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[jackalhearts]

Hi y'all! I started developing a game in July and one of my friends just directed me to this forum for resources. I'm currently working on Afflicted, an interactive horror fiction game. I'm using Twine 2 (Harlowe 3.2.3), and I'm making graphics in Procreate.

This game focuses on themes of power, free will, anarchy, and transhumanism. It's an unreasonably ambitious undertaking for one of my first projects, but I'm having too much fun to be concerned about that sort of thing.

Right now (08/05/2022) I'm nearing 50% completion for the initial writing stages.

Roadmap of my next steps:

• Punch-up
• (Solo) playtesting (for more debugging, to fill in plot holes, add in new scenes as needed, flesh out parts that don't feel right, story edits)
• Proofreading (the longest and most dreadful stage...)
• Creation of line-boil animation illustrations. (one of the most fun stages!)
• Playtesting (I'm looking into paying a few folks for this since I want VERY detailed feedback)
• Edits according to playtester feedback, further bug fixes
• Final solo playthroughs, checks, etc.
• Marketing, social media stuff.
• Release!!!!!!!!

My goals for Afflicted:

• Create a completed game
• Make a game that I'd want to play
• Make a game where player choices matter. I know this is an ambitious undertaking, but I want someone to feel in control while playing.
• Make something that makes at least one person feel a little less alone. The story of this game is personal to me. There are a lot of elements that tie into the idea of feeling like a misfit, feeling used, and feeling lost. I hope that someone walks away from my game feeling a little more seen.

I have a playable demo of Afflicted here: https://jackalhearts.neocities.org/AfflictedDemov2.html

Feel free to check it out. It's the first chapter of the game, and has been through some changes since I posted this demo. If anything, I at least hope my writing is charming. (My game design skills? A work in progress!)

If you like Tumblr, I've got a dev blog there: https://afflictedblog.tumblr.com/

I hope to post some regular updates here that are more detailed than my dev blog posts. I'm learning new skills and getting better at writing at the same time I'm creating Afflicted, so I except I'll learn a few things just by sharing my process here.

[jackalhearts]

I have a lot to share, but I thought I'd first share my list of ideas I had when I knew I wanted to create a game in Twine:

- space marines
- knights (???)
- rebels fighting alien overlords (ironically, this was crossed out despite it kind of being what Afflicted is about...)
- Post-apocalyptic
- starfleet (???)
- terminator (again, what?)
- robot (???)
- space cowboys
- gritty 70s alien type deal
- space war
- castle war/siege
- superhero
- lost/myst/island stuff (I was tempted by this idea...)
- adventurer/indiana jones
- ocean exploration!
- cyberpunk (I didn't expand on this one, but I should have)
- high fantasy chosen one...but like, it sucks (This is also kind of what Afflicted ended up being about, lol)
- a demon?
- lovecraftian/eldritch (this is the "final idea" that was used, kind of)
- deep sea base
- heist
- small town with supernatural stuff happening
- urban fantasy 

I ended up expanding on five of these ideas. I'll share what the final "pitch" to myself looked like:

Eldritch Idea
Genre: Horror
Premise: Ancient gods terrorize the once peaceful Earth you lived on. You were cursed as a young adult, and now have the power of healing. You're sought after, and people want you to expend your powers to fight against the gods. They throw themselves in harm's way for you. Will you help, and in turn, let them help YOU, be learning to take their life force? Or will you use that flip of a switch to control and subjugate them instead, becoming a god of your own by taking advantage of the them for the help you used to be so afraid of asking for?
Inspiration: Lovecraft, Bloodborne
Themes: Dismantling hierarchy, taking advantage, subjugation, self-determination, anti-establishment
- you get powers somehow
- a god of mischief..?
- you can heal people. people are afraid or like you.
- you have a bff that helps
- turning point w/ big fight, people dying  for you. or by your hand perhaps
- multiple endings.

