Adulting

Players explore an interactive story inspired by being an adult and featuring engaging mini-games as well as point-andclick interactions with dialogue. GRAPHICS By combining 2D and 3D art styles Adulting reflects with a hand drawn look and feel comics and graphic novels. It features hand painted assets as well as 2D character animations. This gives it a unique art style which is easily recognizable. THEME The topic of the perception of being and becoming an adult in society is personified with three main characters and their individual struggle with the theme. In preparation the development team invested in a 3 month long research by interviewing psychologists and collaborating with the Sigmund Freud Private University Linz as well as making an online survey with over 70 participants. MINI-GAMES Throughout the story the player will encounter light mini-games that they must complete to continue progressing. It features 12 mini-games with various styles of gameplay. COMMUNITY INTEGRATION Inspired by Kind Words, the community will be integrated into the game by sending and receiving messages in the form of paper planes. Here, own thoughts can be written down and decorated with stickers. SOUNDTRACK A coherent soundtrack with individual themes per character ensures that players are immersed in a calm but emotional atmosphere. Full Soundtrack is available on Spotify.

LIV Liv is a 23-year-old single student who is pursuing a university education in the creative industry as well as a part-time job. She has financial difficulties, as her parents also have to support her other siblings financially. The pressure to get her adult life together financially in addition to education and work is growing. ALBERT Albert is a man in his mid-40s with two children. He has difficulty taking care of his two children and all his other adult responsibilities, such as his own florist store, because his partner‘s job often prevents him from being at home. FINJA Finja is a 70-year-old pensioner who has particular difficulties with loneliness, as it is difficult for her to stay in contact with her friends, as she no longer has the possibility to travel long distances due to her age. Her family through their busy adult life also do not have much time to visit her.

»Adulting« is an experience focusing heavily on storytelling and mini games which evoke a specific emotion. It’s narrative focused and tells its story through exploration, mini games and community integration. The story focuses on three characters, each with 3 acts of the story whereas the storylines are linear. The setting is a multi-apartment building, in which only the respective apartment of the character can be seen, as well as a connecting staircase and a roof terrace. There is also an external florist store. All those light interactions and additional dialogue focus on different problematic aspects of our three characters who should represent different age groups who are struggling with different aspects of being an adult. These mini games vary in gameplay and style. They are presented through the narrative and support the story in meaningful ways. Furthermore it features point-and-click events which trigger short animations or dialogues giving the characters and environments more context. Additionally to clickable storytelling interactions the player can also write messages and send them to other players to share how they feel and get comfort. Writing and sending these messages to other players can take place at any time during the course of the action. With the help of a scrapbook that can be accessed at any time, the player can send messages and read and store collected paper planes.