Next Day Delivery
Summary
A first person stealth puzzle game. After accidentally falling into a secret warehouse whilst fixing a smart elevator, the player must avoid security and sneak past office “compliance” drones in order to escape without being terminated (literally).
The game was developed in Unity Engine over 5 months by The Cluck Collective, a team of 12 formed as part of my first year of university. The game was published on Itch.io in May 2020 and was voted best game from our year by the student cohort.
My responsibilities were mainly in Level Design and Narrative Design: drafting puzzles, building blockouts in engine, and incorporating the game’s narrative into the level progression and via the environment.
Poster and Sign design by Lyra Shillabeer
Game Concept
The player plays as a contracted repairman who unintentionally finds themselves in a secret and extremely secure warehouse owned by their employer. As the player searches for a way to escape, they discover that the employees here are under constant watch by armed security drones, and are abused for maximum efficiency.
The player must avoid detection from the drones (who will shoot unauthorised personnel) by hiding, monitoring their patrol routes and throwing objects to distract their attention. Certain devices in the warehouse can be hacked via a rhythm minigame, which will aid in the player’s escape.
The player’s choices are limited in order to create a threatening and suspenseful environment. There’s strictly no combat or sudden movement, with the focus on puzzle solving and using wits to outsmart enemy drones.
My Contribution
I helped design the layout and puzzles for level 2A (the main warehouse) which was used for the final version of the game. I also designed and blocked out level 2B (Employees Quarters), which didn’t reach the implementation phase.
I contributed to writing the game’s narrative and with planning how story elements will be introduced throughout each level.
I was the primary scene decorator. Using the asset pack created by the team’s artists, I implemented the majority of the game’s environment.
I collaborated closely with engineers to identify and find solutions to bugs throughout development. I also managed playtests and gathered general feedback, helping the team to fix bugs and iterate on the game’s design.
Achievements and Challenges
One of my main contributions to this project was testing the game. This primarily involved getting stuck in with the latest build after the teams engineers implemented or updated features, then reporting issues I found via a Bug Board. I categorised bugs with a lettering system (S, A, B and C), which aided the team in prioritising how to spend time bug fixing. I also directly spoke to engineers about issues I found with their systems, which helped to maintain the game’s intended design. Through these discussions I acquired a grasp of the technical side of game development, which was new to me in this project.
This role also allowed me to make improvements to the game’s design that we had not considered. For example, I discovered that our rhythm minigame (which used letters to differentiate between inputs) was quite difficult for one of my friends who is dyslexic, which led to the team adding more differentiation to the assets used in the minigame.
A key element of Next Day Delivery is the threatening atmosphere and feeling of vulnerability. To support this, one of our main design pillars is that the player shouldn’t be able to force their way through the game and has to think in order to progress.
We adhered to this when designing mechanics and areas in the level. There are lots of ways to sneak past drones such as crawling under shelves, throwing objects to distract them, or circumventing their patrol routes; But there are no ways to fight the drones, and the player can only run if spotted. However, if the player sneaks to an above platform, it is possible to destroy a drone if they time dropping a heavy object on top of them.
Following 2A which introduces the warehouse’s extreme security, Level 2B was going to develop on the game’s dark tone by showing how the tight security affects the facility’s staff. 2B is centred around getting into the staff break room, which is guarded by drones and requires hacking the warehouse clock to make it ‘break time’, a short window of time where the drones will move out of the way of the entrance. This level was going to include multiple examples of environmental story telling which present how the staff are abused, such as rationed food in the break room, small cell like quarters for sleeping and a noticeable lack of bathrooms.
Whilst the team felt this would be a valuable addition to the game, 2B ended up being cut in order to put more time into polishing and completing level 2A before the Falmouth Games Academy Expo 2020.