The Design Process

The Pitch

I pitched Signal Lost as an alternative control game revolving around a phonebooth. I wanted to take advantage of having players inside of an enclosed space, so I wanted to push the experience of isolation. 

Prototype Loop

When Signal Lost was voted to move forward into the Prototyping Phase, I was tasked with creating the underlying game loop that would justify our alternative controller.

I introduced a screen into the booth, which would be themed as a window into the outside world. The basic idea became that the player would receive information from the phone and the screen, and then dial numbers into the phone as a response.

The screen would be placed on the opposite side from the phone, meaning players would constantly divert their attention between the phone and the screen. This would accentuate the horror of the game, as players would feel like they were missing out on information every time they turned from the phone.

During the prototype phase, I established my design pillars:

1. Isolation: The booth is designed to block out light and sound, so players are cut off from outside information.

2. Proximity: The game takes advantage of having players inside this space. The player has to look around in all directions inside the booth to play the game.

3. Spectacle: The game should be interesting to spectators as well as players.

Anomaly Loop

I was unsatisfied with the gameplay from the prototype loop. The game merely told players the numbers they had to dial, and then the players had to dial those numbers. It didn’t feel like a game, more like a completely linear experience with no consequences.

The Problem: There was not enough interactivity and consequences in the prototype loop. The prototype loop did not take enough advantage of diverting player’s attention around the booth.

I went back to the drawing board and designed a new game loop, which pushes the dynamic of diverting attention but allows for more interactivity with the phone. I took inspiration from sit-and-survive horror games, like Five Nights at Freddy’s and I’m on Observation Duty. Because we were trapping players in one space, this genre was a good inspiration for our type of game.

My new loop would have “anomalies” appear in the environment (on the screen), players would find the correct number for the anomaly using posters inside the booth, and then report the anomaly by dialing the number into the phone.

The team also valued the narrative structure from the prototype, so I wanted to maintain narrative in this new loop. I settled on “Major Anomaly” events, which would happen at pre-determined times. These would be vignettes where the player answers questions from the operator by speaking into the phone. In essence, these moments would return to the prototype loop for a short moment.

The Scares

The Result: The anomaly loop succeeded in offering more moment-to-moment gameplay and interactivity, and it did get players to divert their attention around the booth more often. However…

A New Problem: The game became significantly less scary. By focusing so heavily on mechanics, the game became more about skill expression and less about building tension. 

Competitor Analysis

My next goal was to re-introduce the fear factor that made the prototype loop so compelling. I did some research on other horror games to find the ingredients that were missing from this game. I played and analyzed I’m on Observation Duty and found two important things that we were missing that contributed to my fear while playing.

1. The game excels at the anxiety of not knowing information. It doesn’t tell you when an anomaly has spawned, what rooms they are in, or how many are present.

2. The game notifies you when things are dire. If too many anomalies are present, the game gives you a notification. However, it only happens when you are at risk, and it still doesn’t tell you specifically where the anomalies are.

I wanted to replicate these aspects into Signal Lost to bring back the horror. I made the following changes:

1. The game originally had a sound cue which indicated when an anomaly had spawned. I disabled this sound effect, which brought in the anxiety of not knowing information.

2. I added two ambient tracks which increased in volume depending on how many anomalies were active.

3. I changed the rules of anomalies. Previously, anomalies had an internal timer. When this timer expired, they would take away a player's life and disappear. I changed the logic of the timer, making it so when the timer expired, the anomaly would start “damaging” the player. Importantly, the anomaly would not go away. This would  have the anomaly slowly chip away at the player’s health, instead of dealing massive damage and then disappearing.

These changes added stakes to the gameplay. Players were now notified when things were going wrong, but there was still mystery about what exactly they were doing wrong. Instead of failing instantly, players faced a slow descent into failure.

Full Game Loop

In the final weeks of development, we had all our mechanics implemented and the logic for the game loop. My next steps were to take everything and condense it into a 5 minute experience. I outlined the game’s events, along with the times each event should happen.

I implemented this loop into the game, but in practice it took much longer than expected. The experience ended up taking 10 minutes. To cut the game down more, while still showing the most important parts, I made several changes:

1. Amount of anomalies: I cut down the amount of anomalies that would spawn. The game went from 11 to 8 anomalies.

2. Amount of narrative: I condensed the narrative to happen in 3 moments: The tutorial, a mid-game major anomaly event, and the finale. Originally, there was going to be a tutorial, 2 major anomalies, and the finale.

3. Randomness: It was still important to show the best parts of the game, and give those parts their space to breathe. To do this, I added randomness, meaning the game would select which important anomalies it would play. For example, the final game chooses between the missing person and clown anomaly, both of which are the stand out moments of the game.

These changes reduced the playtime to 5 minutes.