Official Quests and Scenario

This might be mixing things up a little bit too late in the game, but I've always liked quests that require both character and environment interactions. And it's really cool when the character makes a discovery that changes the player's expectations at the end of a quest.

Also, one thing I've thought about is why the NPCs who have all these recipes haven't entered the cooking contest on their own. One way to solve that is to have the quests take an unexpected turn, which gives you a recipe that no one else has.

Here's an example:
- Meet with the Bard Hare, who informs you that he is cooking his family's secret sugar soup recipe.
- However, the Bard Hare has been too focused on playing his music to keep an eye on it.
- The Bard Hare offers to teach you the recipe if you go to his house and stir it to make sure it's not sticking to the pot
- You go to his house and, unsurprisingly, it is on fire
- You find a way to put out the fire, then go inside
- After cooking in the intense heat of the house fire for so long, the sugar soup recipe has actually formed rock candy!
- So now you walk away from the quest as the only one on the island that knows how to make rock candy

After several quests like this, the protagonist should have a collection of unique recipes. Then, perhaps combining all of these recipes into one giant recipe, you get a truly unique dish that will dazzle the Fry King. I think this would build a sense of progression and has the potential to be an addictive gameplay loop. With each quest, the player will wonder what twist lies at the end.

For the example quest that I gave with the Bard Hare above, it would require some additional work on the quest system. I'm happy to work on this implementation, if needed. Some additional StepTypes that would need to be implemented in the quest system for this particular example include: (1) Go to Location (check when player arrives at Bard's house), and (2) Check Game State (for when Bard's house = not on fire). Both of these would be pretty easy additions to the current system.

To keep the player on track if they haven't advanced past a particular step, it would be easy enough to add a little thought bubble over the protagonist's head. Just like the bard's lost sitar quest demonstration in the last live stream (EP. #6), the player will be reminded of the step via thought bubble dialogue until is completed. Ex: if the player hasn't found a way to put out the bard's house fire, a thought bubble might appear : "Hmm...I really ought to find a way to put out this fire before the house burns down!" Maybe this could even be extended to give hints if the player is stuck : "I wonder if I could use this bucket for anything..."

 

I like unexpected turns! And these little disasters where accidentally something good comes out of it. We could include some humour in the story. Perhaps this sugar soup is something that you will initially cook with Bard Hare, so that you have a good reason to go gather some ingredients while learning the game's mechanics. Maybe it would consist of some Slime Critter Eggs (Beach) and Plant Critter Seeds (Glade). Once you have them, you cook together with Bard Hare while he starts singing and telling you more about the Festival and this awesome soup. And while he does, perhaps our little Phoenix Chick starts nibbling some of those seeds in the background. A few moments later it leaves a small burp or sneeze (it's a baby after all, it's cute) right on the pot, completely burning down its content. And that's how the Rock Candy has been bestowed upon this world. Plus you learn that the chick exhales fire and you can actually use it for cooking. And obstacles burning, as it's probably pretty intense (even for a baby!).

 

I really like this take on it. Good opportunity for linking story, gameplay tutorials, and even a dose of humor, which is always a good thing in my opinion. Good job!

 

So then, combining these ideas, I think the flowchart for this questline would look like this... Note that I added grey blocks for additional info and a green block for triggering actions, like cutscenes.



And I had a bit of a story idea to tie this all together. My understanding on the story so far is that the narrative beats have pretty much been figured out, but they haven't been given a specific narrative treatment yet.

If that is the case, this is my proposal (and maybe there's a better sub-forum to post this in...if so, I'll repost there):

• Hamlet is a pig in a state of relative comfort, but looking for greater glory. When he learns about an island that holds an annual cooking festival and that the winner of the festival gets a great prize, he sets off to join the competition.
• He gets into his boat and heads off for the island. In a cutscene aboard his little wooden boat, he explains to the Phoenix Chick his strategy for winning the cooking competition. The Phoenix Chick doesn’t prove to be a great conversationalist…all of his replies to Hamlet’s detailed explanations are just “chirp.” Still, Hamlet doesn’t mind. He’s just happy to have someone to talk to about the competition.
• Hamlet approaches the island...for some reason, his boat crash lands on impact.
• Hamlet emerges from the wreckage and explores the beach front...eventually he meets the Bard Hare
• Excited to finally have someone to talk about the competition with, Hamlet asks the Bard Hare if he's joining in the competition
• The Bard Hare says that he is, as is almost everyone on the island...then he reveals that they are all being kept prisoner by the head chef who demands the perfect dish...and the prize for winning the competition? Freedom. It's not that the head chef is evil or anything...he's just a perfectionist.
• But the Bard Hare has a problem...he hasn't been able to enter the competition for the past two years because the Slime Critter population has really grown...and Slime Critters are their Sweet Eggs are the main ingredient in his masterpiece Sugar Soup recipe...he asks if Hamlet could help him with his nifty little cane
• If accepted, the player searches for the Slime Critter nest and destroys those Slime Critters defending it...then he scoops up the eggs and returns them to the Bard Hare
• That's when the Bard Hare remembers that the last time he entered his Sugar Soup recipe, it was too sweet for the head chef's liking...so he asks if Hamlet can get him some Tart Plant Critter Seeds to balance out the flavor
• If accepted, the player get the Plant Critter Seeds and returns to the Bard Hare
• Then, the player finds a cauldron and cooks the Sugar Soup recipe
• He and the Bard Hare each have a bowl while sitting and discussing the competition. The Bard Hare reveals that he has taken up playing the sitar to pass the time.
• During their discussion, the Phoenix Chick eats a leftover Slime Critter Egg and lets out a forceful sneeze, directing an intense ray of fire at the cauldron holding the Sugar Soup.
• This flash cooks the soup, drying up all the liquid, and forming Rock Candy with the remaining sugar...now the player has a Rock Candy recipe.
• Hamlet could probably win the competition with just the Rock Candy recipe, which he thinks about doing briefly...but he looks over at the Bard Hare playing a sullen tune on his sitar...he decides that his goal is not only to win the competition, but to help his friend escape the island...so Hamlet decides to continue exploring ways to help the Bard Hare
• Along the way, Hamlet meets several other characters that are also prisoner on the island and are taking part in the competition just to earn their freedom...for each character that Hamlet interacts with, he'll learn a unique recipe
• By the end of the game, Hamlet will make a truly unique recipe that combines ALL of the recipes he learned from the characters he has interacted with.
• Once the final dish is presented to the Fry King, he is amazed and asked how Hamlet was able to pull off such an amazing dish.
• Hamlet says that this dish combined the recipes of all the other characters that he met, so it's a shared victory.
• Hamlet wins the competition and earns the freedom of all of his friends by convincing the Fry King that the winning dish was a result of combining everyone's recipes.

 

Hey @calculus7, thought about providing some feedback and additions to the above well-structured diagram!

I am not sure whether Hamlet arrives at the island because of the cooking festival, I was thinking this was just another stop in one of his adventures.

Cute, I like that! Mr VanDough is about to have his mind blown with all these truths (I really liked the name that was proposed in the livestream! Since FryKing has only one ear )
Now looking at the Beach – Glade/Forest 1 group, taking into consideration the above but also @NicknEmart suggestion in his Beach Whiteboxing :
I guess the bigger task in the start of the Game is to get that Key Ingredient C, that is one of the 4 for the winning recipe (I guess for the next areas, again, the bigger quest would be “Get Ingredient A” and so on). To get that Key Ingredient C, you have 2 sub-quests:

1. Go through the tutorial (without interacting with any characters just yet)
2. Learn about the Festival and get a cool recipe to start with, which is the one that will give you the Key Ingredient

(Hope I used the legend right. I also added an extra bubble to indicate where we could have cinematics and implicit missions, I like how these were implemented in the above diagram. Plus some "comic relief" moments if we 'd like them)




So I guess this could require adding the following tasks (just to realize the scope of it and as a pool for ideas now that we have the related threads created):

Animation

• Tree shaking once hit by cane, dropping a fruit.
• Barrel breaking into pieces once hit (case 1)
• Barrel opening (case 2)
• Bard Hare surprised as you land on his cooking spot and begins the dialogue.
• Bard Hare singing
• Hamlet stirring the pot?
• Tikki picking on seeds
• Tikki burping fire on cauldron (best animation task ever)
• Hamlet patting Tikki’s back like nothing happened, while
• Bard stares at the cauldron in despair *insert drama here*

Cinematics:

• Arrival at beach
• Showing (destroyed?) barrels scene
• Hamlet and Bard chilling, then the Tikki accident happens and the cinematic ends with both characters looking at the Rock Candy in awe.

3d Art:

• Bard Hare's house – probably a big tree with two entrances (holes?doors?) one at the Beach and one at the Glade to serve as Scene Loading point (we will never see its interior). This is both to justify the barrels and the To Do list at the Beach, but also justifying the Bard Hare cooking and being in Glade, he could be using both areas.

Any feedback also welcome!

