Tavernimals is a project that I am actively designing. The game is not in a tangible state at this point in time, so designing large and intricate systems on paper without implementing them in-engine yet is a little scary. However, knowing everything about a game’s design before implementing anything will give a good understanding of what systems and other gameplay features should be prioritized during development, and thus a roadmap can be built from these features.

Through rigorous playtesting of the most important features, the goal is to “find the fun” and move forward with full production. I hope to reach this point, as this is a game that I had pitched as my senior capstone project before being assigned to Go! Gacha.

As of now, I believe the fun can be found in getting to know the regular patrons of the player’s tavern, discovering new things about the world, meeting new characters, feeling an earned sense of progression as the player unlocks new useful skills from their regulars, customizing their playthroughs by choosing a new starting character or tavern name, and combating enemies.

The only concern I have with the game’s “fun factor” is the repetition of collecting ingredients, but my hope is that players will not be collecting the same ingredients in the same way every time to help mitigate this issue. However, time (and player feedback) will tell if this needs to be adjusted.

I am also actively gathering feedback for design decisions and adapting the original design to accommodate for that feedback. For example, weapons and tools were separate items. There were swords and spears that the player could use to combat enemies, but there were also knives and other cookware that were required for certain recipes. However, to homogenize the cooking theme of the game, certain cooking tools would be used as weapons instead. I suggested this to my team and they agreed it was for the better. Many things had to be adapted to accommodate this change, such as Sven’s level-up table and the weapon tables. I pride myself in my ability to communicate with and unite people of varying skill sets towards a common vision, which I believe is a very important quality for a designer.

In terms of world-building and narrative design, because the characters are animals, the implications of eating meat can be troublesome to say the least and pose a very big challenge. To avoid this problem, every food and ingredient in the game will avoid meat. Eggs, fish, dairy products, and insects will be the only animal products in the game. It’s also a goal of mine for the ensemble of main characters to be relatable and talk with each other to further emphasize the game’s theme of community.