Party For Your Life!
Collaborators
Nova Hale
Grace Rouleau
Roles
UI Artist/Designer
UX Designer
Timeline
Design: Ongoing
Dev. & Iteration: Est. 2027
Product Launch: Est. 2032
Project Overview
One warm, sunny day, in June of 2025, I bolted out of bed, snatched my phone, and immediately texted my friend Grace about a dream I had that would be the coolest game ever. In my dream, I was a college student at a university attending a party during the break. There were tons of activities, similar to ones you may find at a carnival, and I had lots of friends attending the party as well. Also, everyone was some sort of monster or cryptid. There had been a few instances where students from the college had gone missing, so the party had an air of mystery and concern, but sort of in the background. Then, someone turned up dead!
The dream turned into a game where you, the player, had to investigate the murder; finding evidence, interviewing the partygoers, and maybe even flirting a bit to gain social capital. My idea was that the game could have three possible endings; getting framed (big loss), catching the killer (win), or not catching the killer (mild loss). I thought it’d be fun to have a dating sim feel to the game as well, even including a secret ending where you could accidentally (or on purpose) date the killer!
Phase Navigation
Scroll on to read about each phase, or select a phase below to skip to one phase in particular.
Design
Brainstorming
On a first glance, this game probably looks like a not-so-subtle yoink-and-twist of Monster Prom, and honestly, that’s not very far off. I had been playing a ton of Monster Prom at this time, so I’m not surprised the game invaded my psyche so much as to influence my dreams. As Grace and I started refining the idea, however, it morphed into something I’d describe as “what happens when you combine Ace Attorney and Monster Prom.”
We added all our ideas, sketches, and random thoughts to a Figjam document so we’d have an easier time staying organized. We created eight boards to encompass our main ideas:
- NPC’s:
A board to keep small, minimal-effort and impact non-playable character ideas. - PC’s:
A board containing a sketch of each of the four playable characters, as well as their names, backgrounds, character traits, descriptions, etc. - UI:
A board containing hand-sketched ideas for ui layouts, such as the main screen, character selection, and pause screens. - Game Mechanics:
A board for putting ideas of how player and story goals could be accomplished through minigames, turn order, levels, or other game mechanics. - Dateable Characters:
A board containing a sketch of each of the six dateable characters, as well as their names, descriptions, jobs or hobbies, possible interactions, and possible motive for murder. - Scenes/Environment:
A board for sketches and descriptions or lists of any areas or interactive spaces the player could visit. - DLC:
A board for ideas we liked, but were definitely out of scope. - MVP:
A board containing our minimum viable product, clarifying our scope and goals for a pitchable demo version of the game.
Playable Character Sketches
We wanted the player characters to have some connection to the world, and we didn’t really know how to do that with a character creator, like a friend of ours suggested. We figured we could look into it, but we felt like it was definitely out of scope for a game of this size. So instead, we decided to create four playable characters who each fit into a generalized archetype. That way, most people who played the game would be able to see at least a part of themselves represented in the character they chose to play.
Eccland is a charismatic, smooth-talking journalism major who loves a good piece of gossip. As the editor of the school’s newspaper, he always finds a way to go to any campus event, even if he’s not invited.
Tom is an uptight, preppy, logically-minded pre-law major who is definitely the type of guy to correct someone about an obscure fact at a party. He can be annoying at times, but he’s got a heart of gold and a strong sense of justice.
Vanessa is a cool, calm, and collected forensic sciences major who does drag in her free time. But is it cars or queens? I can’t quite remember…
Bennie is a quiet, shy, and introverted arts major who doesn’t really find herself at parties too often. She’s definitely the kind of girl to hang around the house pet while her friend best goes off on their own.
Dateable Character Sketches
We wanted the dateable characters to be just the right amount of trope-defying while still being familiar. We’re still working on these guys, but their names are as follows:
- Saoirse
- Sally
- Penny
- Axel
- Branch
User Interface Concepts
For the look of the game, I drew inspiration from early 2000’s vibes and various dating sims. I also wanted the UI to look like school supplies, like journals, folders, pencils, etc.
Going Forward
As you can see, the game is very low fidelity right now. Currently, the team consists of me and Grace, and we work on what we can in our spare time. In the future we hope to recruit some junior-level game devs with unity experience who would be totally fine with a deferred profit share structure. That’ll be after we get enough content to create a suitable demo, so not for a year or two, maybe.
I would love to commit to this project more fully, so if you’re a game studio or a publisher reading this and you think it’d be a great addition to your collection, feel free to reach out! We’re always happy to hear from fellow indie game enjoyers.
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