The most interesting part of this pitch in hindsight is that I wrote down Lovecraft as inspiration. I like the authors that came before him, and I like the authors that came after him. But I don't like him. I'm not sure why I even wrote down his name, to be honest. As is stands, my main inspirations for Afflicted are actually Octavia Butler (particularly Lilith's Brood), Chuck Palahniuk, Harlan Ellison, H.G. Wells, and Joseph Heller.

I intend to update this dev log at least once a week with my processes. See y'all next Friday!

[Beastboy]

Spooky

[jackalhearts]

Good afternoon! I'm back again with another update. With interactive fiction, I know that story is going to be the most important part of this game. I need to create cohesive rising and falling action, compelling NPCs, and stakes that will make someone keep clicking. So I daydreamed about these things for a while. I did other things, took breaks, and scribbled down notes as ideas came to me.

Eventually, I knew a few important things:
 
- The player needs a core companion to lean on. I don't have the time to write a ton of companions/friends, so I'll focus my time on creating one really good BFF for the player to use as an emotional foil, parallel, or mirror to what the audience may feel.

- I want the player to come into some kind of eldritch power. I want to explore what it means to be a hero, refuse a call to action, or abuse a call to action. When you have the power to hurt others, do you defend your loved ones, or aim to accumulate power for self-serving purposes? When I kept thinking about this, it became a larger core to my story.

- I then realized that I don't actually believe in the idea of one hero making or breaking a cause. Individualism has led to a lot of turmoil in my life. I'm a go-getter, but there's very little I can do all alone. My experience in political organizing taught me this. In Afflicted, you fight eldritch beasts. So, I started clarifying my metaphors: The player might have a cool power/skill, but they can't defeat the beasts without collective action. Solidarity is king. I let this tenet lead the way for a lot of my decisions.

- I want to offer the player more diverse choices than other games are able to. The scope of games like The Wolf Among Us and Mass Effect don't always allow for super divergent choices because of budget, time, and other factors. I'm working in Twine and I'm writing it all, so I should use my ability to vary NPC responses and game events as much as I can within reason. "This NPC will remember that." should come into play as often as it's natural to.

With these things in mind, I was able to construct an outline. It was a 1,000 word stream of consciousness at first. I then broke it down into events I really wanted to hit, and organizing things according to how I wanted to pace the story.



This guide shows the events and Acts I had in mind. On the right, I drew an up/down chart to show how climactic the action in each part is supposed to be. (Tilt your head to the right.) It helped me visualize how I should be treating and arranging each of these sections. A couple of these were modified or cut, but otherwise it was a great starting point.

(Notable things I ditched were the "big attack that you FAIL at" and calling a specific monster a shoggoth. I also turned a lot of the meeting/talking scenes into pub scenes where you could talk to more than one NPC.)

After that, rewrote my entire outline again with more fleshed out details. I endeavored to fill in plot holes, tie things together with logic, and further push the themes of Afflicted. Now that I'm in the weeds of writing, I have a working outline draft #3 that I edit as I go, filling new things in, adding more down the line, and rewriting.

It's tempting to go back to the beginning and start punching up my writing in my game that doesn't quite match the focus and caliber of my writing now, but I know that "editing before you finish" is a massive novel killer for authors. So, I'm not going to do it here. Punch-up and rewrites will happen AFTER I have a finished written game. Then....the dreaded proof-reading.

[oldblood]

I'm always down for interactive horror fiction. I'll be watching this project for sure.

[nathy after dark]

Seems pretty cool! Hope you can keep the ambition in balance 

[jackalhearts]

I'm always down for interactive horror fiction. I'll be watching this project for sure.

Seems pretty cool! Hope you can keep the ambition in balance 

Right on! I'm glad to see folks are interested.

At the moment keeping things slow and steady is helping me stay motivated and balanced with this. My time to work on the project is becoming scant, but if anything, that helps me take more frequent breaks.

