I propose a game in which the player solves (or begins to solve, in the scope) a murder mystery concerning a group of forest-dwelling cats. The main objective of the game is to discover clues, take testimonies, and ultimately put everything together to solve the mystery. The player will be able to walk around in a physical space and explore the locations, as new locations may contain new clues. The player can speak to NPCs, as well as interact with and potentially pick-up objects around the area. The player would ideally have a sort of “journal” (it is mental, in this case, as cats can’t write) where information about the case is stored. Given a larger scope, the game would also include action sequences and character-driven scenes, but these will not be included in order to keep the scope small.
You play as a cat named Frost. He is young and recently independent from his family. Unfortunately for him, he is the first to discover the body of Fire Lily, a cat who was the daughter of The Brightest Star, an influential figure in cat society. Frost, who has now be accused of murder by his own brother, White Fox, decides to investigate the case in order to clear his name. His search leads him to the other major characters (all cats), November, Friday, Red Sky, Black Feather, Heron, and Nessa (not all will show up during this game due to scope.)
Key objects may change during the course of creating the game, as the “plot” is not fully planned yet. Similarly to Twilight Princess, the player will have access to a “sense” mode that allows them to use Frost’s superior sense of smell to uncover clues. This will highlight objects and scent trails. Players can sniff objects to discover who has interacted with them. Objects may include: tufts of fur, loose claws and whiskers, environmental effects such as trampled grass or dead animals. The sense mode may even reveal secret trails or locations that cannot be easily seen by eye.
The game takes place in a small forest community of cats. It functions similarly to a small village setting. Some cats live in family or friend groups and others alone. The physical space is a large forest semi-clearing with hollowed out spaces in a cliffside to function as “houses”. The game begins, however, in front of a Japanese-style forest shrine. It is a small wood and stone shrine featuring a lucky cat statue. The cat locals refuse to go near this place, believing it to be cursed. Frost, as an “I’m not normal” type of cat, frequents this location to get away from his overprotective family. The player will be able to walk between these two locations. There will also be a secret area behind the shrine.
The intended audience for this game is teens and young adults. The reason I target this audience is because it is the same age range I belong to. People my age grew up with Warrior Cats and mystery games like Danganronpa. Due to what they were exposed to, people in this age range have the highest likelihood of being interested in a concept such as this. I intend to make it specifically un-friendly to children to avoid the whole “oh it’s about animals it must be for kids” thing. To do this, I want to make it an almost grimdark style with blood and gore and foul language.
The art style will be stylized, but gritty. The cats are not going to be hyper-realistic, but will still have realistic proportions, and act like humans with their facial expressions and paw movements. The environment will be semi-realistic. The entire game will have washed out, gloomy colours to reflect the dark setting. It will take place in the fall, in the morning. The game will be third person.
Concept Sketch
Reference Images
This game concept looks really interesting! I love the way the concept sketch looks, the cats are cute but I can still definitely see them being able to show a wide complex range of emotions. I am wondering, would it be possible that this game could have multiple story paths and endings? I feel like I a lot of games in the genre you are aiming for with that feature.
Hmm, I didn’t think about having multiple endings. I know that in the full scope, I wanted the game to have multiple characters you can play as to see different sides of the story. So maybe it could have different endings for each character.
I think its good you are passionate about the material, which will in turn help you push forward when it comes to the development of the actual game. What I think needs more elaborating on is the art style/rendering style. What games/media can you think of that would be similar or analogous to the artistic direction your game world would take on?
Hm… for games, I automatically think of a kind of ugly Wii game called Fragile Dreams, mostly because I think I can achieve it’s art style in my scope. I haven’t played a lot of games that feature animal characters, unfortunately, but there’s this game I (still) haven’t played called “The First Tree” that looks kind of similar to what I’m trying to go for.
I really like this concept and the current story implemented. I have read the first couple books in the warrior series and can definitely see the inspiration. Are there going to be shadowy creatures following you in the distances or are the eyes in the bushes just cats.
The eyes in the bushes are just cats!
I’m so excited to see you develop this! I like the twist you’ve taken in that the player plays as an animal in the mystery game, I don’t think I’ve played a game like that. Do you intend to have voice acting for any narration or conversations?
Definitely not in the scope of this particular version! But if this was a fully developed game… probably! I do a lot better with voice acted games when I play them, so I think it would be nice.
The story itself looks very fascinating. The plot alone is very worth looking forward to. At the same time, the stylized character models are also very impressive: most creators now tend to portray cats into cute and well-behaved images. And your design style that emphasizes the wildness and vigor of cats is definitely very bold and refreshing! So my question is how will the characters’ movements be designed? Do cats in the game behave more like humans or cats? Should they walk on two feet like people and use their forelimbs as hands? Will the four-claw landing posture be restored when running fast? Or do you have other cooler ideas! Please let
me know！
I intend for them to mainly act like cats but with a few differences, sort of like you would see in old Disney movies like the Lion King. They will have eyebrows for showing emotions, and “thumbs” to manipulate (but not hold) objects. But otherwise, they will walk on four legs and generally act like cats.
Ah, I see you really are a Warrior cats fan :> I really love the aesthetic of this project, both in terms of art style and of the overall vibes of the place. You really communicated the inspiration from the Rabbi’s cat very well! This project has a fairly large scope; exactly how far in the game do you expect to get within this class ?
I hope to get to where I have both locations and the NPCS placed with some dialogue. I’m actually not extremely worried about creating two locations, as they will largely reuse simple assets.