Fear is only as deep as the mind allows.

I've been thinking long and hard about what I want to do for my dissertation; and I think I've honed in quite a bit from where I was before;

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• I want to make a Unity game (as my chosen readings may convey) this is for several reasons;

             A. Unity is becoming increasingly popular on-line in terms of gaming, and Unity allows creation of game on other devices such as Phones; this is a very nice gateway to expand into for the future. (more information on Adobe vs Unity is available here)

             B. Unity allows creation of 3D games; I have done a lot of modelling for mods and other projects through the years (both for university and in spare time) but I don't think I've actually made a proper game.

             C. Unity needs code like any other program; But I've spent most of my University life mashing buttons in Actionscript 3.0 - it would be good to expand to other languages (which unity allows for)

             D. Despite my moaning, and the extra parts of the pipeline needed for 3D projects... I enjoy it considerably; I just need to know it better and get faster at doing it.

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• I want to make a heavily spooky themed game;

             A. Spooky is fun. AND it's nearly Halloween.

             B. I'd like to think I can do spooky; my pride an joy was a short Gothic-Horror story I wrote in high school - I've never been any good at putting things on paper, so when poor borderline C/D-grade Sean hands in a high-B-grade Gothic horror story; he gets pulled in for possible plagiarizing (Falsely, obviously).

             C. I spent a lot of time in Themeparks when I was smaller (lol); Usually (but not always) the spooky themed rides/areas were done the best. This wasn't because random things jumped at you though - It was because of small details; The fibreglass crypts that were ajar and pouring smoke, Or finger scratches on a wall. The sudden appearance of a monster with flashing eyes was only the tiny punchline in the huge work-up before it. I believe there is a certain type of enchantment in an excellent themed work-up like that.

             D. additionally to C; The best fear is the ones created by the player themselves; Michael Thomsen briefly touches on this in his article "Revival Horror: New Ideas in Fear-Making"; "The things they begin to fear most aren't the resuscitated burn victims with scissor fingers lurking in the next room, but rather some vague agglomeration of their own worst imagination. To have touched a player on the terms of their most intimate insecurities and fears, rather than forcing them into the whirligig of an auteur's invented phantoms, is one of the most delicate and rewarding achievements in game design." Thomsen(2010,p2).

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• I want to make a first-person game which isn't a shooter.

             A. There are too many Unity Shooters out there; 50% of first page here when I checked  and I'm sure other places have similar stats.

             B. Most horror games are shooters, and even though I want my game to be spooky and not horror, I feel the same still applies.

             C. If I am carrying a highly effective killing weapon... What is there to fear?

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Anyway; I made a couple of test assets, testing out my skills and Unity's;

This is what it actually looks like on the other side of the wardrobe. (hilarious lamppost reference)

I was thinking about different mechanics I could have; there was typical mystery/clue finding mechanics, then there was lock and key exploration... and THEN I thought that I could do an 3D avoider game.

Okay, that may need some explanation.

Basically, I was thinking about doing spooky exploration, then you suddenly (reason yet decided) start hallucinating and get taken to a strange area themed on the place you were. the area would be a simple "get from point A to B" game, but you would have to avoid hallucinations of objects in the area you were in (e.g. giant swinging grandfather clock pendulums) I'll be perfectly honest, that seems like a massive, not entirely thought out, over-scope. BUT it does sound a little further away from first person horror exploration which is basically Ross' "exploration of immersion in games" dissertation idea (found here) (which I am proud to have helped give birth to, yet don't wish to stomp on.)

Think I might need help and advice from wise people such as Rob for direction; I could spend a whole year deliberating, when all I really want to do is start making horrible, regrettable mistakes.

Thomsen, M. 2010. Gamsutra, Revival Horror: New Ideas in Fear-Making. [Online] Available at: http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/134160/revival_horror_new_ideas_in_.php [Accessed: 19 October 2012].