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Live Adventure is a graduation project (at RUBIKA Supinfogame).
The team is composed of 11 people.
Made with Unreal
Trailer (edited and recorded by my cares)
Concept
Live adventure is a 2nd person story-driven single-player adventure game where the player controls a sibling duo. While the brother carries the game's camera, his sister is filmed by that same camera.
Game Prototype
Version Finale
My Missions
At the initiative of the project, I took different roles including
Gameplay programmer
Narrative Designer
Lead Writer
Creative Director.
Intentions & Story
Intentions
The game proposes to embody a duet through the eyes of a carried camera in a colorful universe carried by a captivating narration with a light tone.
For the writing of the dialogues, all the traits for each character are discussed in group with references. From this base, I write the character sheets and some examples of dialogues to practice. The story is defined by key scenes to keep it modular.
All the character sheets are written by me on Confluence based on a template that I have established according to many references such as The Game Narrative Toolbox.
Download
Download
The story is documented on Miro and Confluence.
Download
The story of an adventure
With Live Adventure, I want to tell a light-hearted story that revolves around the main element of the game: its controller, and by extension, its characters.
By telling the story of two siblings going on a quest to find their parents, the plot emphasizes the bond of our two characters moving together in the same direction. The lightness is induced by their young age (12 - 13 years old), and the adventure by the different adventures that our young adventurers will live.
A major challenge is to offer an emotional journey carried by our plot and its characters. Using the techniques of pre-production in animation, a color script is made to define the color evolution of the game throughout its history.
Driven dialogs
Because the game has a strong narrative intent and the constant presence of two characters, we need our dialogue system to expose our plot elements and the connection of our characters while marking the impact of the player's actions as they progress.
The dialogue system must meet the writing's needs, and be flexible in order to respond to the many situations in which it must be implemented. A research work is done to answer all the necessary elements in the realization of this system by taking example on those of Double Fine, or Naughty Dog.
Dialogue System
Naturally, I moved towards a data-driven dialogue system where dialogue writing and integration are independent to facilitate the workflow between designers and writers.
I have decided to start with a database called "MasterList" which gathers all the dialogue lines in a shared excel file. It is easy for the writers to work together.
This system makes it possible to consider a possible localization using the excel sheets.
This first file gathers all the elements related to the writing for each line, namely
- the name of the scene where the line is used
- the name of the speaking character
- the text
- the type of dialogue (related to the hierarchy of dialogues)
- the name of the group to which it belongs
- a unique ID (generated by order of creation of a line)
Each line has a unique reference composed as follows: # " Scene ". " ID ". " Character ".
The "MasterList" is then exported as a CSV and interpreted in Data Tables in the engine.
The DT_DialogLines groups the dialog lines and allows to fill in the information related to their implementation in the game: an audio file, a volume adjustment, a delay before activation, an animation, lip-sync, etc.
The DT_DialogGroups groups all the dialog lines by dialog group (or conversation). Each dialog group contains a priority order to indicate whether a dialog can interrupt another dialog in progress.
Other conditions are available, ranging from the necessary gameplay situation to the character that is allowed to trigger the dialog. These rules are mostly used for contextual dialogs that require certain conditions before they can be played, and allow you to vary the dialogs according to the player's actions.
Additional notes
For reasons of optimization and organization, dialogs are divided and loaded by "scene" (with the understanding that gameplay dialogs that occur in all scenes are combined in a "common" scene).
The implementation of sounds and the creation of soundbanks in Wwise follow the same organization.
All information related to the operation and implementation of the dialogues is documented in English on Confluence and made available to the team.
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This is a habit I have developed for my tools on QUASH! so that my teammates can easily use my tools. I find it very useful to do this for features as well because it allows me to review my logic and know its limits.
Writting
Writting
We use dialogues to introduce our characters and expose their personalities, their goals, and their stakes. The player's actions with the protagonists are marked by an interaction, an exchange between the characters reinforcing the immersion and the experience of living the adventure of a duo.
Dialogues are also used to guide the player through the levels. Thus, the characters mark the signage elements that are in place. They can also intervene during the puzzle phases by giving clues through input.
To estimate the count of dialogs needed, we've analyzed the game and the possible location/moment where dialogs can intervene to give feedback, information, or enhance the narrative. Then, we've established their necessity and give them their level of priority. That way when a decision has to be made whenever a dialog is more important than another one, we can quickly decide.
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In order to evaluate the dialogues, several extracts are written and recorded in French. Then, after having implemented them, it is easier to evaluate approximately the number of lines of dialogues to be written for the whole game (obviously this estimation evolves according to the level design).