 

@calculus7 what I also find cool about the Rock Candy, is the fact that this accident could have a domino effect in the whole game.
Idea for Rocky Path:
For example, we have this Rocky Path area where we will find the Rock Critters. Now we need to find a Key Ingredient in that area too, which makes sense to me if it was a Rock Critter Egg. It would be cool for this area, instead of just slaying the poor critters, to actually have a small puzzle. What could that be? Well... A rock candy, really looks like a Rock Critter egg to me! What if you'd go to that area and you see a bunch of Rock Critters guarding their nests. There is no chance you would be able to get one, intact. You need to find a way to distract the critters, and make them leave their nests. You throw a rock candy on the ground and...voila! Critters are confused, they see one of their eggs laying there unprotected, so they will instantly reach out to get it. And quickly enough as they do so, you'll have your chance to get one actual Rock Critter Egg from a nest. NPC movement / Navigation / AI thread , I am looking at you.

Idea for Forest Maze:
And then for the Forest Maze, which is going to be full of Plant Critters, which have these delicious sweet seeds: I would like us to meet an NPC at the heart of the maze that would give us something or tell us something important. Just to enhance that sense of accomplishment of what you are supposed to find at the heart of the Maze. Now, I don't know what this could be, but I was really thinking of having the famous Desserter spawned there. She is one of @Smurjo 's interesting concept art inputs (one of the many puns I enjoyed). It would make sense for her to be there alone, simply enjoying solitude while making top-notch desserts to reward the travellers, with all the plant critter seeds around her. Perhaps the Rock Candy recipe would bring a new outcome at this point and take something interesting for Bake Away !

In general, because I think there are too many nice inputs from all over the place, I've created this Community Miro Board (view only) (i've shared one before to collect ideas about the town, but this one is updated, it's on Miro and it regards every area, and any community input so far. Hopefully to get inspired, to see "holes" and to contribute more!).
If you'd also like to be able to edit, here is the Community Miro Board invite to edit link .

 

I like the big tree as house. Any other special feature you have in mind for this house? Roof in-between the branches? balcony? Door bell hanging from a branch?

Or more like a "hobbit hole" in the "Lord of the Rings" films? Absolutely credible it has 2 entrances, natural rabbit holes have multiple entrances too.

I don't think the player should get rewarded for smashing the barrels. I dare say it is typically ill adviced to destroy the islanders' property right after your arrival on a foreign island. The player should rather get some delay with Bard Hare venting his anger and then not talking to him for some time. I also see no need, I like the idea of hitting the coconut tree instead (looks like I have to make coconuts...).

 

Nice reference! Honestly, I don't mind. I would go with the hole, I also liked the doorbell idea. Do as you fancy!

Me neither, that's why I suggested the cinematic, to make the player feel a bit "remorse"?They could just have opened them instead (the reason behind having a case1 and a case2 for interacting with the barrels). But if that's complicated or unecessary lets skip this!

Not sure if this interaction with vegetation in general is going to happen. But it could be fun!

 

Pretty much how I feel Hamlet is going to win this together with the Wunnais help!

 

@itsLevi0sa , thanks for the edits! I think the new flowchart looks great. Overall, I think you've done a nice job of weaving together narrative and gameplay. I have a couple of small comments below...let me know what you think. Nice diagram by the way! I like the changes.

Sounds good to me. He is a pretty adventurous little guy!

I think this (or something like this) is the key to making the characters and story of the game mean something. Something that ties it all up in a neat little bow and sort of summarizes the moral of the story.

Yes, this is a good idea. Not all of the quests have to be complex like we've discussed in this thread for the sugar soup / rock candy recipes. I think it's a fair point that most of the ingredients required for recipes would involve straightforward quests, but every third or so ingredient sought out will use a more complex questline.

I think that for the most part this idea is fine. We should allow the player some time to learn the controls and take in the world before hitting them with character interactions.

But I do think the block that you've labeled as "Implicit Mission" under the "Initial Tutorial" diamond should be given by the Bard Hare rather than a sign. The reason? I think it's an opportunity for some character development that gets the player invested in the story. Here, the Bard Hare explains (do we know if Bard Hare is male / female / androgenous? ... not sure what pronouns to use) how the Slime Critters have kept his plans for escaping off of the island from becoming a reality. Getting invested in an NPC's backstory early on I think will pay off once the game has been completed and you've helped out all the characters on the island.

That's just my two cents. What do you think? I think the "To do list" is a workable idea as well.
That being said, I do like how you worked in the comedic moment in the Glade where the Bard Hare sees the destroyed barrels. Maybe Hamlet could meet Bard Hare on the Beach at the Implicit Mission point but then the Bard Hare says he needs to retreat back to his home to work on something. At this point, he doesn't tell you about the sugar soup recipe...just that he desperately needs slime critter eggs.

I like the idea of two entrances, serving as a physical gate between the beach and glade. What if instead of two doors on the same house, it's just a gate? Maybe one side of the gate (on the beach side) leads in to the glade. Maybe the Bard Hare is so desparate for Slime Critter eggs, he locks you in on the beach side until you've collected them. Then, once you have the slime critter eggs, the gate is unlocked, allowing passage into the Glade. I think either way could work, honestly.

 

Ooh! I really like this idea! It's almost like a Bugsnax puzzle, haha.

This is also super cool! I like the idea of working in character interactions at key moments.

Thanks for this. I think something like this is necessary to pool all of our thoughts together. I made that first flowchart in Paint thinking it would just take a few textboxes and lines and would be done pretty quickly...won't be making that mistake again!

 

Referencing my reply to @itsLevi0sa above, whether we go with a gate or house with two doors, I think the Bard Hare's house asset is still needed. If we go with a gate, maybe we enter the Bard Hare's garden on the Glade side (with carrots at the main crop, of course). And we will interact with the Bard Hare just outside of its house.

I think the idea of hobbit hole style home is great!

Just my two cents: I've always enjoyed video games that point the finger at the player as a way of saying: "look what you've done!" In video games, we as players typically go through houses without permission, and break open crates to loot things without asking who the boxes belong to. I think sort of breaking the fourth wall and acknowledging the absurdity of that is comedic gold. But, of course, it all depends on what kind of game we want to make. Either way is workable. As I said, just my two cents.

 

I would like that as well. In the Game Flow diagram and a couple of times before it was mentioned that we might want to have a character who could help us but they would face some kind of trouble - probably preventing them from doing so, so you could actually achieve your goal by having helped someone else (moral of story?). I think Bard Hare could take on that role better than a Townsfolk as he is a special character that a lot of people have wondered about his role in that island.
(I think we have pretty much early on decided its a he. Along with Hamlet. I don't mind about the gender so much since most characters looked mostly neutral anyways - yet we thought of them as males. But since we can't escape a he/she pronoun/naming I think we might have a key "female" character at some point. That's why I turned the Desserter into a "she" above. I am glad you wondered though, it felt weird in the beginning how everyone assumed the same - including me. Still, Bard Hare lacks a name though. And not sure if the sound department has worked on a voice yet.)

As for having Bard Hare on the beach that could be more helpful indeed, because I don't know how effectively we could communicate having a loading scene point (that gate) that would be non-interactable at first but interactable later (after you gather the eggs). Having Bard Hare there could solve this simply by telling you "hey follow me" and be led to the new location.

Ok I didn't know the game, and watched the trailer. It has a lot of ideas that were initially thrown at a gameplay thread that was created back then Since I haven't played it, would you elaborate more on what kind of puzzle this is? Since we are still figuring out the Whiteboxing, this could be helpful.

Yes of course, that's how I made mine too! Didn't quite get what mistake you are talking about? If you were thinking about the Miro board this is just something additional - non official, just to help ourselves out (the community) and have it floating around (as it regards multiple threads). Anyways, thanks for the feedback as well! I enjoy this conversation, you definitely bring more than 2 cents in xD

 

Bugsnax is a bit of a wacky game that has you as the player observing NPC patterns and what their attractants are, then devising some sort of way to trap the NPCs and feed them to other NPCs. Here's an example mission: catch two Shiskabugs ... steps: (1) observe that Shishkabugs are shy creatures that like hiding in bushes ... there doesn't seem to be an apparent way to get them out of the bushes and into your trap. (2) Meanwhile, you observe that "Bungers" are NPCs that look like walking hamburgers and are attracted to ketchup ... so, you sling some ketchup and notice that the Bungers run to wherever you shoot it. (3) Finally, you realize that by shooting ketchup at a bush that the Shishkabug is hiding in forces the Bunger to run towards the bush, which forces the Shishkabug out of the bush and into your nearby trap... told you it's a wacky game. If you want to watch this whole pattern play out, check out this video starting from the timestamp below...(if the timestamps didn't work in the video I linked, just watch from about 22:00 to 26:00.)

I personally haven't played the game, but I liked watching the "Let's Play" series on it. It's a simple game with simple rules, but these simple mechanics come together in a bunch of "a-ha" moments when the player figures out how to capture a certain bug.

I was just making a joke about how inefficient it is to make a flowchart with a tool like Paint. Something like Powerpoint, for example, has more flexible tools for putting together a flowchart much quicker. I was just poking fun at myself for using Paint when there are already much better tools out there.

