Vagaba’s Shop
What is Vagaba’s Shop ?
Vagaba’s Shop is an immersive escape game where you have to obey an evil spirit while solving puzzles to get out
Context
We were a team of 2 game designers and 6 product designers on this 2-month project. Thanks to our large team, we were able to do a lot for this project and this lead us to be invited to the 2023 GDC alt ctrl exhibition to show our work.
My work on Vagaba’s Shop
First, I worked as a game designer. We designed the box, where the button would be placed, what puzzles we wanted for the game, in which order to solve the puzzles to get key pieces to unlock the outfit to free the player. During that meantime, I was testing how we could use electronics to give feedback to the player of what button had to be pushed. Thanks to a little add-on we had on Unity, we were able to use Unity with our Arduino card, and that helped a lot. Once the feedback part was done, I did code all the game features on Unity. Starting the game, triggering sound effects, letting the game go from an order to another to obstruct the player in their puzzle-solving times. I also helped with the building part as I built one of the puzzles.
Experience feedback
This project was a lot of fun. It was really informative to work with product designers as we don’t have the same skills at all. During this project I had the opportunity to do what i do best, coding, but also new things like electronics or woodcutting. In the end, we are proud of the result of this project as we all gave a lot of time and effort to it and the immersive experience we offer was as good as we could make it.
How does it work ?
First of all, the player puts on an outfit we designed and created for this project. Then, the player is immersed in a box we also made. The orders of the evil spirit are represented by blinking LEDs which tell you you have to hold the button below it pushed. There are LEDs and buttons on the walls and on the outfit, so the player has to be aware of their environment and themselves to not lose the game.
While pushing the buttons related to the blinking LEDs, the player has to solve some various puzzles to find wooden parts to put on the central part of the outfit to unlock it and free them from the evil spirit.
Credits
Electronics & Game Programming
Alexandre DASPE
Product Design
Clémentine BALLOY
François-Xavier BARBET
Caroline BECK
Maxime CETTIER
Léa GARDON
Margaux LEMIERE