a professional).

Coding is not not a problem since everything is built into Unity, I am assuming for a game like this, i would not really have to do any serious programming, but more like scripting, simple things like inventory management and so on.

If I am right, the majority of the work is then going to be the 3d artwork, story, dialoge etc.

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If you use a framework like Adventure Creator you could probably have a prototype running pretty quick with extremely minimal coding. The value generally depends on what you value your own time at.

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The reason for wanting to create a adventure game is that I got a degree in litterature, and I should be able to write a good storyline and get the the plot elements right. Games are quite differently thought than say a book in it’s structure, and games tends to work better with a simple style of writing. I don’t think that a interactive version of say Kafka’s novels would go well with the gaming community, the writing is to complex, and games seem to work better with a action oriented plot.

As of value, I am thinking of a game of commercial quality that has the potential for decent sales.

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Building an adventure game alone would probably be doable if you:

  • Scope it to be simple and short enough. Make a good and simple plan an stick to it.
  • Utilize tools like Adventure Creator, Dialogue System for Unity and Master Audio to avoid a lot of the work you’d otherwise have to do.
  • Are prepared to work hard probably for at least two years (probably more, depending on the scope).

Creating all the different assets is usually clearly the most time-consuming part of the project.

However even if you did manage to get the game finished, getting decent sales would be a whole different feat. You’d need to invest quite a bit of time to marketing the game way before release to have a reasonable chance of achieving this. The game should also have some good hook or it would be difficult to get people interested in it. If it’s just another adventure game, it can be hard to stand out. If your game doesn’t look sexy or interesting in gifs / pictures it can also be a hard sell.

Since creating new content for an adventure game is really expensive, your game will be short. Even if you make a great game, be prepared to get a lot of negative reviews merely for the reason that your game is too short. If a game is “only” four hours long and costs 10 dollars many people will view it as lousy bang for buck.

If your game doesn’t have professional voice-acting, prepare to get quite a few bad reviews from that too.

Lack of animation skills could be a problem, but not impossible to work around with some creativity. You can get some pretty good generic walk, talk and “interact” animations from the asset store. Spending a couple of hundred bucks here would be a really good investment. Whenever the need arises for some unique animations you can usually get away with some creative writing and having the action happen off-camera (fade out + fade in works pretty well usually).

You haven’t mentioned audio at all yet, don’t forget about that one. If you have no voice-acting the need for otherwise good audio becomes even more important. You can probably find some usable sfx from the asset store for some things. For music you might want to consider paying someone to hand-craft music for your game for the best results.

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It’s good advice. I’ve been into the adventure game scene since the early 90’s, I very rarely play these games these days, as they usually, as you yourself say, has no hook. They pretty much all look the same, bland and boring. But this is were I believe my litterature studies will come in handy as I have spent a lot of time analyzing narratives. Creating a interesting trailer and doing the marketing for a narrative driven game is, the way I think about it, all about mystification and surprise, i hate cliches myself (computer game narratives and dialoges are usually full of them, including the AAA titles). Getting this right has a lot to with crafting a good narrative, of course games is a visual media, so this aspect is just as, if not more, important. And music as well is important, it sets the mood, and can really make a trailer stand out. I had a music studio in the cellar before, I am no Beethoven, then again who is.

As for dialoge, I dont think this has to be to expensive, there is this site fiverr.com, where people offer their services, usually quite cheap, I am sure there are quite a few decent voice actors there.

Getting the visual aspects right is propably going to be my biggest challenge.

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If OP wasn’t been doing games, I would narrow the scope down.

Instead on 3D, which can go really quick out of place, when using assets from different authors, focusing on 2D. I think 2D is more forgivable and easier to adjust. Consider classic Broken Sword game. However, it still requires it own art style.

Making games is full of technical challenges. Not only drag and drop assets, assuming all goes fine, and some coding. I wold expect quite a bit of coding even with assets.

Be careful using generic asset, as players can quickly notice reused assets.

OP strong point is narrative from what is writing. Should focus on that, and secondary on visuals, and thirdly on sounds, which major should be environment sounds. No voice acting.

Problem with voice acting, besides cost and quality, if trying release fix, change, update, it can be potentially hard to do so. What if actor is unavailable. Or recording quality changes. I don’t thing all voice acting is required for such games. Sure would be nice. But increases complexity by much.

People who love such games, will play, as long has strong good and fun/interesting story. I would recommend focusing on that.

If anything, I would advise make storyline with multiple choices, and alternative routes. That allows to extent, with replayability. Only certain thing should be discoverable in game, if specific path of choices were made.

Such thing you want to focus, rather 3D and voices. Utilize what you are strong at.

Good luck.

