Ashen

Atmospheric souls-like exploring the themes of collaboration and belonging,

Launch trailer

My Contributions

February 2018: My birthday as a game designer

In it’s final year of development, Ashen suddenly found itself in need of a specialist quest designer. The game’s narrative implementation had grown too complex for the existing team to maintain.

A 23 year old Daniel - back then a QA tester with some passionate opinions about the story- was asked to step up and take over the implementation of all 30+ quests in the game.

Screenshot of Ashen’s narrative system (NZGDC 2019)

To do so, I had to rapidly learn our quest system… which as it turned out was far more than just a quest system. It also handled the game’s branching quest logic, dialogue flow, UI and even the dynamically growing town, all of which I promptly found myself responsible for.

Despite the steep learning curve, I successfully worked with the system to:

  • Implement all 30+ quests in the game

  • Establish best practices, ensuring it was simpler to read and maintain

  • Set-up and verify all change conditions for the Town

Video showcase of Vagrant’s Rest (town)

By the time Ashen shipped in 2018, I had “taught” the system as much as it had taught me. The logic handling dialogue was now exposed to writers in a separate system, and it had grown flexible enough to handle more traditional storytelling than Ashen’s minimalist approach.

I became the system’s feature owner for the next 7 years. Under my supervision it continued to mature and was called on once again for our next title, Flintlock, a story focused RPG with a far longer script.

January 2019: Hands on the script

Ashen already had a story by the time I joined the team. However, I was with the studio from beginning for its DLC, Nightstorm Isle, and (in addition to the technical implementation) was heavily involved with story and script work.

Nightstorm Isle trailer

Nightstorm Isle posed many creative challenges specific to the games medium, all at once:

  • The story was accessible at any point Ashen’s second half, yet still had to make sense and feel relevant

  • The story could be experienced in co-op multiplayer, yet still had to make sense from both player’s perspective

  • The story had to feel satisfying both to returning players (9 months after the game’s release), and to players experiencing Ashen for the first time

Facing these restrictions so early in my career prepared me for many challenges I would face on later projects.