BA4: Game Design Document #13

Phobias & Symptoms

Here is the research I have done on phobias and symptoms which will all bare an impact on our main character while she is in the hell museum. 

To begin with, here is a list of very common phobias people have which I think will fit nicely into our game. 

Phobias

Acrophobia: Fear of itching or of the insects that cause itching.

Possible fear linking back to X's childhood caused from neglect and bad interactions with insects.

Achluophobia: Fear of darkness.

Common phobia, X could just generally have a fear of the darkness; this will be helpful concerning gameplay.

Acrophobia: Fear of heights.

Could link nicely in with environments or monsters in the game being tall/doors opening to vast falls. 

Aeroacrophobia: Fear of open high places.

Another linking in with environment, top floor of the museum and large, eerie open rooms.

Agateophobia: Fear of insanity or becoming insane.

Relates to X and the fact that the game is about her possible  mental illness from repressed memories, bad family, psychotic episode etc. 

 

Arachnophobia: Fear of spiders.

General common phobia, could link in with character/monster design and effect gameplay.

 

Automatonophobia: Fear of ventriloquist's dummies, animatronics' creatures, wax statues or anything that represents a being that appears to have feelings or perceptions.

This just sounded creepy to me and could affect anything in the game.

 

Autophobia: Fear of being alone, by oneself or solitude.

X is all alone in her life, her Granddad has died and her parents are useless. The hell museum is a metaphor for this anyway which means this could be seen through clever gameplay mechanics.

 

Bacteriophobia: Fear of bacteria.

Could link in with gameplay mechanics and environments.

Basiphobia or Basophobia: Fear of not being able to stand and walk.

If X is rendered unable to walk or takes damage in the hell museum then this could affect her further.

 

Batrachophobia: Fear of amphibians, such as frogs, newts, salamanders, etc.

Possible phobias from X's childhood, repressed memories coming back to haunt her of bad encounters with the above. Could be seen throughout the hell museum to cause panic for X.

 

Blennophobia: Fear of slime.

Something to consider with the environments.

 

Bogyphobia: Fear of the bogeyman.

May sound funny but perhaps the bogyman is a repressed memory/metaphor of the fear/hatred for her rubbish childhood and crappy family. 

 

Cenophobia or Cenotophobia: Fear of voids, empty rooms, barren spaces. (Kenophobia).

Links in nicely with the environment ideas we have for the game and how X would react when facing them.

Claustrophobia: Fear of confined spaces.

X could have this as a result of her childhood/just be something that she unfortunately suffers. It could affect the gameplay in interesting ways.

Cleisiophobia, Cleithrophobia or Clithrophobia: Fear of closed spaces or being locked in an enclosed place.

Similar to the above, could have a really unique way of affecting X when she encounters these types of environments in the hell museum.

Counterphobia: Term used to described those seeking a feared object or situation rather than avoiding it.

This could give us room for a lot of interesting gameplay elements, things that X feared when she was a young girl fall under this category as do other things that she might have repressed over the years. 

 

Daemonophobia or Demonophobia: Fear of demons.

Could link in with the monsters of our game; being demons of her imaginations, mental stability and repressed memories all in one.

Dementophobia: Fear of insanity or becoming insane. (Agateophobia, Maniaphobia)

Perhaps the further into her metaphorical insanity she goes (the hell museum) the more she fears what's actually going on and this could play and bare impact on the gameplay and things X witness's on her venture. 

 

Dermatophobia or Dermatopathophobia or Dermatosiophobia: Fear of skin disease, lesions, or cracks of the skin.

This could bear impact on the monsters and X's reactions to them, it could explain her behaviour towards the monsters.

Entomophobia: Fear of insects. (Insectiphobia, Insectophobia).

Another common phobia, again 1 that X could have picked up during her childhood and would affect her during her time in the hell museum being a part of gameplay and trickery to upset and confuse her.

Hadephobia: Fear of Hell. (Stigiophobia, Stygiophobia)

I thought this would work quite well on a metaphorical level, the hell  museum is a metaphor for everything bad in her life becoming un-repressed and manifesting itself inside the hell museum as a metaphor of her life. This is in turn, her own hell and she should be scared of it.