After this process is done, I start to write dialogs that have a higher level of priority. That way, we can then implement them (and even make a custom recording of ourselves) in order to confirm their importance in the game. Thanks to the playtest we affine our list and tweak our dialogs to respond to the players' needs and actions.
Once the dialogues are validated, I enter them into a document for the attention of our dubbers. I add descriptions of the acting situation for each dialogue, indications of acting on each line, and a folder on the Drive so that the dubbers can put their recordings there, but also listen to those of others.
Finally, I inform the dubbers concerned about the presence of new lines of dialogue to be recorded.
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Dubbing
The dubbing also reinforces the player's empathy for our protagonists Lence & Reel. You can feel the complicity in the duo thanks to the acting of our dubbers. To add dubbing, I had to prepare and gather all the necessary elements to launch the castings.
To prepare the dubbing, several dialogue excerpts were written and then selected to judge the range of emotions of each candidate in addition to their concordance with the characters.
For writing, I use Celtx by creating a shared file. This way, we can easily work together and leave each other comments.
Casting & Dubbing
Here is an excerpt of the dubbers selected for the characters (Carmina MANLEY & Arianna FOX respectively dubbing LENCE for the cameraman & REEL for the filmed character)
00:00 / 01:39
To best capture the complicity between our two protagonists, I asked the actors to record in pairs so that each could respond to the other's performance.
Due to the time difference between our dubbers (USA) and ourselves (France), we could not set up remote recording sessions. However, we proposed they set up, on their side, these remote sessions to obtain the best result for the recording of the dialogues.
Once their recordings are uploaded, the voice actors notify me about new recordings that are directly processed by our sound designer. Recorded lines have a "Recorded" status on the list so that they can be easily spotted. If retakes are necessary, I notify the voice actors by giving them new indications, and I change the status of the "Recorded" lines to "Retake".
Camera
Like Brothers: Tales of Two Sons, the game requires you to control a duo with a single gamepad. The difference is that one of the characters carries the game's camera. We find the perception of a game in the 1st person mixed with the navigation of a character in the 3rd person.
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Special attention is given to the camera's feedback to support its tangible aspect. The player must feel the presence of a cameraman at the controls of the game's camera and direct him in a 3D world.
Camera
A default configuration appeared; the one where the cameraman targets the filmed character and moves around it. The difficulty of this mode lies in the lateral and backward movements, as the player has no visibility in these directions.
Another mode is proposed in parallel where the cameraman moves as in a first-person game. This mode has been added to address the frustration of most players not being able to move their gaze without having to reposition the filmed character.
A configuration system and an architecture have been set up with the Lead Programmer to facilitate the creation of different control modes (using a Data Table). For example, a mode where the filmed character is automatically followed by the cameraman or a mode where the cameraman does not move anymore unlike the filmed character, etc.
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A "pawn" manages all the "characters". While the inputs are managed with interfaces, the characters are generated, referenced as "actor" and assigned to the "pawn". This architecture allows us to modify the assigned actors for others at any time, as in an exotic sequence where the controls change.
Camera feedbacks work by using "curve" and "timeline". All the curves are gathered in a DataTable allowing the game designers to easily customize them, and to vary the feedback by offering several versions.
Characters' interactions and thus player's agency is expressed with a dynamic dialog system. It allows us to react to any player's actions such as stoping one character or another or both of them.
Dialogue triggered by the collision of the characters
Dialogue resuming after an interruption
Dialogue triggered when a character is too far from the other one
Signs
Signs
The orientation of the player in the levels responds to a desire to lighten the player's mental load. Several signs are necessary: both to guide the player to the next level and to indicate the right points of view.
Hooks belonging to the parents, and used for the grappling hook by the filmed character are placed in the path of the player. This solution marks key positions for the player's progress and literally puts the characters on the trail of their parents.
Other graphic elements indicate the right path to take, such as ruined path remains, colorful frescoes, "god rays" or the layout of the level composing the cameraman's frame.
The protagonists' dialogues guide the player in his progress. During puzzles, for example, the characters interact during the success of a workshop, or, when the player is blocked, they highlight our clue system.
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A system of eye weight on the camera allows the level designer to bring the eye to a specific point whenever he wants. Particularly useful when the player asks for a clue, the camera turns towards the next level or workshop.
Credits
Many thanks to the whole team!
Without whom this project would not be possible.
as
Artistic Director
& Character Designer
as
Lead Game Programmer
as
Lead Game Designer
as
Environment Artist
as
Environment Artist
as
Technical/VFX Artist
as
Animator
as
Technical Game Designer
as
Level Designer
as
Level Designer
Eugène Abadi
as
Sound Designer
as
Composer
Sound Designer
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