 

I was thinking that once we start actually writing dialogue, it would be good to use a tool like Celtx, which can be with limited features as a free member. I've used Celtx for other projects before and it has made story development super easy. Here's a sample of how this tool is used for game writing:

Alternatively, if we didn't want to use something like Celtx for writing the final script, we could make an in-editor Unity tool for doing something very similar. It wouldn't be difficult to make something like this, and a node editor could be used for drawing out the gameplay sequencing.

Of course, before we get started on writing dialogue, we need to really nail down the story beats and quest design. I couldn't resist doing a mockup though...here's an example of what I'm talking about (this was created with Celtx):

 

My vote goes to Bard Hare (surprise surprise that's my choice ... name suggestions so far here (is it too old of an American-centric reference?) and here), especially if we can actually do more than just 1 song after completing a quest. I've always envisioned BH as speaking in haiku all the time, as this would be totally different from how everyone else speaks. The haikus could be informative, comedic, or simply riddles to the next step of the quest. Additionally, since he's been on the island for a while, he could have secret passageways to all the important places that Hamlet will need to go to collect his ingredients, so if the player is ever stuck, Hamlet could call out to BH for help. I know we said a following helper would be too much work to do, but what about spawning BH at specific spots under certain circumstances?

Another thought that might help for this thread (and I can try to do after the latest whiteboxing efforts are merged, but feel free if you have more than the 5 minutes I'll probably have in the next week): do a flat 2D (aka top-down) map with location outlines and dots for important characters from the naming characters and things thread so we can get a high-level overview of where everyone is and might interact with Hamlet. Paint might be okay for that.

 

@shuttle127 noted! Happy to see you still invested in your favorite character.

So I’ve tried to sketch out a frame to work on with some questions. If we have the same questions, maybe we can come up with some interesting answers and blend all this together. @calculus7 I like what you suggest, and you already answered a lot of the questions below, I am just putting it out there and have everything under the same umbrella. So questions I think we need to answer:

• Why is Gabbott the only one of his kind on the island and willing to help us
• Why is the Cooking Festival happening every year
• Why is VanDough not impressed
• (Also: Why is VanDough red and only has one ear?)
• How are we going to win this? What will make our dish so special?

Recap about our objectives that the story should revolve around:
Key Ingredient A + B + C + D + Special utensil + Key Recipe (?) =Winning Dish
Not sure about the Key Recipe: I guess if we combined A,B,C,D that would make the Key Recipe anyways. But perhaps we might find one on how to cook one of those Key Ingredients.

I would also link each Key Ingredient to a Key Character that in turn could be linked to each other.
Key Characters are the ones that can hand us one of the above
Important NPCs are the ones that lead us to Key Characters

Key Ingredient C (Beach): Rock Candy
Important NPC for Key Ingredient C: Gabbott (Bard Hare)
Key character for Key Ingredient C: Tikki (our Phoenix chick)
Key Ingredient A (Rocky Path): Rare Rock Critter Egg (perhaps a golden one?)
Important NPC that leads us to Rocky Path: …..[ ]
Key Ingredient B (Forest Maze): … [ ]
Important NPC that leads us to Forest Maze: …..[ ]
Key character that gives us the Key Ingredient: Desserter
Key Ingredient D (Town): …[ ]
Important NPC that leads us to Key Character: …[ ]
Key character: Farmer? I liked this one, and makes sense to have him as he deals with ingredients. (Nice work @MortyJHin )
Special Utensil: …[ ]
Something that is necessary to pull out the dish. Like..?[ ]
Key Character for Special Utensil: ….[ ]
Key Recipe: …[ ]
Key character that gives us the Key Recipe: …[ ]

So trying to answer some of the above:

About that Special Utensil: A Rock Critter Egg cracker
Again, citing @Smurjo : While introducing us to the Rock Critter eggs she also made the remark that they are pretty hard to break. Suggesting that one might need a special utensil for that, like a nutcracker. So it would make sense if we got that from some of the Townsfolk. And this quest might be a separate quest from the Rocky Path one, so they will be connected later on. In general I am in favor of introducing small separate quests that will be linked together later. Hopefully with those a-ha moments! (Suddenly hearing “Take on me” while I write that).
Gabbott:
Perhaps he is the only one left of his kind on that island, because….[ ]
Perhaps he came from another island but decided to stay because…[ ]
How does he know about the Sugar Soup? I would draw a link there to the Desserter.
Desserter:
I think I got the term “Deserter” completely wrong on what it means to the English language. In my native language desert-er (coming from desert= empty area) means the one who resides away from people. But on the English language apparently is the person who abandons army without permission ^^ so maybe the pun will not come across (A deserter who makes desserts == desserter). Or does it? Perhaps the Townsfolk do invest on this competition with almost a militaristic discipline. That might have put our little Desserter off. Maybe she decided to stay away from all this and just enjoy pure cooking instead. Or maybe – like VanDaugh- she is just missing something in all this. Maybe they have a backstory together.
Links between Desserter – VanDough (FryKing):
Maybe those 2 were the best in their art and they were friends/or ”rivals”. But something happened and Desserter has withdrawn away from people.
Why is the Cooking Festival happening every year and why is VanDough not impressed:
Maybe her decision to “withdraw” made VanDough and everybody else sad and now everyone is just trying to replicate the tastes she took away with her. So the contest just lacks some originality and imagination! And that’s the roadblock and the reason Van Dough is not impressed?
What will really make our dish so special:
So Hamlet could bring the “originality” out from the Townsfolk, by finding out about what their own preferences/specialties are instead of what they think will win, and bringing insights/feedback from his adventures and knowledge. This would result in unique contributions, their mixing of which will result into the winning dish. It’s not that they are incapable, they are just trapped!
Links between Desserter - Gabbott:
Perhaps she is the one who gave Gabbott the “Sugar Soup” recipe. Becauuuuse….[ ]

TO BE CONTINUED.

Gosh I know it’s too much. There are a lot of blanks to be filled in. Story is not really my thing, I’d rather design spaces for it (The reason why I try to "push" it)! So feel free to change anything – recommend a different direction.

PS: I made another Miro Board to summarize the outcome of these discussions, and you can use this to edit instead of Paint!
Quests and Scenario Miro Board - View only
Quests and Scenario Miro Board - Edit invite

@calculus7 I also re-edited the Beach-Glade quest I think now we are cool? I kept the sign, because I think reading something should be part of the tutorial (as we are going to read recipes along the game), but Gabbott will have time to tell his story once we sit in the fire. Not sure about the Gabbott-Slime critters link you draw but still- the sign could have whatever written on it - even revealing a backstory hint.

 

So glad you asked because I've been working on an adjustment to Bard Hare's name (and was going to update the naming thread before I saw this post) that answers this question. Instead of Gabbott being a first name, it is a surname/last name/family name, and the family's purpose is to be the cataloguer/story teller/guide for foreigners of the island that they live on (i.e. 1 Gabbott per island, and part of the intro is some variation of "I come from a long line of Gabbotts," which is funny to me because rabbits are known for procreating a lot). Gabbott's are differentiated by their first name and middle initial, each of which is a play on an adjective that describes their personality. For example, our BH now becomes Garrul S Gabbott because he talks a lot, and eventually Hamlet finds out that Merr E Gabbott is the resident BH of the next island over. My one concern about this is that these names work in English, just not sure how they might be translated to other languages. We could always just keep the surname idea and never reveal first names or middle initials because the islanders only ever refer to BH as Gabbott anyway (hence the suggested summoning phrase "Heyyyy Gaabboooottt!" ), so that might be easier in the end. Either way, with this backstory, Gabbott already knows all the shortcuts on the island as well as everyone on the island including the Desserter (who my mind's eye sees looking like Slurpuff, is that bad? ).

This is exactly what I was hoping my 2d map idea would resolve, as I do have ideas for each of those blanks and question marks, but I'll save it for the map itself. To preview, my thoughts were to outline each scene/area and include icons for each character, maybe color code them to show which should belong to each key ingredient. Hopefully I'll have more time over the weekend to at least draw up a rough draft, but anyone with ideas can feel free to chime in or make their own.

I prefer the Reel Big Fish version.

 

And on top of that maybe desserts, cakes and sweet dishes aren't considered proper cooking. And they even caught her sneakily using the community pizza oven for cake...

Here is kind of some fragment of a quest I had in mind:

• Meet two townspeople arguing: The first was supposed to bring blue slime critter eggs but brought orange slime critter eggs to second. The second says he doesn't want the orange "there is nothing better than blue"
• Get blue Slime critter eggs from mountain lake area. Exchange for orange, but have some blue left over
• Discuss whether the different colors taste different with Bard Hare. He would like to know as well and gives Hamlet a yellow egg for experimenting.
• Go to forest and get green egg.
• Make orange, yellow, green and blue cake dough.
• Bard Hare comes to see what Hamlet is doing. While they discuss someone willing to help (Tiki, the desserter?) pours one bowl of dough over the next into the cake tin. Since there is no chance to separate the different colored dough again Hamlet has no chance but to bake it all together. This is how the rainbow cake is born. reward: rainbow cake recipy

I imagine the rainbow cake to look like this (complete with caramel coating which results from the phoenix chick breathing on the sugar coating, not unlike the coating on creme brulee or creme catalana):

 

So Gabbott the Garrulous is Gabbot Garrul S. Nice! Perhaps he also has a famous cousin/brother who is a cook on another island, Gabbot Rams A. (The other popular suggestion for the Fry King’s name, but I felt it was too tied with reality. Or perhaps we could still give that name to a Wunnai) Anyway.
Is Garrul S. taking part in the competition after all though as @calculus7 suggested?
I’ll leave it up to you to decide, I am very blocked on anything Bard Hare related. And @Smurjo nice catch. I really liked the domino effect here, getting things rolling!

