Greetings humans. My name is Erlend Sogge Heggen, and I’m working on the game design and story aspects of AotGB. Today I’m gonna show you what the current iteration of our internal high concept doc looks like, which is one of many collaborative documents (via Google Drive) that we perpetually update.
View the doc
Here is a snapshot of our official High Concept document, as of 24. December 2012. Drop us an inline comment if you'd like!
The section I consider most valuable when writing a high concept doc is the “Experience” section. I like dividing it into “Expectation” and “Excerpt”. This is where I as the writer try to put the Player’s Hat on and take the imaginary finished game for a playthrough in my head. You start by asking yourself “having watched a trailer or read a brief summary of this game, what would I be expecting from it?”. From there, you write a vertical slice depicting an ideal experience that would live up to said expectations. As in...
The Experience Excerpt
AotGB_High-Concept wrote:
My objective is to destroy the Gummy Drops factory. What is produced there is dangerously similar to my own recipe for destruction. Though to my knowledge they have not come close to matching my progress - their gelatinous substances are still made strictly for consumption by humans, not the other way around.
Before I make my move on the factory I must make sure there is no possibility of escape. My blobs will form a perimeter around the factory. I do not expect much resistance from the inhabitants in the town of Orville.
The perimeter was easily secured with the help of my newly researched vomit-beam, effectively slowing down the humans whilst empowering my blobs. Time to bring down the factory. I start attacking it and-- it self-destructs!? Out emerges a gummy drop monstrosity of massive proportions. By the gooey gods, they did it!
It appears the monster is absorbing any blob with inferior mass, and it is headed towards my base. I must quickly start to wear it down without getting too close. Once it arrives, I’ll need to have a superior blob waiting for it, or I’m doomed.
If your fellow developers are entertained and excited about this mini-story, you’re probably on to something and The Same Page is effectively reinforced.
Are you going by a similar approach in your project?