[jackalhearts]

The good news: I'm now employed (ironically enough, working on an indie game)

The bad news: Afflicted's development process will now take place every Sunday afternoon, instead of at a manic pace every afternoon after I finish job hunting. Instead of finishing 5% of the writing at a time, I'll take my time working out half a dialogue tree every week.

A fed & housed game dev is a happy game dev, so while I'm sad I won't be able to keep working on Afflicted at a breakneck pace, I think that the reduced stress and slower pace will be good for me. I'll get more perspective between chunks of game development, and I'll be more refreshed to sit down and write now that I'm not doing it every day.

And now for this week's update: More from the backlog!

I'm right in the thick of writing the game itself in Twine, and I'd prefer not to just dump an entire game draft here. (It seems like it would just be dry and take the wind out of the demo or game for folks if they wanted to play.) Instead, I'll share a few interesting scraps/info/notes I collected as I've been writing.

Historical Research - Home Base

Initially, the game was going to take place in some part of New England "because Lovecraft" as a reason. When I got into writing about some locations, especially the rebel home base for these people fighting eldritch beings, I got a bit lost with why I was trying to choose New England. My parents are from there, and I spent plenty of summers in N.H., Derry, and other rural towns. I realized that I wasn't really connecting though. I didn't have a good reason for my choice.

So, then I went "Hey, I live in the southeast-- and this story is particularly unconventional. Why not choose Georgia?" Then, I suddenly had a wealth of inspiration. I had recently visited the Chattooga river, I'd seen the gorgeous Tallulah Falls, and I'm familiar with historic neighborhoods in Atlanta. The story felt much closer to home when I could see characters struggling against unfair institutions in my backyard, rather than in my parent's childhood region.

I collected some info, decided more about who my NPCs would be, and started looking at old houses that would have made interesting underground bases to fight evil gods in 1900 Atlanta. Although I searched on Zillow and other sites within the perimeter, I wanted the home to be situated on Ponce de Leon Avenue. That would give me a clear picture of where these characters were, and I could look up historic photos of what that was like around 1900.

(This picture isn't Ponce, but it's something I saved along the way.)



The two homes (both over one hundred years old!) that caught my eye were these. These are both public photos I found on real estate sites:



They're close enough to be believably situated on the street I want them on. I love the delightful plum color on the first one, and the architecture on the second (which I believe has a carriage house out of frame). I ended up combining them and letting the paint job on the first one inform what the rebels would nickname their base: The Orchid. (Which reminded me of the show Lost, but hey. That's not a bad thing. Just a nice shout-out.) I reasoned out that a particularly wealthy and philanthropic member of the rebellion loaned out their home, and I was able to move forward with seeing how the player character (and NPCs) lived, interacted, and navigated their world much better than before.

[Thaumaturge]

Congratulations on your employment, and on the expected reduction in stress from it! ^_^

[nathy after dark]

Atlanta seems like a cool setting for Lovecraftian weirdness (if I've learned anything from the spooky episodes of the TV show).

[jackalhearts]

Congratulations on your employment, and on the expected reduction in stress from it! ^_^

Thank you!! <:

Atlanta seems like a cool setting for Lovecraftian weirdness (if I've learned anything from the spooky episodes of the TV show).

Yes!! And gosh, I can only hope to create something half as brilliant as Donald Glover-- his mastery of treating a setting as a character and touching on social issues through comedy & horror are fantastic.


Status update: I wrote out another dialogue tree and a half last weekend, which is nice steady progress. I'm finding that sitting down to work is much easier now that I can just chill out on a Sunday afternoon feeling refreshed. Life is hectic right now, so focusing on the weekend is much easier than during the week.

Since I'm still just in the middle of writing, I'll share some more of my thoughts on locations. I had initially planned to let each of the conversations with some key NPCs take place in a variety of places. After each action-packed chapter, I wanted the player to be able to debrief and chat with the NPCs they'll (hopefully) come to care about. I also wanted these NPCs to be able to call out decisions the PC made that they disagreed with, or become closer to the PC if their ideas & feelings lined up.

