Author: rc3477

 
This project is designed to give the audience an opportunity to experience what a person struggling with smiling depression might feel through a 2D platformer game. Smiling depression, also known as “masked depression”, refers to the phenomenon where someone might feel depressed inside but pretend to be perfectly content on the outside, which makes it difficult for other people to assess their mental wellness and then give help. In this game, the user will control a character who is living inside a transparent bubble that resembles the “mask” – The bubble is a barrier between the character’s internal and external world – the outside world is black and white while the inside of the bubble is colorful, the outside world is filled with darkness while the light exists inside the bubble. By going through a series of adventures, the user will gradually learn that they have to break the bubble because, although the bubble looks like a comfortable place to stay in, it’s shrinking and compressing the space for you to live in.

This project contains only the last level of the whole game. The name of this level is called “Spiral”, which refers to the psychological spiral in which someone with depression is trapped. Since the game is 2-dimensional, the map is designed so that the user has to go deeper and deeper to break the bubble. However, the bubble will also shrink faster as the character goes down, which creates the dilemma for the user to choose whether they’d like to fight with the difficulties to break the bubble to just stay in the same place but “die” slowly.

The game art is carefully designed as well. The piano piece was played and recorded as the background music of this level. The hand-drawn assets can create a very intimate feeling for the audience. The users can resonate with the music and the images because they seem more personal, which helps them to see the world through the main character’s point of view.

Besides the images used in this project, several other elements were also tested to see how they affect the whole experience. First of all, is the length of the game. Since this project only contains one level of the whole game, the time it will take for someone to finish this game is very crucial, as it influences whether the user can learn enough information about the gameplay and the background story as well as fully experience the “smiling depression” within a certain amount of time. After several tests were made, the level was designed to be played between 5 – 10 minutes, because the user can both experience the gameplay and it’s also a reasonable time for them to quickly review and give feedback. The second factor is the use of color to indicate the collectible items and the traps. Since the game is more about an experience, the choice has been made to not include too many user instructions in the level. Different colors were used to help guide the user: red colors suggest that something is dangerous and should be avoided whereas green and yellow are helpful objects and collectible objects.