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The Broken Record Design Overview
The Broken Record Design Overview
The Broken Record is a first-person narrative game. The player explores an abandoned apartment in the hopes of finding answers regarding the disappearance of their friend and former roommate.
The Broken Record was created for a one-week Game Jam with the theme "Unreliable Narrator."
As a way to reinforce the player character's uncertainty of what occurred, I adjusted the scale and arrangement of in-game objects to create a disorienting feeling, as even the player's own perception of the game world becomes "unreliable."
Apartment Layout Grayboxing
Apartment Layout Grayboxing
After establishing the game's setting as an abandoned apartment, I began creating a graybox layout of the game world. The resulting layout resulted in six prominent POIs: the bedroom, the living room, the window, the dining room, the kitchen, and the painting.
Bird's-Eye View
Bird's-Eye View
Pictured above, the player capsule is centered in the apartment. Since our narrative for the game revolved around information coming to light, the most prominent feature of the design was a window, pictured north of the player. As the player progresses through the level, this window slowly lets in more light.
Living Room Graybox
Living Room Graybox
Pictured above, the early living room layout remained relatively unchanged, aside from new props being implemented to make the space seem inhabited prior to the events of the game.
Dining Room Graybox
Dining Room Graybox
Pictured above, the early dining room layout remained relatively unchanged. Experimenting with scale and proportions, the wide kitchen pictured to the right of the dining table contrasts with the narrow space of the dining table itself.
Apartment Prop Placement
Apartment Prop Placement
Once the layout was finalized, new props were added to each room, which the player would be able to interact with. While some of the pictured props are not interactable, I placed them around the apartment for their purpose in environmental storytelling, detailed below.
Note: The screenshots of these placed props are prior to the lighting and skybox added in-engine.
Bedroom POI Props
Bedroom POI Props
The Bedroom POI is unique from other locations of the apartment in being a separate room. Given its distance from the window, the player has access to a bed, lamp, and dresser prop. The room is sparsely decorated, reflecting its abandonment.
Wall Artwork
Wall Artwork
The Wall Artwork pictured above is located near the Dining Room POI. Alongside other environmental props, including a guitar and record player, these concert and album posters subtly reinforce the bond of music shared by the apartment's roommates.
Lighting the Apartment
Lighting the Apartment
After all props were placed in the apartment, the final priority became how to light the scene.
Since the primary light source of the game is the boarded window, the apartment itself had to physically block out all light from the in-game skybox until the game's conclusion.
To balance player visibility in being able to navigate the apartment layout as well as maintain the narrative pillar of information "coming to light," the window itself was partially covered, allowing slivers of light to enter the room. I also placed additional light sources to assist the player in navigating the rooms.
Dining Room POI Lighting
Dining Room POI Lighting
The Dining Room POI is located relatively close to the window. To help players navigate the room, a dim light was placed above the room itself, allowing players to see the wall artwork and kitchen.
Living Room POI Lighting
Living Room POI Lighting
Similar to the Dining Room, the Living Room POI was partially illuminated by the window. However, to assist with player navigation, a faint light was placed above the couch.
Bedroom POI Lighting
Bedroom POI Lighting
Since the Bedroom POI is fully blocked from the window's light, the room required two faint light sources: the ceiling light and lamp. These lights are a compromise to the game's narrative and level design, as they allow for navigation without fully losing the feeling of being left in the dark of the game's central mystery.
Kitchen POI Lighting
Kitchen POI Lighting
The Kitchen POI is intentionally dimly lit. Once the player removes all boards from the window, the light floods into this area. The most prominent prop of this location is the painting, which is barely visible on the wall to the right of the kitchen counter. This intentional darkness resolves once the window is unboarded.
Sealed Window POI Lighting
Sealed Window POI Lighting
Upon starting the game, the window is boarded up by prop boards. As the player investigates the apartment, the boards slowly remove and allow light in, which leads to the game's conclusion.
Open Window POI Lighting
Open Window POI Lighting
Serving as the central POI for The Broken Record, the window lets in golden rays of light once its boards are removed. The result of the window's placement allows the light to shine upon the back of the apartment, which is the location of the Painting POI.
Dark Painting POI
Dark Painting POI
Like the window, the Painting POI is intentionally obscured from the player by the lack of light.
Once the player removes all boards, the Painting POI becomes fully visible and functionally serves as a beacon for the game's conclusion.
Interestingly, the painting was also created to be notably more detailed than the props around it, reinforcing the player character's newfound clarity.
Light Painting POI
Light Painting POI
When working with this prop, I added a lighting property to the painting to glow regardless of whether the player obscures the light or not.
Not only does this serve as breadcrumbing for the game's conclusion, but it also contributes to the player's unreliable view of the game world in seeing something glow without light.
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