Premise
In this dystopia, our character “wants” to process the death of their brother. (Wants in quotes because doing so is painful but also feels psychologically and spiritually necessary). They can’t because people struggling with grief and depression are placed into the ‘Trance.’ The Trance is a medical treatment where people are put into a sleep-like state, kept just conscious enough to experience an endless stream of content until they forget what was making them sad.
Our character has limited agency within the Trance: they can “Like” a video or scroll to get the next video. A faux-algorithm determines what they see next. If they “Like” a video in line with a particular story thread, they become more likely to see the subsequent content in that story thread. If they ever stop scrolling, they are slowly overwhelmed by memories of their dead brother.
The intention is for the story to be told nonlinearly, akin to My Body: A Wunderkammer or Victory Garden. The player will explore different story threads based on how they engage with the ‘Like’ button. Still, if there was something akin to an ‘intended’ route, it would be this:
- Hard Left Turn: Learning what the Trance is, and that they are in it
- No Turning Back: Encountering a video by a friend that misses them
- All Hope Is Lost: Being dragged down one of the rabbit holes (the alt-right, meaningless reddit story content, or #depression content)- and realizing it is now almost impossible to receive other forms of content
- Climax: Encountering a second video by the same friend
Map
The space here is not a physical space, but an algorithmic one, with further content in each story chain being unlocked by “Liking” previous elements.
Project plan
Storyboard of all custom video content & criteria for found video content: by 10/21
Paper story prototype: by 10/21
External playtest 1: by 10/23
Obituary written: by 10/23
All custom video content filmed: by 10/28
Programming of platform: by 10/28
External playtest 2: by 10/30
Revisions: By Nov 1
