1000 paper Cranes
1000 Paper Cranes is a VR/WebGL multi-network game for people to share blessings, find social support, and destress. I started this project with the hope to help people build love and connection in the difficult isolation times during the pandemic.
Duration
3 months (2020)
My Role
Game Ideation, Storyboard, Interface Design
Team
Melissa Parkinson (Programming), Rachel Stukenborg (Programming), Stephanie Wang (Programming), Trae Stroud (art design)
Tools
Figma, Unity, Blender, Kanban board
I pitched my game idea with the stroyBoard below.
My storyboard was selected to be featured in class.
Design process
Design sprints
My team used the Agile Method for project management with 4 sprints in total.
Aesthetics
I chose a dreamy and peaceful color palette that reminds players of the beauty of tranquility.
Game Mechanics
Our asynchronous feature— sending and receiving messages via paper cranes— is comparable to pigeon mailing or emailing. Players will send their messages through folded cranes to other players. The recipients will be able to read the messages on their received cranes when they click on their birdhouses. After reading messages, they can choose to reply or forward the cranes to other users.
There are two synchronous components to this game. First, all players will be able to see the journeys of the cranes they interacted with on a world globe/map. In other words, players who interacted with the same cranes will see the locations of these cranes simultaneously (if they are both in this game). Second, all players will be able to see the total number of cranes born in our fantasy gameland. The number will appear on the top of the gameplay interface. Players will have the opportunity to collectively make a wish and our game will give to a social cause every time we have 1000 cranes born.
Multi-user experience
The multiuser experience in our project is mostly asynchronous. It is intentionally designed in this way to foster a safe, personal space for users to foster trust and become comfortable with sharing their positivity via this game. Ideally, users will relax by walking around in our beautiful scene, reflect on their life by recording and spreading positive notes, and do fun paper foldings.