The way I see it now coming together is to actually have each of the 4 key ingredients helping 4 different NPC’s cook something really special. So we do not gather the key ingredient for us after all, we gather them for them, in our effort to help them do something unique. But since we were kind enough to help them, perhaps they help us in return by sharing with us the special thing they made. It could be part of a dish: Sauce, topping, sider, dough whatever. So Key Ingredients A,B,C,D are the different Townsfolk contributions combined in an awesome dish (#OpenProjects.)
So, so far we have:

• a Rock Candy (Key Ingredient C),
• a Rainbow Dough or Rainbow Cake (thinking of leaving it as dough, it could be used for something else than a cake. Could this be Key Ingredient D, the one we find in town?),
• a Golden Rock Critter Egg (Key Ingredient A) that we might open with a “nutcracker” (or perhaps use Phoenix Chick for that?) and
• we are lacking a Key Ingredient B in the Forest Maze, something that the Desserter will probably give us.

Then these 4 need to be combined in a dish that actually makes some kind of sense ^^ We could have the Rainbow Cake, that will be sprinkled with Rock Candy on top (?), have a golden topping or filling (if we make a rainbow pie instead of cake) made from the Golden Rock Egg that the Town’s top saucier(?) could make for us, and something from Key Ingredient B?
All of which will link all key characters together somehow, hopefully in some kind of narrative puzzle. For example I do think that this Rock Candy will be linked to the Desserter from which Gabbott probably has learned the Sugar Soup.

@shuttle127 I like how you imagined the Desserter, maybe we should communicate that in the Accessories thread. As a character I also tend to think of her like the Oracle in Matrix (Funny how the character also baked cookies in the film). I mean it in that she will acknowledge we are about to change something in the course of failures in the Festival (are we The One?Would be funny if it’s proven in the end that we were not), and she will bring her own insights in that cause.
Also, @Smurjo I really like the remark on how much sweet dishes can be considered proper cooking. We need to restore some pastry appreciation here. “In a world full of pizzas, make a cake” xD We could even turn this into a salty/sweet kind of war, like in real life, with the 2 breakfast kind of people. Maybe it all comes down to a red vs blue pill! (Ok I’ll stop with the references, let’s stay original.) But yeah, perhaps VanDough is indeed a perfectionist "tyrrant" that only favors salty dishes, so we need to prove him wrong and inspire the Townsfolk to express themselves in cooking any way they want. And thinking now that the Desserter and Gabbott are basically the only ones living as hermits and cook sweet things....it kinda starts forming something here.

 

@cirocontinisio true and we can cut those "extras" as we go (however, I do not consider anything yet as a big "extra", nor do I think we have introduced any new gameplay, except if you are refering to the NPC/AI post regarding the Rock Critter behavior, which is the reason I asked if it's doable. But if it is not, we will withdraw it of course) . I know its long to read, but one cannot simply come up with a story without writing a bit more than in other threads, it's useful to have a domino effect in the discussions and keep the best bits of all in the end - as we are surprisingly doing. We are trying to keep everything into "we need to find 4 key ingredients to make a dish" but these ingredients need a character to lead us to them, or give them to us and initiate a dialogue. And I already feel like we are getting there. If you manage to find the time to go through it-it would of course be helpful, we know how busy the core team is. And we are also trying to be aware of the scope (all the extra stuff with cutscenes etc you mention is to keep in mind exactly that, that these would need to be made, so we might want to abandon them), so hopefully we will have a full diagram soon for you to revise and say what to keep/what to throw.
Edit: 20 min of gameplay with 4 ingredients to find in 4 different areas while interacting with townsfolk and learn about their preferences is I think not very realistic. But I know you say it to keep expectations low, hopefully we'll manage to blend everything into the least amount of time possible!Again, critique is more than welcome, and if you see something that is definitely a red flag, you will save us time too

 

@itsLevi0sa I couldn't agree more! I think that the storyline charted out in this thread, in fact, doesn't stray away from the core tenets initially planned for the game. But I think some of the descriptive aids that we add in to these storylines, like the cutscenes, make it seem like the story suggestions require major changes to the game. But that's part of the fun in crafting a story - having fun with envisioning how your ideas will play out on the screen in the end-product. But what's written here is, of course, negotiable. I think that the story- and quest- line laid out here are both taking a very clear direction. And because these contributions come from a bout of creativity, they are often bundled with cutscenes, etc. Just like with a REAL game, writers write in the way that they feel brings out the most creativity...it is not up to writers to design systems or mandate where cutscenes show up. Their job is to lay out a story. And I think we've done that here.

@cirocontinisio Can you please point out specifics on what you like / don't like so we have a clear direction to proceed?

 

hey yall! im new here and just caught up with this thread and thought of pouring in my views to the mix too!

as my friend talked to me about the utensils, i always pictured it to be some basic object like a bowl or something (which i thought wud be cool to get from a crab critter from the beach or something) but an eggcracker, while being a neat and fresh idea, also gave me a view of what kinda utensils wud fit in for the special occasion (rn bowls seem too frequently available or common to be a 'special' utensil*).

@shuttle127 https://miro.com/app/board/o9J_kkiU1T0=/?moveToWidget=3074457350239703167&cot=14 found this on codecks with a layout of the map, wud it help for the 2d rendition? and this map overview includes the 'whole' area ryt? i mean i know the map in the link barely helps but the flow of the areas wud atleast contribute a bit ryt?

so are desserts the general main dishes? it'd fit in with the story related explanations (also VanDough missing something and Hamlet providing something especially with help from the deserter (whose meaning can be bent from the military deserter to just a family/friend-circle deserter i guess @itsLevi0sa cus anything cud be used as a metaphor ryt?) Desserter gave me real Ratatoullie vibes tbh and is cute!). as mentioned by @Smurjo , desserts are an interesting topic for discussion in the island (name?) as some cosider it to be an art form while others merely take it for granted, hence KingFry ridiculing Desserter wud make sense (but hates to admit that desserts are what hes been missing in these festivals?) and at the end wud also give Desserter a chance to come back to the Kitchen and resume their post or something idk...

* 2 questions come to me:
1. there are non-special utensils too? i havent been able to catch up to all the threads so idk tbh
2. as our special dish is a fusion of several simpler dishes, i guess with the right ideas (and ingredients /parts), wud it be plausible to make a utensil 'special' if it were made with other lesser utensils?

 

Hey @sajithsathes welcome on board!

Nice, I def agree! I think one gets the point behind the name (hopefully).

I like that! Ending with reconciliation and some acknowledgement, nice.

Yes, we have quite a few art assets of simple utensils. Just for the sake of time saving though, I wouldn't go down the road of assembling a special utensil out of different ones. I think a small "backstory" or a special usage would suffice for making a utensil special. What do you think?

 

I agree - it is special already since it doesn't exist in real life. We would obviously need some kind of explanation too. Why would someone open an egg with a nutcracker-like utensil otherwise?

 

Ok teammates, a couple more additions to come up with a really rough – but somewhat “whole” course of actions?
Key ingredient D:
Starting from @Smurjo ‘s input, I would link the rainbow dough (or cake) to be the Key Ingredient D we find in town and I would make the characters she introduced us to be a quarrel between a Baker and an assistant, the Baker probably being this old lady for 2 reasons:
1st She is cute, there is no better pie or cake than a grandmas cake
2nd Given her age she will be able to tell us a lot about the different critter eggs and probably she is going to be the one introducing us to the Golden Rock Critter Egg (back in her days…they used to have some).
Key ingredient A:
Then for the Golden Rock Egg and its usage: Given the other mostly solid ingredients, I think we could use that Egg to make a Sauce (filling or topping). So perhaps we should introduce a Saucier in the story who could probably be Gourmando, this Unibrow fella? For the newcomers, Gourmando was a name contribution from the core team at the very beginning (unless they changed mind but I do find it really suitable for the role). Gourmando owns the Egg Cracker and also a Golden Sauce Recipe (the Key Recipe) that traces back many generations but both have grown pretty useless nowadays as nobody has been able to fetch that rare Rock Critter egg.
Key ingredient B:
Then for the Desserter and the Key Ingredient B: Maybe she would hand us some ie. Almond seeds? They might be something she has discovered in her solitude and point us to the Saucier (they might be old friends) to use their oil to skyrocket the flavor in his sauces. Or perhaps point us to the Farmer to plant them and multiply them/introduce them back to the Townsfolk. I think the farmer is an interesting character to have as he would know a lot about ingredients and stuff, so he might be an intermediate – linking character between Key characters.