Herpetophobia or Herptophobia: Fear of reptiles or snakes.

Another common phobia we could use to impact the gameplay somehow.

Hormephobia: Fear of shock.

If something makes the player jump or shocks them then this could be an affect being pushed onto X as she makes her way through the hell museum. Her fear building up more and more from shocks dealt to her in various ways and form.

Homichlophobia: Fear of fog or humidity.

This would have a direct impact on the environments and is something we have already considered to be a crucial element of gameplay and environments. Whether we implement this into the gameplay mechanics or leave it as a given piece of information (X is in an uncomfortable setting, no need to slap a phobia on top of it; she is already scared) is yet to be discussed with my group. I just thought it was interesting as an stand alone phobia.

Hydrophobia: Fear of water.

A common phobia, another to link back to a possibly repressed memory, flashback or environment setting.

Insectiphobia or Insectophobia: Fear of insects or bugs.

Another common phobia which could be called in for when regarding the gameplay mechanics.

Isolophobia: Fear of solitude or being alone.

This would be an interesting phobia to play around with regarding gameplay. X will be alone for the gameplay (there are no companions or co - op options) so this could be the kind of thing that creeps in now and then in various forms to cause effect on the visual gameplay.

Kenophobia: Fear of voids, empty rooms, barren spaces.

Similar to another phobia mentioned previously but can be great influence when it comes to designing the environments and how X would react to them.

Keraunophobia or Ceraunophobia: Fear of thunder and lightning.

Another common phobia which could be used throughout the game to cause fear in X and have effect on the gameplay.

Ligyrophobia: Fear of sharp or loud noises.

Another common fear which could be played on when thinking of monsters and possible jump scares in the game. This will all have effects on the gameplay itself for both X and the player. 

  

Lygophobia: Fear of being in dark places or darkness.

Common fear in many people and will be used consistently throughout our game world to entice as much fear as possible in the player through use of X.

Maniaphobia: Fear of insanity, becoming insane or of seeing others who are mentally ill.

Similar to a fear mentioned previously but include the fear of seeing those mentally ill, do we consider her parents mentally unstable after the death of X's Fathers parents, the estrangement of X's Mothers parents AND the loss of their baby son? Maybe this is WHY X fears seeing those who are mentally ill for fear of her own sanity?

Methyphobia: Fear of alcohol, drinking alcohol or becoming an alcoholic.

Directly linked to her parents abusive nature towards alcohol and the fact they were borderline (practically full on) alcoholics in front of her.

Mycophobia: Fear of mushrooms.

Could be linked through to X's parents and their drug abuse (magic mushrooms?)

Necrophobia:Fear of corpses, death or dead things.

This could be played on heavily within the environments to cause fear in X and the player.

Neopharmaphobia: Fear of new drugs or medicines.

Links to X's parents drug (prescription and illegal) abuse.

Noctiphobia: Fear of the night.

Possible night time setting, perhaps something to do with a flashback causing this fear in X.

Ophthalmophobia: Fear of being stared at.

This could be linked to monster behaviours and could lead to scary gameplay for the player.

Phasmophobia: Fear of ghosts.

a fairly common phobia, could be used to cause fear in the environments.

Psychophobia: Fear of mind or psyche.

Fear of X's own mind just sounds clever and is the idea we are going for, it fits nicely into the narrative we have. She would literally fear herself (perhaps when she looks in the health mirrors).

Satanophobia:  Fear of Satan, Satanic control or devils.

Metaphor for the museum?

Sciaphobia or Sciophobia: Fear of shadows.

Used heavily in our environment design to create fear in the player and X. Could cause clever gameplay.

Selaphobia: Fear of flashing lights.

Jump scares for the player possibly? X could have a fear of flashing lights as a repressed memory of an ambulance taking her dead granddad away? (something like this anyway).

Stenophobia: Fear of narrow spaces.

