This Twine game I initially created for my final project in the Interactive Storytelling course during my Junior Year at The College of New Jersey. I later expanded upon it by fleshing out the story and expanding on some mechanics. In the game, you play as a high school student named Tyler McCallum, who lost a bet at school. As punishment for losing, he now has to spend the night at the old Burton estate on the outskirts of town.
Teaser Video
Project Description
Before this project was a Twine, it was originally a writing piece that I did for one of the creative writing courses that I took at The College of New Jersey. I decided to repurpose the story for the final project in my Interactive Storytelling course since I liked the concept and wanted to expand on it. The story was very easy to adapt to a choose-your-own adventure style of gameplay that a Twine game can provide. After a bit, I decided to expand on the game further by adjusting some mechanics and adding in music and sound effects.
When initially coming up with the story for the game, I was really interested in writing something sci-fi/horror. While the original story was written from a second-person perspective, expanding upon it by adding in specific characters created the opportunity to flesh out story elements. Some of those elements include the background on the Burton family and the backstory for why Tyler had lost the bet.
With the story of the game, it is very focused on exploration and giving the player choices as to where to go. Once the player reaches the third act, they can freely explore the manor and search different rooms, looking for items that can assist them later on. I implemented a backpack system where after the player discovers and collects items, they can open up the backpack and see what items they have collected so far. Each of the items in the game offer unique story opportunities and can impact how the game plays out.
Before I uploaded the final version of Howling Hollows, I thought it would be a fun idea to release a little teaser video to build hype up. I released the little teaser on both Instagram and Youtube. I made the teaser in Adobe Premiere Pro and utilized some of the sound effects that I used in the game.
Compared to other Twine games that I have made, this one really stands out to me due to the content in the story, backpack system, and just the large amount of time that I put into it.
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