Again it would be great to draw links between all characters, but I’ll leave this blank for now. Also I think it’s interesting the recent naming contribution by Ciro regarding the Fry King’s character and the hint of how he lost one ear.(I am favoring VanDough as last name and the “Comb” as nickname, both being used, what would you choose?Other popular one in the livestreams was Ramseye and you can also take a look in general in the Naming thread)
So still a long way to go regarding all the blanks and the links between all characters, but you can find the rough sketch here (repost, for @ChemaDmk as a quick summary ) :
Quests and Scenario Miro Board - View only
Quests and Scenario Miro Board - Edit invite

PS: Just trying to figure out the basic frame here, all ingredients or characters could be changed to the liking of the most, but I think the course of actions slowly starts forming something (I hope?). Apologies if being “pushy”, time is running My wish is for others to have enough time to write the dialogues and the rest to have something to refer to

 

Hahaha @itsLevi0sa you beat me to it, I just finished my drawing and was about to post!

Anyway, the drawing ignores some of the suggestions and keeps some others (if not as the Key Ingredient (KI), as part of a quest to get the KI), and I'll try to do some linking below the image (apologies for the hand-drawing, quickest sketch I could do based off the Game Map Miro board).



TL;DR: Each of the 4 Key Ingredients (KI) all go into the final recipe per suggestion from Community Miro curated by @itsLevi0sa to create a 4-course meal (which allows us to make a dish from a dish) to serve to Fry King (FK). Most of the characters have roles from the kitchen hierarchy linked in the naming thread, and several of them tie everything to the Desserter (TD) being the missing link. 3 out of the 4 KI can only be made by Hamlet because he has Tiki to light them on fire.

ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNICA VERSION (AKA MY USUAL):

4-Course Meal
Hors D'Oeuvres: French Onion Dip
Appetizer: Cheese Saganaki
Entree: Flaming Shrimp/Shrimp Flambe
Dessert: Cherries Jubilee

Kitchen Hierarchy

Rank: Executive Chef (EC)
Name: Fry King aka "Comb"
Background: He's combed every island (except his own) for his missing relative (aka The Desserter (TD)), holding the festival every year in hopes TD comes back after their fallout due to disagreement on validity of Pastry Chef in the kitchen (similar to @Smurjo and @sajithsathes ideas).

Rank: Head Chef (HC)
Name: Gourmando
Background: Unibrowed lovable guy that knows everyone and cares for "the kitchen" (loving name for their town) since FK isn't the same anymore. Shows Hamlet the kitchen hierarchy chart at some point with a ? where Pastry Chef should be, which provides a little more backstory. Gives the long-term quest to talk to the townsfolk to create a 4-course meal for FK in hopes of lightening his mood.

Rank: Veggie Chef (VC)
Name: Kooky
Background: Really good at hors d'oeuvres like French Onion Dip (KI 1), also dabbles in soups since there's no Entree Chef, so taught Bard Hare (BH) how to make his sugar soup (@calculus7's idea?).

Rank: Roast Chef (RC - forgot to put in diagram in town)
Name: TBD
Background: RC gives Hamlet the idea of using Tiki to light his dishes on fire, and once RC sees that Hamlet has the rock critter sauce, RC explains how to make cheese saganaki (KI2) and provides some extra cheese for it. The tricky part here is the player knowing that he needs to talk to RC after getting the sauce to complete the quest. RC also suggests Hamlet should apply for Deputy Chef if he wins the competition. Hamlet politely turns down the offer since he's already set his sights on his next adventure and won't stay in one place for long. He does promise to visit again some time.

Rank: Seafood Chef (SC)
Name: TBD
Background: Found in town lamenting about loss of fishing net and/or rods, which Hamlet happened to pass on the beach and didn't know he could pick up (or maybe he did pick them up and is holding onto them?). Once provided to the chef, Hamlet is given a recipe and/or shrimp for Flaming Shrimp (KI3), the entree.

Rank: Pastry Chef (PC - in diagram as TD)
Name: The Desserter (TD), real known unknown/TBD? ("Muffin" could be FK's term of endearment for TD)
Background: This post is unfilled due to TD's fallout with FK over 20 years ago. Hinted at by Gourmando's chart, Kooky's dialogue with Hamlet (Hamlet: "Mmmm, this dip tastes like my nana used to make" ... Kooky: "Hey, I'm not that old, but I know someone who is..."), and Baker/Confectioner's disagreement about the blue/orange critter eggs (see next rank). Hamlet eventually learns Cherries Jubilee (@Smurjo's idea) from TD and uses it as KI4.

Rank: Baker and Confectioner (B/C)
Name: TBD and TBD
Background: From the Community Miro board again, the idea of arguing over which color slime critter eggs are the best ("Oh I wish TD were here! TD would know what to do!") hints at needing to find TD. The "resolution" could be part of the dialogue Hamlet has with TD if he has seen them before meeting TD, otherwise it's not and can either be skipped entirely or gone back to afterward.

Rank: Meal Server
Name: "The Twins"
Background: The twins are kids who go around offering to share the dishes with the other townsfolk, but really what they're doing is sampling each dish for themselves. When Hamlet "catches" them, they let him know they're just trying to see if anyone has been able to replicate the "magic" of TD's dishes, to no avail. They're the ones who suggest going into the forest maze because they like exploring, but they are afraid of getting lost because they've heard that the only person that went in there hasn't been seen since.

 

Ah, it shouldn't feel like a race I am sowwyy Your input was really eye-opening. I love the thought you 've put into this, I already have favorite bits and in general: I wish we can use all the characters you mention even if they don't become part of a main quest. It would be great to meet all these roles and I would expect in general to interact with multiple different NPC's that would have a default dialogue bubble but still give a little something to the story. And I had indeed your kitchen hierarchy suggestion in mind introducing the Saucier, I am glad you elevated this even further. Especially liked The Twins and in general how multiple characters refer to TheDesserter (funny how FryKing has searched everywhere except his own island) and big like for the saganaki cheese Maybe Tiki's fire will be a game changer after all in many aspects.
I'll leave room for others to comment on this and strongly encourage all of you to edit that Miro board if you'd like. Perhaps you could copy/paste below or re-write some chunks as you'd like. Trying to think of quests as steps and how one character could point to another, it can quickly become a big narrative maze. I tried to keep it to the bare minimum I think is possible. Have a good week.

 

I looked at what's already there and most of it will stay as is, just needs a few tweaks and a few more steps, I'll see if I can lose more sleep next Sunday night to update the rest and then pare it down as much as possible. Looking forward to more feedback!

 

I don't want to make any suggested storyline edits since I like what we have going here. Perhaps after we have some feedback from the core team.

I just wanted to point out that some of the tasks mentioned in these storylines could be implemented very simply with components that we already have in place or components that would be extremely simple to add in.

For example, let's look at the "cutscene" where the Phoenix Chick eats seeds and sneezes / burps on the sugar soup. This could be done offscreen during dialogue between Hamlet and the Bard Hare. Here's how that might play out:
(1) Dialogue between Hamlet and Bard Hare discussing the Sugar Soup recipe
(2) The Bard Hare comments that the Phoenix Chick is eating the leftover seeds...Hamlet doesn't care (P.C. gets cranky if it doesn't eat)
(3) Dialogue interrupted when the Phoenix Chick lets out a powerful sneeze
(4) During the sneeze:
- Camera remains fixed on Hamlet and Bard Hare...offscreen action is implied
- The dialogue bubble pops up with the Phoenix Chick uttering "ACHOOOO"
- Screen shake is added
- Camera view tinted with flashes of red and orange
- Maybe Hamlet and Bard Hare switch to their surprised expressions
(4) Dialogue ends...Hamlet investigates the pot and discovers the resulting Rock Candy

In that example, I think that the only custom addition is the screen tint, which could be implemented in a shader that would take five seconds to write. Of course, this scene could also be pulled off without it. Anyway, my point is just because the flowchart says "cinematic" we don't have to interpret it that way.

Let's use our creative skills to rework the storyline we have using the toolset already in place. I think we have a cool story and quest structure going here.

 

What edits are you referring to here? What I've described changes the key ingredients but doesn't remove any of the quests that currently exist in the community Miro board, and Ciro didn't make any suggestions? He also said that @ChemaDmk would review this thread today, so when she has time she'll chime in (probably groaning that this is turning into the old dialogue and narrative thread instead of having the diagrams (although those do exist in Miro)).

To that end, I joined the community Miro Board earlier (somehow using Google instead of being anonymous, should probably introduce myself at some point in that thread on these forums, heh ) to try to make some updates, but using my laptop's trackpad (don't ask me why I don't have a mouse, I can't give you a good answer) proved to be a bit of a nightmare trying to copy-paste, make new groups, and even do simple things like zoom in/out and move screen from side-to-side (I could've just missed the tool that does it if it exists, but I didn't do the tutorials). To that end, here's a ginormous wall of text with my ideas for long-term quest and the 4 main quests for key ingredients based on locations in the core team's Miro board that Ciro linked above. It is nothing but dialogue, fighting, collecting, and making dishes and manages to tie 10 characters into 47 steps, so probably a bit much for 10-20 minutes of gameplay.