Heavily focused on the environments here and the use of space when monsters are around to impact the gameplay for X. 

 

Teratophobia: Fear of monsters, bearing a deformed child or deformed people.

Fear of monsters is more what X would acquire while in the hell museum but fear of deformed people of children could link to her dead baby brother and his monster form in the museum?

Thanatophobia or Thantophobia: Fear of death or dying.

Perhaps there are moments where X thinks she has died and is in hell, the fear she faces just from the museum could be overwhelming and cause for things to happen gameplay mechanic wise.

Trypanophobia: Fear of injections.

Could link back to X's parents and their drug abuse, fits nicely with the idea of needle spawn environments which could then effect X's behaviour through gameplay. 

 

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I think these are really helpful, especially when I try to imagine just how the gameplay could b e effected by traits of X’s character and more specifically, her phobias. I will run these past the group and with them, try to narrow down the list so we can allocate them to X and her personality/character. 

Another element of X’s life, personality, repressed memories, crappy childhood etc will be this mental illness she is trying to escape in the hell museum. To represent this in gameplay we need to understand her symptoms and how they will be reflected in the game itself. 

 

We finally came to the conclusion (after one of our earlier group crits) that we shouldn’t *name* the mental illness X is suffering from in this museum but rather allocate her symptoms that she might suffer throughout the game (all of which affect the gameplay) which all point and hint towards an illness. This way we are left more room to manoeuvre with gameplay and our facts.

After some group discussion and research (all posted on my blog previously) we came to the conclusion to say that she is going through a “psychotic episode” that was triggered from her fall in the museum which is what causes her to fall into her alternate reality museum; a metaphor for possible mental illness creeping in as a result of her awful life. 

 

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Here are the symptoms often faced when going through an psychotic episode which I also think would work really well for the gameplay mechanics and influence how we affect X through the game and how she might react to certain situations. For now, here are the symptoms (semi finalised). 

Symptoms

Hallucinations/Delusions

Could cause X to hallucinate in her environment; maybe this causes flashbacks. Maybe she hallucinates positively but then ends up back in hell museum. Perhaps this is shown to the player in a 1st person perspective and can be genuinely terrifying; if you hallucinate monsters or shadows. 

Disturbing Thoughts

Disturbing thought could be seen through flashbacks, areas of environment could become infected (almost as if her mind is becoming infected). This could be seen through the 1st person perspective. 

Confusion

Confusion could be caused as a result of the player reading a note left by their sane or insane self throughout the museum. This confusion could be reflected through screen distortion obscured view. 

Lack of Self Awareness

Perhaps  her lack of self awareness could cause the character to do as they wish; perhaps the player wants her to go forwards but she jolts to the side instead, causing confusion in the player and showing the lack of self awareness in X. 

Disorganised or Incoherent Speech

Perhaps X tried to read at certain parts of the game but if the darkness has consumed her body too much then she starts to suffer from incoherent speech and  mumbles to herself during gameplay and is somehow dis organised (perhaps the map doesn’t appear how it should do?)

 

Strange Behaviour

Strange behaviour is interesting because we could do anything in terms of gameplay mechanics, have it affect the player an a variety of ways (strange movements, jerk reactions, camera flashes, random photos, things that will confuse the actual player). 

 

Slowed and Unusual Movements

Similar to that of the above, we could physically affect the gameplay so that the player is confused. We don’t want it to be annoying so we need to obviously work on this but the idea would be that X’s movement had a mind of its own as it tries to reflect this symptom. 

 

Possible Schizophrenia

I thought it would be cool to have a monster that mumbles and whispers when X is near it. Its almost like a physical warning that one of her “illness/symptom/phobia” monsters is near by and perhaps to be cautious? How scary would that be D: 

Now you have a better understanding of our ideas for how the illness could affect gameplay for both X and the player. I think there is lots we could do to make a genuinely horrific game. I really find these ideas inspiring for our game and its mechanics, I think we have room to concept up something truly unique and clever; an terrifying experience. Sure it still needs a lot of work but luckily I am in a dedicated team ;)

BRING IT ON!