I had written down that the player should talk to some of them at the home base (The Orchid), then maybe an abandoned rooftop, perhaps at a park, and maybe lakeside somewhere. The first location I settled on for this conversation was actually a location I named The Candlelight Pub, which was loosely inspired by Atlanta's Bookhouse Pub. Bookhouse is known for being cozy, having walls trimmed with bookshelves (filled with books, of course), and having some tasteful nerd decor (in the form of painted portraits of icons like Laura Palmer, The Tenth Doctor, and Alex DeLarge).

When creating Candlelight, I took notes about the bookshelves and dark mahogany decor motifs from Bookhouse, and leaned into the idea of it being a 1900s underground rebel pub, with bookshelves that stretch from floor to ceiling filled with literature, pamphlets, and some eldritch tomes. This setting ended up being so compelling and lovely that I decided every debriefing with the key NPCs should be here. Across chapters, some of them are tucked away inside by the fireplace, others sit on the roof and look at the stares, and one of them sits out back on a bench by a scrappy, fenced-in garden. While the PC still goes to The Orchid after missions, explores other areas, and has lots to do, centering their relationships back on this setting-character of the cozy pub felt right.

That evening, many of the rebels shuffle off to the Candlelight Pub. It's an underground meeting place that's often bustling with people late into the night. You go too.

You hear a fireplace crackling. Rain and tree branches tap at the grimy windows. People move about, laughing, arguing, drinking, and eating. The walls are lined with photos and art. The most unusual aspect of the Candlelight pub is that many of the walls have inset bookshelves, packed with literature, magical tomes, and pamphlets. Sometimes, you see someone returning a book, or taking one out to borrow. A few people break into a labor union song, denouncing the Elder Gods in the same breath as the bosses.

The chairs, barstools, benches, and tables are mismatched. Many are a dark mahogany color. There are burgundy and orange patchwork cushions distributed across many of them. Oil lamps and sconces flicker around the pub, casting friendly shadows across the faces of the patrons.

You see Cora leaned against the bar, sipping from a glass of bourbon. Gabriel sitting in a booth, reading something. He has a dark beer on the table. Axel is laughing with a few other folks at a table. They sip on a drink you don't recognize.

I realized two interesting things with this first description-

The first: If this story is about dismantling hierarchy and oppression, then the Elder Gods are behaving a whole lot like bosses and billionaires. On a larger scale, they behave a lot like the concept of capitalism (consuming, destroying, growing, etc) itself. I realized all this when it made too much sense for characters to see their experiences with human forms of oppression, and apply them to eldritch beings as well. Hence, the union songs at the pub. This gives my narrative much more focus when I asked questions like "What sort of human capitulates to a powerful abuser?" and "What atrocities do Elder Gods commit?"

The second: I had decided the NPC Axel didn't drink alcohol, and I didn't elaborate on what they were drinking in this description. I wanted the PC to ask. That led to the invention of 1900s La Croix, lost to time.

> What are you drinking?

"Strawberries and soda water. I gotta keep my mind sharp for the next attack. I gotta be ready for anything."

> ...What do you call that?

"I don't know. It kind of tastes like whispers of strawberries though, y'know? Like they're not really there. I'll probably just get a regular soda later."

[jackalhearts]

As I'm building this story, I'm constantly learning new techniques when writing with Twine. Early on, I built this little randomizer for when the player asks the bartender to surprise them.



As I was looking to solve other issues that were cropping up (variables, passage history, that sort of thing), a lot of the solutions I read didn't quite solve the things I was running into so much as say "Stop using Harlowe, start using Sugarcube." While Sugarcube has tons of great functionality for complex mechanics, it's not totally suitable for a story that's so text-based. While Afflicted can certainly be accomplished in Sugarcube, there are a lot of features I wouldn't end up using. (Those being the primary reasons for a possible switch, once upon a time when I didn't have 690 passages.) In my case, using the user-friendly text-adventure-focused version of Twine is ideal.