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I also strongly recommend Adventure Creator for adventure games, 2D or 3D. It takes care of all of the technical hurdles of making an adventure game, including menus, inventory, saved games, dialogue, and everything else. If you end up wanting a little more in the dialogue department, consider the Dialogue System for Unity, which includes an Adventure Creator add-on. But you can also do everything to make a modern, commercially-releasable adventure game solely in Adventure Creator, too. The developer has been refining it for a few years. It’s true that an experienced programmer could hack their own system together in a few months, but it wouldn’t be as battle-tested and feature-rich.

From the writing perspective, I’m going to link David Kuelz’s article again: Narrative Design Tips I Wish I’d Known. It’s a good introduction to interactive writing specifically because it doesn’t go into the details of writing choices for branching dialogue trees. It takes a higher level view that naturally leads to better decisions about writing branching dialogue among other aspects of game writing.

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I would do it in 2D or 2.5D if I were a competent artist. I feel that for 2D games there is a higher demand of quality artwork. Making it 3D you can put some precreated assets together with a some modification just to make sure that they fit the general art direction/estethics.

Also 3D makes it easier to make good enviroment effects, fog, rain, lights, the stuff that sets the mood.

3D is generally a more “interactive” way of interacting with the game world, if I come up with some brilliant ideas at some stage, they will be easier to implement in a 3d world.

For example, the recent Dreamfall chapters adventure game had two cities you could walk around it, doing something like that alone might be difficult, thought certainly not impossible if using premade assets.

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Yes, I have been looking into Adventure Creator, it will propably save me severall months of programming, So I’ll be using it.

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I would recommend going with 3D in this instance. It’s surprisingly costly to create 2D art for adventure games, since you can rarely reuse almost anything between different scenes except maybe for some character art. Creating good-looking animated 2D characters is also a really difficult challenge. 3D is much more flexible when it comes to things like asset reuse, having different camera angles and lighting conditions, and enables you to get a lot more help from the asset store.

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I would go against you thinking about “gaming community”, it’s not a monolith and you would surprised by the need for sophistication in part if the market, do it depend to who your audiences is, not what prejudice you have about video games.

Some game, considered legendary by the gaming community have more words that the kings James bible (planescape torment), and there is definitely game that have some kafkaesque quality.

I would redirect you towards some example of writing oriented game like edith finch, or and fitewatch, and for writing interactive fiction I should mention Emily short’s essay, most notably her work with versu.

Knowing the medium is key.

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yes, I tried to do 2d animation some years ago but gave up quick. I will never try that again. I would never think of doing a 2D Game such as Broken Sword. Working with 3D is the only viable option for me.

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Well, I think that the first Life is Strange had some great writing and ideas, it surprised me, and was different. The narrative worked (mostly) really well in that form. I think it’s the first game I’ve played that have had a such a sympathic main character.

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It’s definitely not impossible to create wordy games and find an audience (see inkle’s games), but then I think it would be best to go pretty much full interactive novel at this point, so that your audience knows exactly what they’re getting into.

In most cases I think that the audience tends to enjoys it more when the dialog flows forward at a pretty good pace. Think more comic book or a screenplay than a thousand-page novel. When the player is switching between the modes of controlling a 3D avatar and reading linear text, impatience can very easily set in.

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@tlilletveit what is your actual goal, in terms of artistic direction?
Realistic looking? Or stylized, toward something like animated characters?

Do you want make something, like rooms/scenes/level, or more like open world? Because further we go, more complex it becomes.

Personally, if I see games with standard asset subway asset alike, I am quite steering away.
Don’t know however, how others reacts, seeing same assets all over, across different games. Or if that matter at all?
But for me, it brings boredom, as I know, what to expect already, rather feeling sense of “adventure”. Yet, if someone has skill, to bring some life to such, that is fine. (rarity).

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I kind of disagree with this. But if it is correct as you say, the developers of “Life is Strange” had a good solution for it. They made the enviroment a interactive part of the narrative, by having objects in the enviroment foreshadow the plot. This led to lots of Youtube videos of people finding obscure clues and proposing different theories about the plot. So, the interactive world and the narrative is here connected, making the world a part of the narrative.

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I have a weakness for the bladerunner aesthetics: dark, blue, rainy, foggy, moody. Thought I havent decided on anything yet. I will propably go for a realistic style. But i do want to incorporate some uniqe art, something that makes it stand out.

As of now, I am thinking of mainly rooms/scenes as opposed to open word, I gotta see how time consuming this is. If viable I would like a combination of a open world (but of course, nothing like GTA V) and seperate “rooms”, propably with a loading screen inbetween.

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I would suggest you focus on little scene tests for art and lighting. You will learn all your limitations fairly quickly then.

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