“Miss” is a single-player quest in Fallout 4. The player is invited to explore a haunted mansion to unravel the mystery of the family by collecting bobbleheads in different areas of the mansion. After collecting all bobbleheads, the player will confront the man behind everything and decide the fate of the family.
Gallery
Design Goals
Immersive Horror Experience
-
The level tries to evoke the player's sense of horror using various element
-
On the most basic level, the mansion contains ghouls - some are roaming around while others are lurking in the corner and are ready to jump-scare the player at the right moment.
-
-
Narrative-wise, the plot keeps the player engaged and forms different hypotheses on what happened to the family. Soon the player will find out those speaking bobbleheads are family members of the mansion trapped inside of those toys, which strengthens the suspension as the player eagers to find out why.
-
The player learns about the family in form of conversation with each bobblehead after completing each area and optional narrative notes throughout the space.
-
Each family members have unique personalities and desires, which are reflected through the dialogues, bobblehead representation, and gameplays specific to the area
-
The level keeps track of tension and release so that the player will not get tired after seeing too many horror elements consecutively in a short amount of time.
-
At the end of each area, the player always returns to the lobby, which is large, bright, and contains no enemies, which provides a sense of safety, making the next area's horror elements more effective.
Effective Hub & Spokes Design
-
The Mansion consists 5 unique areas
-
Lobby
-
Storage/Garage
-
Kitchen/Garden
-
Bedrooms
-
Lab
-
-
In each area resides a bobblehead represented by a family member that the player needs to collect.
-
E.g., Lockpick Bobblehead represents Grandpa Bo who is a locksmith with a painting hobby. In his garage area, the player needs to use lockpicking skills to find keys as well as push painting to reveal hidden rooms.
-
-
The player starts at the lobby, which is the hub area where the player keeps return to after completing each spoke area. The barter bobblehead (Uncle Charlie) is available in the lobby for the player to exchange gold bars for extra items.
Returning through catwalks on top after surviving the maze below
Shortcut back to the Lobby
-
Multiple level techniques are used, such as shortcuts, reuse of space, and framing, to help the player naturally find the way back to the lobby after completing each area.
-
The level includes some supernatural elements such as talking bobbleheads, weird paintings, and unsettling lighting. Yet, at the beginning of the level, the little girl seems calm and wants to play hide and seek with the player, which creates a sense of eerie.
Kitchen - Mother Eva (Medicine Bobblehead)
Desire - Save his missing daughter
Gameplay - Surviving poison gas in garden maze
Garage - Grandpa Bo (Lock Picking Bobblehead)
Desire - His hobbies
Gameplay - Lockpicking/hidden path puzzle
Bedroom - Cousin Daemon (Sneak Bobblehead)
Desire - Play more hide and seek with his sister
Gameplay - Hide and seek
Lobby - Uncle Charlie (Barter Bobblehead)
Desire - Wealth
Gameplay - Trade gold bars for goods
Incentivizing Exploration
-
The level features a barter in the lobby, which asks the player to find gold bars for him. Gold bars are spread around the mansion, and often placed in hidden spots or optional rooms.
-
The player is required to give the barter bubblehead 3 gold bars to pick him up as a part of the 4 bobblehead collection.
-
The gold bar trade system is custom-made in the editor
-
There are a total of 9 gold bars available in the mansion. The extra gold bars, the player found, can be used to exchange for extra items with the barter.
-
So that if the player finds the level a bit hard, the player is always welcome to explore the mansion more to find gold bars and exchange more items for an easier time.
-
-
Besides gold bars, there are also narrative notes and other supplies to be found.
Postmortem
What Went Wrong
-
Pacing in the Early Stage. In early milestones. I spend a lot of time setting up ambushes for each ghoul. As a result, the pacing is not very good as players got tired of jump scares really quickly. To fix this, I change some ghouls to make them roam around and make sure the overall difficulty increases gradually.
-
Lighting. In the development, lighting was an issue as the player cannot see much when the environment is too dark, but there is not enough pressure when the rooms are well-lit. It took several iterations before the lighting reaches a good balance between the two.
What Went Well
-
Atmosphere Building. With the eerie setting and creepy lighting, the players often commented that they felt horror in various moments.
-
Player Navigation. The level requires a lot of reuse of space, and the player needs to turn around often, but, with lighting, signs, and a clever layout, players are able to find the correct and flow through spaces naturally.
-
Work Efficiency. With the experience from the previous project, I am much more familiar with the editor as well as more adept in level layout. This time, I was able to nail down the overall flow quickly in White Box, which saves me time from making big changes later in the development.
What I Learned
-
Determining the Level Layout first. During implementation, if the level layout is good enough, so that big changes are not needed, a lot of development time can be saved to polish other aspects of the level. In addition, a good level layout is a natural conveyance to help the player through spaces.
-
Playtesting with Different People. Some major bugs may not occur when playtesting by myself multiple times, but when some other playtesters play the level, they may find the problem in the first playthrough as everyone plays a game differently.