Overview

As the game is developed further, this section will grow to encompass the entirety of the finished game, detailing every single gameplay function that will exist, linking when necessary to every single narrative beat. Therefore, this overview will be used to provide basic information regarding the gameplay, as well as establish some core design tenets and logistical information, so that the reader can explore this section at will.

[A] Concept

The Way Things Were is largely inspired by narrative RPG’s such as Disco Elysium and the Persona series. However, keeping in mind the ways to tell stories in games, it tries to set linear narrative content within a framework which allows the player to freely encounter these stories at their own pace, as well as give them greater freedom of choice. As this is a smaller project, this feeling of choice is not created through increasing the number of paths in a discrete dialogue tree, but rather by gamifying the players narrative input. This creates the feeling of immense player agency and consequence, despite this data eventually being filtered down to similarly discrete narrative model which is actually implementable. Thus, in order to achieve this, the game incorporates elements of deckbuilders, deduction games, and action roguelikes. Additionally, know that the main driving force initially, as well as later in the game to a large extent, is the players engagement with the mysteries of the narrative.

Very briefly, the gameplay loop is as follows:

1. DAYTIME
   1. During the daytime, players can explore the semi-open world of Marangad, and talk to the various inhabitants. Here, they can gather information, and observe what happens in the town over the course of the week. Conversations happen in two ways. The first is a traditional dialogue tree system, and the second is a more gamified deckbuilder system. This is in order to accommodate easier conversations which do not necessarily require any skill or knowledge, as well as more intense encounters where the player may be aiming to confront, barter, or lie to someone who is hostile towards them. NPCs begin, depending on their attitude towards the player, with one of these two systems, and as they become more familiar with the player, or more aggressive towards them, they may transition from one to the other.
   2. Without going into detail, there are two types of cards that can be obtained during this section: information-based and archetype-based. Information cards are people, places, things, dates, mysteries, etc. Archetype cards are obtained during particularly intense conversations with people, and revolve around personality and emotion. Each main archetype card (think Pokémon) also has a number of archetype skill cards associated with it (skills of that Pokémon).
   3. There is a journal players can access during this section, which contains a transcript of all dialogue interactions up to that point. Players can highlight certain paragraphs of text in order to investigate contradictions and gain more information cards.
   4. Whenever players engage in a dialogue battle, they must equip three archetype cards, and use the archetype skill cards they get access to, in order to barter with information and unlock dialogue options.
   5. Time passes whenever the players engages in conversation with someone. NPCs will move about the time according to their schedules, as this happens.
   6. As a result of the narrative, by the end of the daytime section players will want to speak to certain spirits in order to gain more information. This acts as the main goal for the nighttime section.
2. NIGHTTIME
   1. The dream world and the spirit world are one and the same. It is an ethereal, ever shifting plane that mirrors the real world, and the thoughts and feelings of those who sleep there. Certain spirits will only appear the closer they are to the mortal plane - particularly if a sleeping blood relative has been thinking of them recently. To find these legendary spirits that you will need to talk to in order to find out more, players must contend with the beautiful and monstrous apparitions of the people they have angered or befriended in the real world.
   2. Thus, on entering the dream world, players will be greeted with a 2D map of hazy clouds. Certain clouds will be bigger than others, and everything will be roughly arranged in the shape of the town map. These clouds represent the dreams of the people in the town, procedurally determined by the way that players interacted with these NPCs in the daytime section; the emotions used, and the information revealed. There will be passages marked between certain clouds, which represent dream-hopping. There will also be spirits marked on the map inside certain dreams, once again generated depending on whether the player has successfully lured them in with their actions during the daytime.
   3. On X-ing out of the map, players will find themselves in their own dream room. Here, they can look at the information they have gathered so far, plan out their strategy, as well as equip archetype cards for the battle ahead.
   4. This begins the action-roguelike section of the game. As soon as the player crosses over into someone else’s dream, a room is generated based on the NPC’s mood during the day, which for many NPCs will be dependent on how the player treated them. Enemies, terrain, etc are all determined by this mood statistic. Therefore, a player might unintentionally screw themselves over with a particularly hard room, if they were so determined on getting a certain piece of information that they caused an NPC great mental strain. If ever the player is defeated, they appear back in their own dream room and must attempt the challenge once again.
   5. In terms of gameplay, think Hades or The Binding Of Isaac. The equipped archetype cards will still generate skill cards, but an animation will show these skill cards flipping over and revealing weapon based attacks and skills. When “playing” a weapon skill card, which costs X amount of skill points, players temporarily receive particular weapons, or boosts. These might do different things when playing them in a different order. On defeating enemies, players receive more skill points. These skill points can also be used to upgrade the equipped main archetype cards in order to obtain more powerful weapon skill cards in the next room. The player’s hand of weapon skill cards is cleared and re-dealt every room.
   6. On clearing a room, there is a chance that the player will recieve an information card based on what that person was thinking about. Additionally, players will be able to choose what dream-passageway to hop through. This can be the most direct route to the spirit they wish to meet, or filled with detours in order to gain more information/upgrade their archetype cards.
   7. When the player reaches a spirit, there may or may not be a sort of boss battle with the sleeping consciousness of the person whose dream it is. Often, this will be related to a buried hurt, or secret hope that caused the spirit to appear in the first place. If the room is cleared, then the player will see a short cutscene showing information about the spirit’s life. The next day, this information will be in the transcripts section of the journal, and that particular NPC who’s dream-self was defeated, may behave much differently than before.

[B] Core Design Pillars

[C] Maturity Guidelines

• No nudity, or explicit sexual content.
• Explicit violence, but no blood; imaginary constructs do not bleed.
• Heavy, adult narrative themes throughout that may not be suitable for younger children.

[D] Documentation Guidelines

• All concepts that have their own page will be hyperlinked to that page when they are mentioned. As such, these concepts will not be explained again, and it will be assumed that the linked page has been viewed.
• The game consists of seven days. Each day has two sections, daytime and nighttime. Here on out, we will use a (Day)(Time) notation to refer to a particular section. That is, nighttime on the third day would be section 3N, daytime on the sixth day would be 6D, and so on.