Above all: There are no missing features nor things I compromised on because Harlowe just couldn't do it. And that's the most important part to me.

Coming from an animation background, I'm really used to designing and pitching the best version of something, with all the features, qualities, and things that make it amazing. Then, as a project continues, molding a pipeline to fit that ultimate vision, and compromising on quality and features as a very last resort. Obviously a lot of compromising happens regardless for budget reasons, but when you know you can figure something out, there's no reason in my opinion to just remove the feature because it's difficult, or it might be tough in the future.

So as long as I never catch myself removing things or shrinking scope because of something so simple as a software limitation, then I'm happy with my choices.

[oldblood]

A lot of people sleep on how much Twine can do. It's a pretty powerful tool for narrative games. Love the use of randomization.

[jackalhearts]

A lot of people sleep on how much Twine can do. It's a pretty powerful tool for narrative games. Love the use of randomization.

For sure! I've seen some really impressive games with it that involve things like randomly generated maps, complex health and stat systems, and things like that. It's incredibly versatile. And thank you :D


Status Update: My time to work on Afflicted is limited, but I'm continually chugging ahead each weekend when I have a free Sunday! This week I'm headed out to a concert, so I'll have to suffer one more week without getting to open Twine up.  

One of the things I wanted to keep in mind with this game was to make sure that for as many dramatic, horrific moments I have, I have just enough humor in parts of the game to prevent it from being an unbearable march of depression. It touches on some serious and terrifying subject matters. Horror can be hard to swallow without artistry, a deft narrative hand, and sometimes comedy.

While I think it's very possible for some senses of humor to feel grating or unfunny, I have to remind myself that the most important thing is to just be myself about it. Some folks out there share my sense of humor, and the jokes I include in this game are for them. The worst thing I can do through this process is get too in my head about anyone liking my writing. The reality is, if they like it, they'll play. If they don't, then it's not for them, and I don't need to really worry about it. The most important thing at this early stage is just to make the game. And worry about editing later.

[jackalhearts]

I typically wouldn't put out this kind of update since it's more personal and less game dev related, but I wanted to post this anyway so that I can release myself from the "abandoned project guilt".

So, Afflicted is getting shelved until further notice. I had a (massive, unexpected) personal tragedy happen in my family very recently, and the themes & concepts within Afflicted just don't speak to me right now. While I have some creative energy that I want to use (for healing, grief), none of that energy is for Afflicted.

Some writers say that you should finish manuscripts quickly before they look unfamiliar to you, since we all change as people over time. I tend to agree with that, and went into Affliced with the understanding that the game would slowly change with me as I wrote. (And then when I did 2nd and 3rd drafts, I would smooth it out and solidify the themes.) I had passion for the project, and a huge drive to tackle it every week.

The problem is: grief changes you instantly and drastically. Your priorities shift, your relationships change, your entire life transforms. It's destabilizing, upsetting (obviously), and not conducive to working on the same things you did before. I have no desire to push myself to create anything that doesn't pay my bills, so that's not my struggle. My struggle is wanting to make stuff...but not Afflicted. 

The things I was writing about in my plans for Afflicted look familiar, but those themes aren't at the forefront of my mind anymore. I get where I was going, but it's just not as compelling to me now. I'm early in my grief, so I might find those themes compelling again in six months, or a in a few years. Maybe I'll find them interesting again if I have lots of time off work, or as soon as the new year comes around. Who knows!

I now release myself from "abandoned project guilt"! Begone!

Good luck to everyone on TIG forums with your projects. I'll still be lurking, and I might be back with this project or something else sometime.

[Thaumaturge]

Ah, I'm sorry to read of your family tragedy! Strength to you for your journey in grief, and my condolences.

As to the game, that is very fair, I do think!