Long-Term Quest (4-course meal of Key Ingredients)

1. Complete item tutorial in Beach, optionally picking up items for KI3 (fisherman’s net/rods)
2. Complete fighting tutorial in Beach against Slime Critters
3. Complete character tutorial with BH in Beach
4. Go to Glade to learn “Sugar Soup” recipe, hinting at Kooky (likes his songs & taught him recipe)
5. Fight plant critters in Forest Path 1 to get rest of ingredients for “Sugar Soup”, optionally picking up items for KI1
6. Return to Glade to make recipe with BH, with reward being information about Town/Festival/FK and suggestion to introduce himself straightaway to FK upon entering the town
7. Introduce self to FK in Town, who explains about festival and to talk to Gourmando to enter competition
8. Talk to Gourmando in Town, suggesting to introduce self to FK first
9. See the kitchen hierarchy chart and inquire about the ? where Pastry Chef should be, with reward hint about FK/TD’s fallout and explanation about the “real” reason for the festival, followed by suggestion to talk to the rest of the kitchen staff (i.e. the townsfolk) to get their opinions on the matter
10. Complete quests for KIs 1-4 in any order, one at a time, with encouragement along the way if talking to Gourmando or FK again
11. Learn how to combine dishes into a meal from Gourmando
12. Present meal to FK
13. When asked about preparation, explain how the entire town helped with dishes and suggestions on how to bring TD back
14. Cut scene as TD comes back and reconciles with FK
15. FK offers Hamlet Deputy Chef position, which is politely turned down with a promise to visit again
16. Cut scene as Hamlet sails off into the distance, bound for his next adventure!

Key Ingredient 1 (French Onion Dip)

1. Triggered by talking to Kooky in Town after speaking with FK & Gourmando, suggestion to introduce self to FK first, politely suggesting to complete other KI quests before interacting again
2. Fetch requested ingredients from Forest Path 1, with recipe as reward
3. Try prepared dish
4. Comment on “just like my nana’s,” with reply (hint about TD) as reward

Key Ingredient 2 (Cheese Saganaki)

1. Triggered by talking to Roast Chef in Town after speaking with FK & Gourmando, suggestion to introduce self to FK first, politely suggesting to complete other KI quests before interacting again
2. RC notices Tiki and suggests using to light dishes on fire for extra flair, especially if Hamlet’s planning to use certain sauces/spices
3. Hamlet asks what kinds of sauces/spices would be good, and RC recommends the golden rock critter sauce which can only be found in the rocky path area, but neglects to mention the utensil to open the eggs
4. Hamlet heads to rocky path 1 and finds BH, who also happens to be looking for the sauce/spice
5. BH gives some hints about how to deal with the rock critters and shows the golden rock critter egg opener
6. Hamlet defeats the rock critters (either by distraction or attacking) to obtain 2 golden eggs
7. Hamlet returns to BH to collect the opener as reward for 1 golden egg
8. Hamlet returns to RC in Town with the opener and egg, and asks what’s next
9. RC provides cheese saganaki recipe and gives Hamlet some extra cheese and trays as reward

Key Ingredient 3 (Flaming Shrimp/Shrimp Flambe)

1. Triggered by talking to Seafood Chef in Town after speaking with FK & Gourmando, suggestion to introduce self to FK first, politely suggesting to complete other KI quests before interacting again
2. SC laments about forgetting/losing their fishing nets/rods at the Beach
3. If Hamlet picked them up first time, presents to SC, with reward of recipe and shrimp to make the dish
4. If Hamlet did not pick them up first time around, backtrack to get them, then present for reward

Key Ingredient 4 (Cherries Jubilee)

1. Triggered by catching “The Twins” in Town stealing from Baker/Confectioner after speaking with FK & Gourmando, suggestion to introduce self to FK first, politely suggesting to complete other KI quests before interacting again
2. TT explain how they were trying to sample B/C’s dishes to see if they’ve recaptured TD’s “magic,” to no avail
3. Hamlet asks TT about TD, whose reply explains how they’ve explored the whole island shaking down trees looking for sweets and looking in vain for any sign of TD, but they don’t want to go into the maze because the only person that’s ever gone in has never been seen since; they don’t know that TD is that person
4. Optional interaction with B/C before going into the forest maze to give more flavor to the need for TD’s return
5. Head to forest maze, shaking down trees for cherries and the like
6. Reach the inner forest and find TD
7. Talk to TD about what’s been going on and why TD is needed back in Town
8. TD is not in a mood to talk about the Town and instead asks to be left alone
9. Hamlet does not want to leave TD alone and asks what would help them cheer up
10. TD explains how a good cherries jubilee used to do the trick, but those hopes were crushed years ago (hinting at the disagreement with FK)
11. Hamlet asks for ingredients and offers to bring them back
12. TD provides ingredient list and Hamlet gets (or presents if already collected)
13. Upon making recipe, Tiki gives it a little puff for good measure and TD loves it!
14. Hamlet asks for permission to use the recipe in the competition if TD does not want to come back, and TD approves with some comment about “I’ll bet they’ve never tasted anything as good before!”

 

Reading over the posts that we already have here, I feel compelled to offer a tweak on the storyline that addresses the above quoted points and works it into the current storyline.

So here goes:

• Long ago, the Fry King was on the bad side of unrequited love for the Desserter. The Desserter just considered him a friend.
• One year, for the Fry King's birthday, the Desserter made him a cake that was absolute culinary perfection - the Savory Crunch Rainbow Cake.
• On his birthday, the Fry King decides to finally prove his love to the Desserter. He cuts off his ear and offers it as a gift. The Desserter is disturbed by this and well ... deserts him.
• Sullen that he no longer has the Desserter in his life, the Fry King fruitlessly tries to replicate this recipe. He knows that he can't have the Desserter, but having that recipe will make him feel closer to her once again. So he sails off to hold a cooking competition in the hopes that he'll attract the most talented chefs around the world...surely, their combined talents can recreate the masterpiece.
• But the Fry King becomes obsessed. He won't allow the chefs to leave the island until they concoct the perfect recipe. And it isn't until Hamlet comes along and combines the skills of all of these chefs until the recipe actually comes together.
• Year after year, the Fry King is not impressed because the chefs always prepare salty entrees...somehow they've learned that sweets are a bit of a sore topic for the Fry King. Nothing can compare to the Savory Crunch Rainbow Cake.
• Also, as a bit of a twist, it turns out that when the Desserter left the Fry King, she retreated to the same island ... though she somehow never knew about the Fry King being here or the cooking competition. The final recipe can't really come together until we learn the Desserter's secrets.
• Of course, the only recipe that will win is the Fry King's beloved Savory Crunch Rainbow Cake. And to make this cake, we'll need to combine the four key ingredients mentioned previously, and somehow the recipe isn't completed until the Desserter reveals / gives us something?

 

Sorry if there's confusion here. I was just saying that I was going to hold off on making any further suggestions as far as storyline is concerned (which I quickly undid with my next post, lol) given Ciro's suggestions that we may be exceeding scope. I was making the point that I'd hold off on further suggestions until we have some feedback / approval or disapproval on the story direction.

 

When that writing bug hits it hits HARD!

I don’t envy the core team’s challenge of dealing with this community-sourced story, heh. All things will change and we’ll come up with something that works in the end!

 

Drawing a straight line to van Gogh now aren't we I think this is a bit too cult. I'd prefer to keep Ciro's input with Fry King being called "Comb" because he combs any area to fetch everything on his own despite the danger and that's how he lost his ear.
Anyways, after the last inputs:
We now have to choose between 2 general story roadblocks regarding the Festival dish failures and how we'll win:
Suggestion 1:
1. There used to be normal times - 2. something tragic happened where the facts perhaps are: Fry King lost ear? - Desserter became a deserter - there is a general aversion of anything sweet from FryKing's side that is forced on the community's way of cooking/ there is a general favoring of only making salty dishes: reason of failures-> the Townsfolk are not really cooking according to their personal preferences/they are not original 3. Hamlet can restore things back to normal.
Suggestion 2 (summarizing from @shuttle127):
1. There used to be normal times - 2. something tragic happened and the pastry chef vanished, reason of failures-> dishes "missing something" - 3. Hamlet can restore things back to normal together with the community (bring her back)

I think the key is to decide:
what's the roadblock - how we resolve the problem(goal) - and what's the moral of the story
My personal vote still is the salty > sweet dish thing, and the moral of story is to be original and express yourself the way you want and not the way you are "supposed to win" (reason behind cooking failures).

No matter how much thought we put into this, lets keep in mind that this will come out only in the form of several lines at best spoken by several NPCs.

