Issue # 2 - World Building

Ever since I was little, I loved building imaginary worlds. Whether it was creating a superhero dystopia in my Super Ninja comic book or inventing a language like a crappy teenage Tolkien, I could always lose myself in the planning and shaping of another universe. I think that is why I started my game-making process with the map. If I wanted the world of the game to be believable, I need to create the space, history, and peoples within. Once those were established, the story and gameplay could follow.

I created the first little gameplay seen above in 2020 and technically this is the first room every created for Barty's Adventure. That room is still in the game! Designing the level itself was simple, but all of the questions that came from this small space sent my mind into forty directions at once. I needed enemies now that I had a player moving in a space, and what better than the thousands of future dirty diapers people were constantly warning me about. Remember this was 2020, and for me that meant harrowing thoughts of all of the changes this new human would bring into my life. It was with this mindset that turned this one room into an entire area filled with dirty diaper monsters and sludge-filled hallways. It was gross!

Not wanting to make an entire game revolving around my daughter's bathroom habits, I expanded my focus. Hollow Knight is a huge inspiration for the adventuring portion of the game, and I wanted to make something on a similar scale as far as world-size is concerned. Hollow Knight is amazing in so many ways, but what hit hardest for me was the ability for you to think you hit the edge of the world, only for there to be another whole section of the map waiting to be unlocked. I wanted to mimic this feeling in Barty's Adventure, which means that I needed a good amount and variety of biomes.

I also wanted to base it in a somewhat believable and connected space. So it only made sense to look around my own newly-purchased home for inspiration. Each room could have it's own themed biome, while still tailoring them to some of the expected tropes of the metroidvania genre. The Bath is the obligatory water level, Underbed is your caves/dark level, and the Kitchen holds some platforming challenges. I drew out each biome, room by room, in order to plan the entire framework of the world, and then over the course of a year created each room in Gamemaker with it's own aesthetic.

But as interesting as I tried to make the biomes, they're still just areas if they aren't populated. I'll get more into the characters of the game in a future issue, but to keep things fresh I wanted to have a unique side story occurring in each of these worlds. For instance, the Foodies in the Kitchen get rotten over time and a war will break out in the Playroom if you don't take steps to stop it. With these stories relying on time-associated events, it naturally led me to look deeper into clockwork games (aka games that run on a specific schedule that often involve a timeloop). It's strange to break it down like this, but the entire three day cycle generated from wanting to make my world a more believable place.

Understanding my history and background, I guess it only makes sense that I had a worldbuilding-focused development strategy. Focusing on the strange new world, and attempting to base the history and story in real emotions is my favorite part about this whole process. And in the end, I think the world of The House will really shine through in the people and places I've brought to life. I hope you enjoy your visit!

Thanks and talk soon! 😄

This newsletter is an update series for the development of the game Barty's Adventure. If you are interested in continuing the conversation, please join the community Discord server: https://discord.gg/M7p2Mtgkyx. Your input in these early stages of the game are invaluable and much appreciated. Thanks!