Underworld Pharmacy
Key Words: Simulation Game, Choise orientation, Strategy, Multiple Endings
Apr. 2024 - May 2024
Skills: Git, Unity, C#, YarnSpinner
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This is a creation for BooomJam, developed within 3 weeks.
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Our game was showcased at G-Fusion Game Carnival 2024 in Guangzhou, China.
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As the lead programmer, my main job was to built the entire dialogue system, integrate the whole process and manage multiple endings.
Play online & download exe on itch.io!
Video
Game Concept
「 Life, Death and Balance 」
Ⅰ Brainstorm
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The theme of gamejam is Side Effect.
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We proposed several independent gameplay mechanics, and ultimately refined upon the basis of the potion craft gameplay.
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Ⅱ Theme
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Soul: In the underworld, the appearance of souls vary widely. Some appear as banana, while some might take the form of camera. These forms are shaped by their strongest fetters and memories while living.
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The Logic of 'Self': At first, as a homebody, I feel thrilled to become a pretty girl after death and be unwilling to return to the living world. However, through the process of dealing with various customers and learn their story, I realize that there are side effects for fulfilling desires. Moreover, being a beautiful girl comes with its own struggles. I don't want to betray my conscience and I'm willing to satisfy the desires of others.
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Selection: There is no perfect selection. How to manage the pharmacy and deal with guests depends entirely on yourself. After 5 days of operation, how will you choose the path of your life in the following time?
Ⅲ Reference
Papers, please
Emotional Choices, Moral Orientation
Potion Craft
Pharmaceutical Gameplay, Dialogue System
VA-11 Hall-A: Cyberpunk Bartender Action
Simulation Management, Narrative Experience
Game Visual
Game Flow
Hint:
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Every day, the Oven Bear will bring different goods to update the entire store.
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Not every customer comes to buy potions.
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Meeting some hidden prerequisites may lead to special dialogues!
Story
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Finally off work, I was exhausted and decided to get a drink to relieve my stress.
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I just noticed people burning papers, and realized today is Mid-July Ghost Festival.
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There are far fewer customers today, maybe because of Ghost Festival.
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Nonetheless, I still have a glass of Old Boatman beer.
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My vision suddenly become blurry. Wait! Is there something wrong with the beer?
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Alright, when I regained consciousness, I found myself in the underworld.
Core Mechanism
Ⅰ Potion Pipeline Computation Rule
Ⅱ Various Effects of Materials
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Potions are composed of 3 key elements: Wealth, Health, and Talent, and there is a restraining relationship among them.
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Some advanced materials have other useful effects, including 6 categories: Basic, Multiply(once), Multiply(all), Temperature, By-product and Devour.
Level Design
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As the number of business days increases, new mechanisms (new materials) are introduced.
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Different mechanisms need to be combined to meet the customer's requirements.
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Technical Details
Ⅰ Dialogue System
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The dialogue system is built with YarnSpinner, which is a powerful tool for writing dialogue in games.
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Yarn is a language that make it easy to create interactive dialogue for games. Yarn Spinner interprets the Yarn language, and is written in C#.
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So we can write dialogue scripts with a .yarn extension and call C# functions within the script, as well as call parameters from yarn scripts in C# scripts.
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Ⅱ Dynamic Potion
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In order to provide players with a more immersive experience, we will dynamically generate the obtained potions, with different bottles and different colored contents filled.
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The sprite of the bottle, the conditions for switching bottles, and the colors representing each attribute can all be conveniently customized.
