Project Title: "The Horror, The Horror": The Exploration of the Effects of Audiovisual Stimuli in Horror Games
BASIS Advisor: Ms. Jefferson
Internship Location: Cogswell College
Onsite Mentor: Ms. Mira Nikolic
The unspoken rule of a video game: The more you use your faculty senses, the more invested you will be. Game developers painstakingly develop complex characters and plots for their games, but without the proper SFX and audiovisuals, the game is merely just a husk of its potential. Many players and even some developers overlook the effects that well-implemented audiovisual stimuli can have on a player, from the rise and fall of a character’s breath to the tangible and audible effects of a breeze. This project, conducted at Cogswell College, seeks to answer the question of how important these effects are, and why it is essential not to overlook these details. By designing a horror game—a genre known for vivid sounds and obscured vision—from the ground up, I will be able to playtest different versions of my game and try to find a correlation between a heightened sense of investment and the amount of audiovisual effects I employ.
My Posts
Week 11: Fully Playable, need to add audio
Apr 29, 2019
I’ve made some changes to the game that are pretty important, and resulted in me changing the plot of my game. The player is still finding himself in a room in another world, but instead of a killer clown and the like, I’m keeping it simple, a normal ghost that goes in set patterns. If […]
Week 8/9/10: Urinetown, Video, Soundbooth
Apr 22, 2019
I’ve finally finished up my acting in Urinetown, the school musical. Boy, was it rough. Two weeks of nonstop performances, rehearsals, and practice. Playing the lead role and singing 8 songs really takes it out of you. Our last performance was on the 21st, and I’m starting to see how much work I have left. […]
Week 7: Huge Progress
Apr 01, 2019
I doubled down on work since I haven’t been making much progress in the previous two weeks. I’ve finished programming an interact function, so the player can pick up and use/throw objects, made safe zones where the enemy AI can’t enter, as well as created the monster AI. All that’s left is for me to […]
Week 6: Tutorial
Mar 24, 2019
My introduction for the player is to drop them in a locked room on the 2nd story of the mansion. The tutorial will have them walk around the room and learn how to press F to pick up and use objects. For the tutorial’s purpose, I’m making the player find a key and unlock the […]
Week 5: Dallas Trip
Mar 24, 2019
I wasn’t able to go to my internship site this week because I was in Dallas visiting UT Dallas. Therefore, I did not do anything regarding Senior Project.
Week 4: Level Design
Mar 20, 2019
This week was relatively simple; I looked around online for ideas on what my level will be like. The overall theme is for it to be set in a 19th century style mansion, and the way I envisioned it looked something like this: The general idea is that it’s a brick mansion, simple and rectangular […]
Week 2/3: Basic Mechanics of Character
Mar 04, 2019
This week was all about designing the basic elements of my character. This essentially meant modifying a correct jump height, creating a sprint mechanic, natural head movement while standing still (to simulate breathing), and a stamina bar. Some of these will be hard to put in a picture, as there are animations involved, but I’ll […]
Week 1: Starting Out
Feb 24, 2019
When I picked this topic for my senior project, there was no way for me to really know just how much work I had cut out for me. Sure, I knew that game development was a naturally long and hard road, but only once I actually started on my project did I realise just how […]