1. Premise
An international student wants to be known for who they really are, but can’t, because the words they need always arrive a little later than the moments that need them.
What I Meant to Say is a short choice-based interactive fiction that follows an international student across four years at a university where everyone speaks Velen, an invented language. In freshman year, on an orientation walk to a burger place, they can barely follow the conversation, and every choice leads to the same quiet spot at the back of the group. In sophomore year they understand the seminar but can’t speak fast enough, and they watch a classmate say their idea first. In junior year they finally have every word, and the conflict shifts from what they can say to what they choose to say when a friendly stranger compliments their Velen and asks where they’re “really” from. In senior year they go home for winter break and find Velen words slipping into their first language, leaving them partly foreign in both places. The game ends with their mother asking, “Are you happy there?”
Main question: Who are you when you can’t fully express yourself?
Role. You play the student, written in second person. Their name, gender and home country stay open so more players can step in. The player’s own first language stands in for the student’s, shown as English.
Goals. Across the game: to be understood as yourself, to connect with others and to belong. Each year has a smaller goal: join the group conversation (freshman), contribute your idea in seminar (sophomore), respond to how others see you (junior), and reconnect with your family (senior).
Conflict. Language takes years to grow, and conversations don’t wait. In the first two years the obstacle is skill and speed. In junior year it becomes social cost: you have the words, but saying them risks the moment. At home it turns inward, because your first language has started to slip, and two languages start to mix up. You find yourself struggle to search for words from your native language.
Choices. The choice is always what to say, from a limited set that matches your fluency. Every card shows what you actually mean, crossed out, above what you can say. Agency follows language growth: almost none as a freshman, a little as a sophomore, the most as a junior, then less again at home.
Actions. Say a line built from words you know, smile and nod, ask “Ke?” (what?), point or gesture, write it down, stay silent, or, by junior year, say the honest thing or not.
Resources.
- Vocabulary: a Phrasebook that grows from six words to a handful more, which unlocks new things to say.
- Time: timed cards (a three-second count) where hesitation becomes silence.
- People who slow down for you: Teri, the friend who shrinks sentences to your size.
Game events. Words get added to the Phrasebook. Moments pass on timed cards. Different choices converge on the same outcome. Each scene closes on the first sentence you fully understand. At home, the language flips: the fluent English is crossed out and Velen words fill your options.
Scope. Four short scenes, about 15 choice points and 7 endings in total, roughly 30 passages in a digital build and about 20 minutes of play.
2. Map
The game has two places: a campus town abroad, where everything happens in Velen, and the family home, where it all happens in the student’s first language. A flight at senior winter break connects them.
The one route that repeats is the street between the dorm and Vesh Burger. Freshman year ends walking back down it, barely understanding anyone. Junior year ends walking home on the same street with Teri, understanding everything, and learning the one Velen word that has no translation. Home is drawn as a single path through four places.
3. Project plan
Milestone 1: premise and map (Tue, Oct 20). This write-up, plus the first paper playtest in class. On Wednesday, turn the playtest notes into decisions: which endings stay, whether the timed cards work, and which lines confused people. Lock the Velen lexicon so it stops changing.
Milestone 2: first draft (Thu, Oct 22 to Sun, Oct 25). Build freshman and sophomore on Thursday and Friday, junior and senior over the weekend. The goal is a rough but complete path through all four years, with timers and the Phrasebook working. Polish with feedback.
Milestone 3: playtesting and feedback (Mon, Oct 26 to Tue, Oct 27). Four to six players, including at least two who live or study in a second language, and at least one who plays all four years in one sitting to test the senior-year payoff. Use the class session on Tuesday if possible.
Milestone 4: revisions and final submission (Wed, Oct 28 to Fri, Oct 30). Fix the three biggest problems from playtesting first, then pacing and typos. Freeze content Thursday night, and use Friday only for a final playthrough and submission.
4. Potential challenges
- Four scenes is the biggest risk in ten days. Freshman and senior years are the core, since the senior payoff depends on the freshman setup. If the draft isn’t complete by Sunday, I’ll cut junior year to two cards rather than skipping playtesting.
- The three-second count is easy on paper but could take some setup in Twine. If it gets fiddly, I will probably just go with an auto-advancing passage?
- I don’t know if players will disengage if they notice nothing changes in freshman year – this is one of the observation goals in playtest.
