This is a Live Action Online Game, that takes 90 minutes to play with 10 players and two Storytellers / NPCs.
The game was created in 2021 for an in-company event at the company I worked, with a colleague, then we repeated it for friends. After the first run we made some changes based on the first iteration: the gameplay became longer, we added new information to the character backgrounds, filled in some plot holes. (And translated from English to Hungarian, then back for a third run.)
The Story
A spaceship is struck before landing due to a dead body of a customs inspector who boarded the ship.
Before learning about the crime itself, the crew had already dealt with a fire on the ship, then the Captain realized that there had been a serious air leak – so they ordered everyone in their cabins to lock themselves up, to contain air. They have 90 minutes left, and the countdown starts.
Key features
10 players should play it – each has their own backstory written, that contains their situation, a brief description about their characters, and a little longer about the events that lead to the emerging situation during the game. Everybody has their own agenda, and each of them did something that they wouldn’t like to share with the others.
The game is played entirely through video chat (Teams or Discord), and in real time.
The stakes are high, because if they don’t solve the crime in one way or in another, they all will perish – but other than survival they don’t have a common “optimal” goal.
There are two NPCs in the game, played by us, who are detrimental to the solutions – each can offer a way out of the situation, but only a portion of players would benefit from those further. During the game we ran a workshop at the beginning to ease the players into the game (and teach them about role-playing), maintained the video-chat setup and the intended “glitches” in it, answered incoming questions, and generally listened to the game itself.
My tasks
- Developed game’s fictional story, lore and characters
- Wrote one pager character descriptions
- Wrote instructions and rules for the players
- Wrote briefs for the lore
- Prepared short in-game messages
- Produced and wrote a trailer and a starting video for the game
- Produced a soundtrack for the videos and for the game
Tools I used
- Onenote, MS World
- White board
- Adobe Premiere Pro
- Mixcraft 9
- MS Teams / Discord
Ágnes Fábián 