Omw is a single-player walking simulation vertical slice where the player takes on the role of a Scandinavian teen who has to find his way home amidst family and social drama. Armed with only a cellphone. Will you make it home?
Created as my 2nd-year project at Uppsala University's GAME program.
Genre: Walking Simulation
Time: 8 Weeks (2019)
Size: 7 Developers
Engine: Unity (2018.3)
Game Length: 10-15 min
Nominations: GGC Narrative
My Contributions
Narrative Design
Scrum Master
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Sprint Planning
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Manage Trello
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Team Contract
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Marketing & PR
Narrative Pillars
Cellphone
The tool for communication, all narrative is told through texting.
Teenagers
Narrative focus on interactions between teens and teen-life.
Staying Connected
The player always has someone to communicate with.
Character Design
The World
omw is set in a "Scandinavian" country. The character names, architecture, and atmosphere are inspired by Norwegian norms.
The Characters
The teens of omw drive the narrative forward. They assist, berate, entertain, harass, threaten, and frame the protagonist's status in this world. Each character has their own communication style, complete with general slang, emoji usage, and tone.
William (age 14)
The protagonist. William is at the center of this story. Known as an introverted passionate musician by his peers and a carefree rebellious teen by his family. Low-status social standing.
In the original design, William suffers from an overactive imagination that can manifest as visions of terror when stressed or afraid. This concept was scrapped due to over scoping.
Emma (age 17)
The authoritarian dispatcher. Emma is William's supervisor, liable for his academic success, behavior, and tardiness. Practically William's second mother. Medium-status social standing.
Elias (age 14)
The tempter sidekick. As William's oldest friend, the two share the same social standing. Elias is a loud and extroverted force in William's life, who influences his behavior negatively.
Hugo (age 18)
The antagonist. Hugo is charismatic, egotistical, and considered as high-status. To William, Hugo is the classic "alpha male" bully who uses his force of will to influence their peers.
The original outline has unfortunately gone missing.
Astrid (age 15)
The loveable friend. A new friend to William, the two have bonded over a shared passion for music. They support each other emotionally and posses a strong platonic friendship. Medium-status.
Mom (age 53)
The distant oppressor. The adoptive mother of William and Emma. She treated both as adults from the beginning, a parenting style that worked only for Emma. Considers William a failure.
Isn't present in the game's dialogue, only in past conversation.
Story Outline
Disclaimer:
The story of omw is split into five separate acts. The vertical slice covers three of these acts. Tentative plans of continued development were cancelled, thus, leaving us with an incomplete game.
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Hover over the acts below for the full story outline and details of the first three acts.
The preliminary draft of the five-act story outline of omw.
Act 0: Setting the Scene
Over winter break, Astrid hosts a party while her parents are out of town, Elias and William are both invited. The two have planned a classic air horn seat prank for Astrid and are eager to pull it off. When William arrives, he turns off his phone with plans to ignore the curfew set by his sister.
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The night of festivities proceeds, until eventually, an hour past curfew, William turns on his phone only to receive a barrage of texts from his sister demanding he get home. With little choice, William prepares to set off on the long, cold journey. The game begins with William facing the door leading out of Astrid's house.
Act 1: Astrid's Party
William can choose to ignore Emma's texts or interact with her before leaving the party. The player is allowed to move either when William writes "omw" or chooses to stop responding to Emma. Once the door is thrown open, act 1 ends.
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During this early act the player has the opportunity to look through the previous text conversations between William and the rest of the cast.
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In addition, the player can choose to let Elias and/or Astrid know of the Williams situation before he heads off.
Act 2: Winter Walk
Jumping Astrid's fence, the only audible sounds are the low beats of party music and the earsplitting blast of an air horn. Passing by a suspicious red car, William receives messages from Elias who is eager to hear William's reaction to the prank. The player can have conversations with both Elias and Emma as they're guided towards a shortcut.
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The act continues until William enters the shortcut. Astrid and Hugo begin texting William. Halfway through the winding path, the sound of a car driving off are audible. Elias alerts you that Hugo triggered the air horn trap and "jokingly" drove off to find William. The path ends as William finds the same suspicious car awaiting him.
Act 3: Signs of Danger
The car lights are on, illuminating the long road. No sign of Hugo. This is the beginning of Hugo's revenge prank. As the player continues forward they will come to a long tunnel leading under the road.
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This is where omw the game ends.
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Traveling through the tunnel William will hear sounds of a struggle behind him. Shouting for help, the voice trails off and a laugh can be heard. William's imagination kicks in and fear spurs him forward. Act 3 ends as William leaves the tunnel.
Act 4: The Maze
Hugo's master plan is to fake his own death, text William under the guise of a serial killer recently made the news, and follow William on foot to scare the shit out of him.
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William's over active imagination begins to manifest his fears into reality. Creating shadowy figures who are skulking about the maze of apartment buildings.
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As William progresses the maze becomes much more complex and the figures seem to chase him. The player unlocks the sprint feature and can put distance between themselves and the manifestations of fear.
Act 5: Running Home
Breaking out of the maze, William no longer looks at his phone as he sprints into an open field. The screams of Hugo amplify the fear factor causing path to close in on the player as shadowy manifestations attempt to catch William.
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Fear of getting caught paralyzes William, causes him to black out.
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If William makes it out of the field untouched, he collapses at the front door of his house as the game slowly fades to black. Either way, omw ends with William blacking out. The last sounds the player hears is that of an ambulance and a text message notification.
Game Narrative
Personal Motivation
The challenge of creating a complex phone-based narrative game was the factor that initially drew me into this project. As I began working, I fell in love with the relationship forming between William and his contacts.
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Each contact brings out a different side or "mask" of William. I drew parallels between my experience with online communication and began basing the texting styles of the characters off my own contacts. This created a personal connection to the game and allowed me to express specific masks of myself.
Emulating a Phone
My goal was for the dialogue system and conversations to mirror the experience of texting in real life. I've emulated the experience with the following design choices:
Past Conversations, Ghosting & Double Texting, Texting Goofs, Sharing Information, Real-Life Element, and Small Details.
Act 0: Astrid's conversation history.
Ghosting & Double Texting
Like real life, the player can choose to ignore the messages of any contact.
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Motivated by anger, worry, boredom, and irritation. Contacts will continue texting the players. Total ghosting of all contacts will rack up to 30 missed messages.
(14)
Elias' phone gets taken away from him by Hugo, during this time he cannot respond to the player's messages.
Sharing Information
Once William has learnt information or heard a particular story, he can share that information with other contacts.
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Elias tells William a scary story featuring Danny DeVito, later William can share that same story with Astrid.
Real-Life Elements
Three of William's contacts are attending the same party.
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Hugo will use this to his advantage when making idle threats towards William.
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When Hugo throws Elias' phone in the snow, Astrid will lend Elias her phone.
Small Details
Hugo has a top of the line cellphone with emojis which don't register on William's phone, instead showing up as "?" in circles.
Past Conversations
To fully understand the relationships between William and his contacts, players can scroll up to view past conversations.
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I created act 0 to give players the opportunity to read each contact's history with no stress.
Texting Goofs
William's phone is an older model which lacks autocorrect.
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Some texts that he sends will have small grammar or spelling errors.
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Likewise, other contacts will misspell words and get sloppy when texting quickly.
Example Conversations
Below you will find two examples of dialogue in omw. On the left we have William getting directional advice from Elias, and on the right is a simple conversation with Astrid.
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