The player walks around the room and attempts to complete tasks. Artificial game lengthening was used here for an actual mechanical purpose - since you have a limited amount of time to do the amount of tasks required, this forces the player to be unable to finish and promotes a sense of anxiety.
The overall map design - designed to represent an actual small apartment a student might have. Open kitchen/dining room/living room, a bedroom barely able to house a bed and desk, and a bare bathroom.
The player is tracked on what they were able to accomplish. To the left is the end screen detailing all tasks that remained unfinished after the three days. Each task relates to a social, interpersonal, or responsibility related task. We noted that not changing your cats litterbox made people feel the worst, and not calling your mom over the weekend came in a close second.
Guilt Trip
This project was created in a team of two with a time constraint of 4 weeks. The primary restriction was to create a game that features the aesthetic of feeling “Guilt.”
The game begins with the player waking up from their bed, with a series of tasks scattered throughout the apartment. The scene is in a 2-bedroom apartment with a bathroom and combination kitchen/dining/living room. Each room has 2-6 tasks within it, which light up when they are approached. A countdown begins immediately and the player is set off to resolve all tasks. Each time the countdown ends, the day is progressed, and all unfinished tasks are also progressed in severity. The tasks are focused on making you feel guilty about the things you don’t have time for.
A few examples are your mother calling you to attend her birthday party, missing out on group projects, and not emptying your pet’s litter box. Each task worsens each day. Any tasks you don’t accomplish are ‘failed’ and you are given text displaying how each failed task ends in a bad situation for you. Examples compared to the previous list include your mother calling you crying to let you know you missed her party, you failing your group project, your cat getting sick, etc.