@shuttle127 I feel like you introduce a lot of characters that are important to quests and some back and forth between already visited areas, which is time costly (referring to Key Ingredient 3 where from Town you are pointed back to the beach. You could go to the lake perhaps). 10 characters is definitely too much, I don't think we can have more than around 4 (each linked to a Key ingredient) in order to also leave space for some development. Everybody else can just be an NPC with a single line to serve as distraction (story is supposed to be a puzzle too, so I'd suggest the puzzle being the realization that we need to focus on sweets, the secret longing of the Townsfolk, instead of salty dishes which are "the norm" that the "Distraction NPCs" are pushing us to make. It might not even be a "necessity", perhaps we really like the Rock Candy we made and we decide to focus on a sweet dish despite everyone pointing us against it. What do they know? ^^ And by doing so perhaps we liberate the rest who might want to do the same but are trapped in the "favoring someone else" mentality which makes FryKing not impressed)..Sorry for the bold, I know you are linking your own narrative puzzle to find the Pastry Chef, just addressing my key points for the quick readers. On top of that, perhaps we might be able to come up with an alternate salty dish (the saganaki-shrimp-onion dip one) but it wouldn't win because you didn't "resolve" the story, you went with the flow. I am just afraid, it can't fit the time we have for this. (perhaps we might be able to get these ingredients and dish "too easily" and actually reach the ending scene in like 10 minutes resulting in a failure, so we'd have to re-run the game (from the EnteringTown point) and pay more attention to details this time. Sorry for favoring Suggestion 1 over 2 and turning your idea into the "failure" option (my opinion is as good as yours), just trying to find a way to combine both because one kinda outrules the other.

General conclusion:
I think it would be great if we ourselves (the players) come up with a solution to the narrative puzzle, instead of being guided by the game to a deus ex machina character (ie the Deserter). She might help us, but I'd rather the player to be the one who has to realize something (in this case that it is the sweet dish you'd truly like to make despite the game distracting you and pointing you to the opposite direction).
Example: Regarding the quest with the rainbow dough, perhaps the baker tells you that the combination of all colored eggs into one mix would result in a really sweet flavored dough and that's definitely something to laugh at, nobody is that crazy to do that and think it would win. It's against the basic old rules of fine baking! And that's how you get tempted to put all eggs in her blue-only mix if you'd value more what YOU want and not what the game wants.
Does it make sense? We will basically try to "trap" the player into making a dish that they think the game seems to favor just like the Townsfolk are trapped making dishes they think the FryKing will appreciate.

The core team is not going to go through all this. It is our duty to present them a diagram, some clear steps/character connections and a brief summary that can be even told in a sentence that will reveal the roadblock we 've come up with (reason of festival failures) and the goal/way to overcome it.
That's why we came up with the Quests and Scenario Community Miro Board , so I'd recommend any new take on the story to be copy pasted below and let the team decide which diagram/story bits seem to work best just by looking at the board and the 1-2 sentence description.

 

I have an idea how Comb (ironic name for a character with no hair) lost his ear and put off the desserter: He wanted to get a golden (they are not really golden in the sense of metallic but a golden yellow) rock critter egg for the desserter which had been laid by a golden rock critter. In the fight he lost his ear but what really puts the desserter off is that he had killed the only golden rock critter on the island - so no more golden rock critter eggs. Until Hamlet finds one. The simple solution would be to cook with it - but the real solution is to bring the golden egg to the farmer who will let the golden rock critter hatch and this way ensures a continuous supply of golden rock critter eggs from the tamed golden rock critter.

 

@Smurjo your paragraph tied everything together in my mind and couldn’t resist to share. I didn’t change anything in the Quests and Scenario Community Miro Board except the fact that we get the special utensil from the deserter and not the saucier (explanation further down). I am just filling in the background blanks based on what I’ve read:

Scenario summary (the brief description accompanying the Miro board):
Hamlet, on his quest to understand the Townsfolk preferences and cooking in order to win the contest, discovers an odd situation: everyone seems to make only salty dishes that also happens to be the Fry King’s specialty. Anything sweet related feels almost banned and this restriction seems to block the townsfolk of actually creating something original and impress the Fry King. Will Hamlet bring this succession of failures to an end and restore the Festival’s success?

-----------------------------------now the background stuff of how we got here------------------------------
Backstory about the island – its famous annual festival – and the reason it has become a succession of gastronomical disappointments

Normal old times:
The island used to be famous of their Golden Rock Critter eggs. It was also famous of having excellent chefs that would cook great things with it, the Fry King and the Desserter being the best examples complementing each other perfectly – Fry King was known for his main dishes while the Desserter made the best desserts. Once a year they would celebrate their gastronomical breakthroughs through an annual Festival that would attract travelers from all over the world to witness their unique dishes.
Problem appearing:
Inevitably the Golden Rock Critters started falling in numbers. The competitive nature of the Festival and the aspiration of many didn’t leave much room for them to reproduce as quickly as they were being exploited. Fry King and Desserter made a common agreement that they should refrain from using Golden Eggs for a while even at a cost of downgrading their dishes taste and “risking” their fame and the Festival success.
The tragic turn of events:
On one of his area “combs” to look for alternative ingredients the Fry King actually encountered a Golden Critter on a nest that immediately attacked him almost fatally. Fry King tried to defend himself and accidentally killed it while trying, losing one ear in the end. The nest had only one egg. He decided to bring it back to check if it could still be saved, but on his way back it was evident it would never hatch. Unfortunately, the Deserter saw him killing the Critter and carrying the egg from a distance. Knowing that Fry King was a perfectionist that enjoyed his success and respect, didn’t believe this was an accident and was filled with frustration and anger. She decided she didn’t want to value winning and fame (at all costs) more than the pure joy of cooking, so she decided to go away from all this before she gets “blinded” like the Fry King and everybody else. She also decided that such a tragedy shouldn’t happen again so before leaving she actually took the only Utensil that was able to crack a Golden egg open, should any Gold Critter still remain out there.
The Townsfolk were furious. How dare she take away their “power”(Special Utensil) for her own purposes, leaving poor Fry King abandoned who almost lost his life to protect their gastronomy and Festival? She and her sweet dishes can be forgotten, they are not important and do not have the power to shape the Festival's identity. They will make the Festival great again and the only way is going to be with main, salty dishes.

Bard Hare’s role in this - backstory:
This decision was met with Bard Hare’s disappointment, who once used to be one of the travelers who came annually to the Festival but loved the Desserter’s desserts so much he decided to stay on the island. Due to the unfortunate course of events and the bonding with the island, he decided to withdraw to the beach and enjoy whatever remained from sweet dish cooking in solitude, unjudged. He is the only one who knows where the deserter is, but would never risk revealing it and that’s why he resides away from her. Perhaps he can still reach her (through holes/underground paths, could this be a hint in the Forest Maze puzzle?). He might also secretly bring her news from the Town.

The roadblock
Nobody is really expressing their own preferences through cooking anymore and they are all basically trying to please someone else. Especially the younger generations are secretly longing for sweets (they have all secretly tried the taste from plant critters) and do not quite understand all the hate, but out of respect to their elders and traditions they have somehow grown to replicate that aversion in an endless loop, at the cost of innovation and originality.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Where the narrative puzzle lies
The game will constrantly try to trap the player in becoming a part of this loop and make yet another salty dish, following the simple -guided by the game- solution instead of their own original,critically thought one. It comes down to the player to realize this is a loop and not “fall for it”. In this way we could leave some room to actually make the game re-playable by leaving the possibility of ending with a wrong dish.
Above all, we should aim to have the 4 correct key characters/ingredients be met/collected in these 20 minutes. But perhaps we could also have some of @shuttle127 characters as distractions that could result in the wrong dish to get the point of the story across.

 

*hats off*

Indeed and in case we do have the Rocky Path "puzzle" with the Rock Candy as a bait to make the Rock Critters leave their nests we would also need a "Drop" action or "Throw" action. Which if it's too much we can drop it, it was just an idea. And the barrels could be optional as well I guess, especially if we don't use this action again in the game, right now they are not really important in any other aspect than a humorous touch.

True. If we settle in having a false dish, perhaps we could remove any other extra steps and just make the default (non Key) NPCs give you something very easily - right away if you interact with them or if you happen to have something useful for them from things that you will in general carry along the game (any droppable). Especially since we are bound to interact with Generic NPCs anyways to find which ones are Key ones, I don't think this would be really time costly.
So I guess what we could have is:

• Distraction NPCs: Will only point you to the Key Characters, but can give you:

1. a distraction ingredient/dish right away (no steps needed)

Example:
Generic NPC: "Not to boast about it, but I do make the best cheese saganaki in town, since you are a newcomer I'll treat you some, you'll definitely win with it". The player has the cheese in inventory right away and might be tempted to mix it in the final dish, but that's what everyone will do anyways so that's how you fail since nobody will be impressed.

• 2. a distraction information about that Key Character to make you think "simplistically" and not originally. So you might indeed end with a "trap" ingredient even when interacting with a KeyCharacter.

Example (reposting from above):
Perhaps a Distraction NPC tells you about how awesome and famous the blue dough/cake of the Baker (KeyCharacter) is. So you do find the KeyCharacter but the game points you to mix only the blue slime eggs in the dough which is what everybody would do, when the desirable outcome is to be impulsive/creative and think "but what if I put all of the colored eggs in it?" That's what cooking is all about anyways Being experimental.

• Key NPCs: They are they only NPCs that are linked and point to one another, and the ones that can give you the correct hints for ingredients.

Example (reposting from "Smurjo above):

I love the idea of having a simple and a real solution. So only from paying attention to details/Key Character hints will you be able to actually contribute to the solution of the story and make the winning dish. Thinking that this (the golden egg-farmer solution) could also be the necessary step for the Desserter to give you the Utensil for example.

