Documentation 3 - Audiences and Game Design
Conclusion For This Week
The whole process of deciding the target audiences is kind of struggling, and it finally settled down for now. After several modifications and discussions, I have decided to target
Expecting Chinese/Asian/International Dads in the US(any situation that they look for help but they could not get one) as the primary target audiences.
New Chinese/Asian/International Dads in the US(any situation that they look for help but they could not get one) as the secondary target audience.
Any new/expecting dad who wants to know the information about Postpartum Depression as other target audiences.
Expecting and new moms who need to know about how to prevent and handle postpartum depression as other target audiences.
This is because,
I, as an Chinese international student, am more familiar with Chinese/Eastern culture. As we know, there are large differences between Estern and Western culture in terms of the way to raise a baby. The families in the US tend to raise the baby without help from their parents due to the individualism in the western culture, whereas Chinese families as well as other families in estern culture tend to raise a baby within a bigger family size. Due to the preset of this setting, Chinese new parents are more scared to raise a baby with less help, and the way they raise a baby requires more energy both physically and mentally compared to the western families.
Since the priming idea of raising a baby needs help and only new parents are not enough to raise a baby, Chinese new parents who could not get help from their families or any other ally could be a scary thing. Although this is more anxious than the reality, Chinese new parents need to be more prepared than others to properly navigate through the special period of time. Moreover, the complicity of raising a baby in a different culture may also confuse them. They may be raised up in a totally different environment than their babies. They don't know the way a native uses in the US nor they could not use the experience from their parents. This caused a lot more anxiety than they would imagine.
Due to the pandemic and many other reasons, many Chinese new parents are raising babies on their own. This creates a large amount of parents feeling helpless and anxious.
Another major change for the project is the game design. I had the very first version of the game design as a game where players would find out the whole story by talking to different people by texting them like Coming Out Simulator and Bury Me My Love. However, I found it hard to put stories together, and it is not interesting enough. Then I added face-to-face into the story telling that players could talk to some characters in the game. It would be more interactive and better communicate the ideas. However, the key mechanic is still to choose the right reaction to different events. Later, I came up with a totally different mechanic that I kept the game mechanics I have for the solution part and added the concept of time travelling and mini games for the prevention. This makes it easier for players to learn the solutions after having baby blues and preventions before they have one. I felt it would be more interesting. To better communicate the idea of the importance of preparation for mental health, I changed the way to tell the story by travelling back and forward in time so players should play the game for the first time only reaching the worst ending to unlock the better choices in the second game round. This allows them to further explore the game as well as the key concept of the game. They will find out the better ending by doing the correct selections. However, this leads to one problem: the development would be hard due to the mini game, and the first timeline would not be immersive enough and playable to only have interactive novels. So here is the final (so far) game design:
In the latest game design, players will play as a new dad who has a two months old baby. He has to make choices to balance the different variables(new parents’ mental health level, family household, baby’s wellness, time and stemina) to get a higher Overall Family Wellness Level. Within the game, they would face some difficult decisions that mimic the real life struggles. They will also experience pop up events that may disturb their plans and scores.
Players will play the game by experiencing the story twice. The first time gameplay would only reach to the Medium Ending and Bad Ending. They would unlock some better decisions in the second gameplay so that they would have the chances to reach the Happy Ending.
Higher scores are encouraged. A score leaning to some of the variables( like mental health(30/100)+family household(60/100) + baby wellness(90/100)) is not higher than even score (say, mental health(60/100)+family household(60/100)+baby wellness(60/100). Weight is applied to suming of the final scores.
I also have some design ideas about the game:
I would use a calendar in the main page that indicates the date, variables and different events. It would look like the real calendar that has many reminders on it. Moreover, the pop up events would not show on the calendar, and there would be a small animation indicating the characters living past the time instead of saying two weeks later.
The design of the character animation. The color would link to the mental health level. The higher they got, the higher the saturation the animation had.
The Next Steps
I will start writing down the scripts in the next week, while figuring out the flow chart of the game. I will also working on the mechanics. By the class of next week, I would have a rough pic of the game including the storytelling and mechanics. I will also working on the art to finalize the style of the art and find potential assets for game(images especially).
So, see you next week!