Quest System

Apartment 20 implements a simple and linear quest system to aid in narrative development. While many games have quests systems with choices to encourage replay ability, Apartment 20 leaves its choices in the narrative system. During development, we decided that a major pillar of our game design would be immersive narrative. To implement this pillar, we decided that we would have to keep the gameplay, and therefor puzzles, simple.

This design choice naturally led the team to design our gameplay directly around the narrative. Is a resident in limbo giving hints that she wants to reunite with her husband before moving on? The player should explore to find something to remind the resident of her husband. Thus, the quest “Reconnection” was born.

In “Reconnection,” your goal is to help an old soul, Gladys, reunite with her husband, Herman. Luckily, they live right next to each other. During your quest, you must find you way from Gladys’ apartment to Herman’s; we achieved this through a puzzle platforming segment.

Designing this section of the game posed a problem to our team. How do we diegetically prevent players from leaving Gladys’ apartment early? Our decision was to put another quest in the way. When you finish Gladys’ first quest, you trigger her cat Priscilla to get up from her cat tree and reveal a path out of the room.

Integrating our quests with our narrative allows us to tell our story through gameplay. Players platform over a rich environment, motivated by clues in the dialogue. Players use these hints to solve puzzles relevant to the characters and their homes. Players are rewarded with more hints, written in the detective journal, that aid them in completing each quest.

Not only is our gameplay easy to design, with its links directly to our narrative, but it also encourages our team to work in close coordination. Our narrative, puzzle design, and programming teams develop the design of each level, each quest, and each line of dialogue to properly implement our vision. This workflow is vital to the coherence and consistency of Apartment 20.

Designing a fun and interactive quest system for a narrative driven game was a challenge, but a welcome one. We are proud to share this narratively driven quest system with you as you explore Apartment 20. Come chat, explore, and solve mysteries alongside Ace!

Mackenzie K, Apartment 20 Programming Manager