Dissertation ideas - Horror game using unity

Hi all,

I am still quite new to unity and going into my third year of University for Digital Media Production, It looks at all medias. In second year I did an independent study where I had a chance to do my own work on an area of my choice which I chose to be game development and am probably the only person on my course doing this. I learnt Unity all by myself and got advice from a tutor and eventually made a maze horror game. I loved it and now want to do this as my third year dissertation. I really want to go into horror still as its my favourite genre but as its my dissertation I need to add cut scenes and make it bigger and multiple level with it getting progressively harder. I was wondering any unity creators here who are also into horror or any aspects I have mentioned could give advice on where Is good to go with this and also I need to create a question to answer as I will be writing a paper on this too. I am really interested in new games such as little nightmares and layers of fear and also the big games like resident evil 7 as inspiration.

Thanks, Izzy

 

Hello @izzf22

I'm also into the horror genre massively, and have practically have the same tastes as yourself, little nightmares was pretty nice.

If you wanna check out my progress on a PT style game it's here.

https://forum.unity3d.com/threads/wip-the-horror-room.375789/

If you have any questions I would be glad to help. I would say for your final project, you would have to scope much much smaller. Even a Playable Teaser type game gets unmanageable.

Depending on your experience with 3D modelling and texturing will also make a difference. If you aren't particularly good at this then don't worry, you can go for a stylized horror game and still make a reasonable contribution - an example might be playdead's 'Inside' although the art style is superb.

So obviously before you get carried away with the graphics and sounds and cut scenes and even the menu you will want to nail the gameplay. This can be as simple as having a cube walk around your level with triggers for opening doors etc.

The horror genre is different from your standard FPS as you are not just mindlessly firing zombies. Half of the tension build up comes from limited ammo or no ammo at all.

So just to recap scope small, nail game play. Then build on this iteratively and you'll have something.
Don't underestimate how much time you will need to set aside!

 

Hey,

Its awesome! I loved pt and that style of simple progression is something i'd like to add a lot! at uni I did digital modelling last year using 3ds max and next year will be doing character modelling also so would be nice to add into it, i've also used maya before for animating.

I really want to focus a lot of the emotional feel and mood of my game then jump scare as I think that is really interesting aspect in the indie horror game scene. I need an area also I can write a paper along with my game too and delve really deep into as it will be a heft 8,000 - 10,000 words.

I just actually downloaded inside off of steam to get a feel of the 2d horror games and I've heard really great things about it! I need to look into coding a lot especially for interactions as that was one I dabbled in before.

yeah I made for my previous game a prototype as I was so new to unity practising with a lot of things id want to incorporate into a game! This project will last 2 semesters and is my biggest piece of work I would have done all uni so i definitely want to nail it!

Thank you for replying It's nice talking to somebody else that uses unity as everyone on my course is primarily focusing in the film industry and I'm the lone gamer haha but I really appreciate it you have given me loads of great things to think about.

 

Yes I had a look at your screenshots and they look great, you got the mountains and the trees in the background really adding to the atmosphere within the maze.

The menu looks pretty good too.

But yeah, I'm not sure what your uni is judging, if it isn't gameplay and more atmosphere and how that is established you can really forget about what I said about gameplay and crank up all the atmospheric sounds and things.

The thing I loved about playable teaser was you just never knew what was lurking around that L shaped corridor and that was the brilliance of it. The sound design was something else as well.

You probably wanna check out this video

Also, I actually started a little nightmares clone try myself, but didn't get very far heh!



If you have any questions or need some help with unity just drop me an email. But to be honest I'm still a newbie too.

 

Yeah they are some earlier screen shots I added a lot more to the game, Id post it to you but i'm not too sure how too.

I think they wanna see thought and progression in the game and my genre and also just a lot of different interactions and take advantage of different techniques usable in unity so I think its a bit of both and just finished nicely. Pt will definitely be a big inspiration for it as they want the level progression and interactions like that so will be great to look at more. That video was awesome I've watched their vids before but not that one.

I love the little nightmares inspired game I wanna add health and re-spawns more in my next game too but your lighting gives great atmosphere.

As its summer and I wont start this till september properly im just researching and looking what to do as a proposal but I have a good idea now and I will start making prototypes too as my tutor said to as you probably know I will have a lot of work to do!

I will probably mostly likely email you when I start prototyping a lot so I hope I dont become too annoying haha

Thanks again!

 

No worries, I love talking about horror, as there seems to be few on this forum that truly appreciate horror.

Actually my favourite horror game to date is 'Fran Bow.'

I guess my obsession with horror must have came from when my mom used to traumatise me with the horror movies she used to watch while baby sitting me!!!

Hope your project goes well and good luck!

 

Yeah if you wanna go the whole PT route, you can really build great tension and what's more is you only have one level so it cuts down a lot of modelling and texturing you need to do.

You can really work on the sound design and the 'uncanny.'

I tried to just duplicated PT's level design (see below), and it was pretty creepy to play even though there wasn't any background drones going on yet.

 

Since you know RE7, I'd direct you to closely follow their demo as an example for your project. I think your thesis should revolve around the usage of lighting and sound.

Did someone tell you specifically you need to expand the game, make it larger, and grander?

The above is not a friendly convention of thought in today's industry especially for a solo developer.

I recommend you actually scale the project's deliverable's back to a single-room with a lot of attention to detail.

• This offers you the opportunity to do a lot of simple prop modeling (modularity)
• You can be more artistic and better manage and contain your lighting
• And it also narrows the variety of assets required (textures, particles, sounds)
• You'd avoid the problem of your game looking like its lacking assets and detail... I saw this a lot with student projects.

When it comes to narrative, I think you'd have an easier time by telling the story through prop placement and lighting direction.

A simple interior also has locked doors which you can unlock for progression (Resident Evil style). Or find whatever context specific element you can think of, which is easier to do in a smaller setting.

Overall, scale things back, focus on design/thesis. As a solo developer, its how I approach all my projects.