These are my final cents ^^ Really wish you good luck and thank you for going through all this! Lots of "food" here for the Whiteboxing as well.

 

I think it could be achievable by adding just a new interaction "open" and use the attack action to smash the barrel. It should not impact the interaction system that much.
Next do we want to advise only the open interaction and let the smash one an hidden option or it would be better to highlight from the start something like (E to Open / Left Click to Smash) in the interaction UI?

 

Thank you for going through this massive thread!

I also like the idea of different endings - to an extent. This is something I haven't brought up in this thread so far, but I think it would be good to have different final recipes (multiple failing recipes, just one success) instead of different endings. What I mean by that is that you play through the game and reach the point of presenting the final recipe. If that recipe is not the winning recipe, I don't think the player should have to start the game over from scratch. That might make it seem very tedious. Instead, I think the player should be able to leave the festival, re-trace their steps, and figure out the correct solution without having to repeat the exact same dialogues, etc. Now, I'm not quite sure how to solve that narratively since the festival only takes place once a year...maybe the player is given the opportunity to submit three recipes before they have to start the game over again?

Another idea I had is that we could very clearly communicate to the player when they are headed for the winning recipe via the inventory itself. Maybe ingredients in the "correct" recipe have a gold border whereas the others do not. Or maybe the correct ingredients are called legendary ingredients or something like that.

Yeah, I was waiting for this reply . The storyline as it stands is certainly too big in scope for the vertical slice originally planned. But, as you said, I think there's an excellent basis here for building a trimmed down story.

Ooh ooh! Me me me! I've been looking for a way to contribute in some significant way to this project. I'd love to take a crack at it on a joint PR. And since my background is more technically-oriented anyway, it wouldn't be a problem to write code for any modifications we might need. I'll wait to hear back from you after you've discussed with the core team.

 

Since we will be compacting the story a bit to fit this vertical slice, I'd like to summarize the key components of the story here in broad strokes. For more details on backstory, @itsLevi0sa summary above is great at pulling everything together.

Main Story:
- Central Conflict: Salty vs. Sweet ... Fry King is master of all things salty, Desserter is master of sweets
- Fry King accidentally kills endangered Golden Rock Critter and gets the last egg, Desserter "deserts" him, misunderstanding this as intentional
- Fry King bans sweets at the Festival as a result and judges salty entrees harshly given his expertise
- Given the banning of sweets, some characters have chosen to no longer participate in the Festival. These characters make sweets in secrecy, for fear of retribution. This list of characters includes the Bard Hare, Saucier, Baker, and, of course, the Desserter...these are all the "main path" characters you'll meet as you unravel the storyline
- Over the course of the game, you will meet characters giving you ingredients / tools for salty recipes
- At key points, you'll meet main path characters, directing you to follow the main storyline
- The Player can submit salty recipes (all failures) or the one winning recipe: Rainbow Crunch Cake (see below)
- After submitting the winning recipe, sweets are once again allowed in the Festival. All of the main path characters can now come out of hiding and rejoin the Festival with their amazing dishes!

Winning Recipe (Rainbow Crunch Cake):
The winning recipe requires the following set of four key events to happen:
- Learn Rock Candy recipe from Bard Hare
- Learn Golden Sauce recipe from Saucier (requires Golden Egg + Tool)
- Obtain Gold Egg Cracker utensil from Desserter
- Learn Rainbow Cake Dough recipe from Baker

Modifications:
I'd like to make a small modification here in terms of the current storyline. There's a lot of narrative focus on the Golden Rock Critter Eggs being a precious resource that has been hunted to near extinction. I think instead of the final recipe requiring the Golden Eggs to be cracked open, maybe as @Smurjo suggested above, the solution would require saving the golden egg to replenish the Golden Rock Critters numbers. This would give an excellent reason for the Desserter to rejoin the Fry King and restore the Festival to its former glory, given that this is the whole reason the Desserter left in the first place. Maybe at the end of the game, Hamlet could return the last remaining Golden Egg to its nest?

Granted, the winning recipe would still require golden sauce...and maybe the golden egg cracker can be used on the rock candy to make the sauce instead. Or maybe the tool can be used to make rock candy sprinkles instead of the golden sauce?

 

I think that would work nicely: Of course the desserter doesn't want to give Hamlet the golden egg cracker if he intends to use it on the rare golden rock critter egg. Being very experienced with sweet dishes she suggests Hamlet could use the rock candy sprinkles with his rainbow dough and wouldn't need the egg then (technically she gives the player an additional recipy in exchange for the egg - the rainbow crunch cake, the other recipy is rainbow pie). If the player decides to make the rainbow pie, it isn't the winning recipy.

To stick with sweet salty conflict possibly the rainbow dough in itself isn't sweet but only becomes sweet with adding the rock candy. Furthermore the rainbow pie is made with onions which the saucier gives to Hamlet - leading the player down the salty path.

 

Who remembers way back in the old dialogue and narrative thread when I asked how we'd determine the winning dish and Ciro said this? To me that means the wrong answer is a waste of time/resources, especially if that time/resources could be spent on something like this instead! The rainbow crunch cake should definitely inspire something like that, as the townsfolk have never seen such a thing!

 

Hi @shuttle127, I agree that the current scope of the storyline is too large and we should be cognizant of resources. It's a fair point that we should consider going forward. But I would like to address some of the things you mention, specifically.

It looks like in this post, Ciro said that a trial and error system would be a waste of time, but that's not what we're proposing. The current storyline is still very linear. I think it'll be very clear to the player when they're interacting with a main storyline character...they should all hint that they secretly cook sweets and hint that the reason they need to do it in secret lies at the heart of the Forest Maze (the Desserter). That very clearly points the player towards unraveling this major secret and heading towards the Forest Maze.

But you do bring up a good point...I think there needs to be a sense of mystery surrounding the Desserter to drive the player along in the story to unravel the mystery. Maybe all the main path characters that you meet are initially hesitant to reveal that they cook sweets in secret...and maybe they all are too scared to mention the Desserter's name out loud (they just refer to her as the one of which they do not speak)...it is up to the player to venture to the center of the Forest Maze and find out who she is / what her relationship is to the Fry King and the salty vs. sweet conflict.

Maybe it could play out like this:
(1) Because you help Bard Hare with his "to-do list", he reveals the sugar soup recipe to you, then you eventually make the rock candy
(2) You ask Bard Hare why he was so hesitant to talk about sweets / why is he not participating in the Festival, he says he's sorry but he can't tell you more, so Hamlet will need to find the one of which they do not speak (referring to the Desserter) if he wants to know more...he does not reveal the location of this character
(3) Hamlet presses Bard Hare for more info, but the Bard Hare just says to seek out the Saucier in town...he might be able to give Hamlet the info he seeks
(3) When meeting the Saucier, Hamlet tries asking about the salty vs sweet conflict, but the Saucier says he knows nothing and keeps offering salty sauce recipes
(4) You mention to the Saucier that Bard Hare taught you the sugar soup recipe...he drops his guard and tells you that he misses being able to make his golden sauce recipe
(5) Hamlet asks Saucier about where he can find the golden egg needed for the golden sauce recipe and he says that he can't say more but Hamlet will need to find the one of which they do not speak that lies at the heart of the Forest Maze (he is referring to the Desserter)
(6) When Hamlet presses the Saucier on how to reach the Forest Maze, he says that he doesn't want to say any more and Hamlet should seek out the Baker if he really wants to learn more
(7) The Baker is very secretive and isn't forthcoming with the rainbow cake dough recipe until Hamlet reveals that he knows the sugar soup and golden sauce recipes...the Baker sends Hamlet out to collect blue and orange rock critter eggs
(8) After returning with the eggs, the Baker says that the recipe really isn't complete until the golden egg is obtained and the cake is covered with golden sauce and she points Hamlet to the Forest Maze to meet the one of which they do not speak
(9) Hamlet finally meets the Desserter and learns that golden rock critters are extremely endangered...the Desserter tells you that she trusts you to make the right decision and hands you the golden egg cracker...she says that it can be used to make golden sauce, but suggests that you use it to make rock candy sprinkles instead...she reveals her history with Fry King and knows his tastes, so she knows that the rock candy sprinkles would complete the recipe and win the competition. Here, the player is given the choice to make golden sauce or rock candy sprinkles...the moral / correct choice will be obvious.

Along the way, sure there will be decoy characters that instantly hand over ingredients to make salty recipes. But I think our design will clearly communicate wrong ingredient vs. right ingredient...especially with a linear storyline as laid out above. No trial and error involved, but all the while allowing player autonomy. I think the right / wrong recipe makes the player feel like an active participant rather than a passive observer in the game. The player is doing the work to unravel the mystery of why sweets are banned on the island. I think player autonomy is really important in any game, but especially important in an adventure game where discovery was always meant to be a major part.

Fair enough. That is a pretty cool scene that you describe. But I think at the very least that we were planning on including intro and outro cutscenes. So a scene like the one you described could be worked in to the current end game cutscene pretty easily.