Hyperspace Space Mechanic

Overview

Hyperspace Space Mechanic is a first person walking simulator with a focus on repair minigames. The player is a mechanic on board a space ship, guided through the story by a fully voice acted AI. After the ship was caught in an asteroid field, the AI woke the player up from cryosleep, to repair the ship and get them out of hyperspace. As the player repairs the ship, they discover more about it and what mysteries it hides.

Gameplay

Background

My main goal in this project was to create an immersive atmosphere that extents the themes of the story. Themes include loneliness, loss, and mystery. Specifically I accomplished this through various ambient tracks as well as music that swells with the story. Additionally the large empty rooms and heavy reverb on sound effects adds to the feeling of loneliness implied by the story and setting.

Minigames

The main gameplay loop of this game revolves around fixing everything in a particular room or area, which then unlocks a new area and typically invokes some sort of story event. Fixing things in this game consists of completing a short minigame for each broken object. As this game is mostly a story focused walking simulator, the minigames serve to keep the player engaged and to give them a way to meaningfully interact with the world.

Surge Squasher

The board has 4 valves connected to a tube. Electrical surges random come through one of the four tubes at random intervals. The goal for the player is the close the correct valve before the surge gets through. Once the surge reaches the other side all closed valves are reopened. Additionally only one valve can be closed at a time.

Different instances of this minigame have a different number of surges that must be squashed. Typically, instances of this minigame found later in the game will have more surges. This doesn't make the game harder but rewards skilled players, as they can complete the minigame quickly no matter how many surges there are.

This minigame can started by interacting with electrical panels around the map. The electrical panels produce crackling sparks until they have been fixed to help them stand out in the environment

Minefield

The board contains a 5 x 5 grid with randomly generated mines. These generated mines are briefly shown to the player. The player's goal is then to click on all of the grid elements that contain a hidden mine. If a mistake is made the screen flashes red, the correct mine pattern is shown, the screen then returns to the blank grid then a new pattern is shown.

This is a simple memorization game. Different instances of this minigame have a different number of mines. Typically, instances of this minigame found later in the game will have more mines. This does make the minigame significantly harder with every additional mine.

This minigame is housed within computer terminals scattered around the map.

Hull Breach

This is a simple world interaction, where the player can hit the breach with their wrench until it slowly returns to a normal wall. It challenges the player, not with their ability to complete a puzzle or challenge, but instead with their thorough examination of the game environment and attention to detail.

The breach produces a slight wind sound effect that can help guide players to find more hidden instances.

Systems and Features

Multiple Endings

There are two different endings depending on how much the player explores and what choices they make. One involves the destruction of the players home, the other involves the destruction of the ship and the player within, but the evil AI is destroyed along with.

These different endings give the players actions throughout the game meaning, elevates the game from being a mere walking simulator, and incentivises additional playthroughs.

Inventory

The inventory system allows the player to save Repair Guns for later. Repair Guns act as a powerup that skips a difficult minigame. The inventory system is designed for the quick and easy implementation of new items with new abilities.

This adds an element of risk vs reward to all minigames. If you're having a hard time completing a certain minigame is it worth it to use one of your stored repair guns, or should you save it for an even harder minigame you might come across later.

Terminal Entries

These are fallout style terminals that allow you to read entries to gather more information about the ship and its history. This required a new system to facilitate the quick and easy implementation of new terminals with different entries. This allowed for a much more detailed story than was previously possible.

Terminal entries accentuate and intertwine with things uncovered in the main story to create an overall more cohesive, engaging story. This also add additional incentive for the player to explore the map and see everything the game has to offer.