Ortiz - The Perfect Ramen

Room 1 – Arriving on island Honshu with Mount Fuji in the background. You’ve arrived with your time-traveling cat to catch the perfect ramen.

Room 2 – A port to take a ship to a different part of Japan.

Room 3 – The receiving end of the previous port that leads into a small-town in Feudal Japan.

Room 4 – The hub of the town with a tori gate in the center with a shrine located to the left. The player can move right to go to the crop fields or interact with people in the town.

Room 5 – A small house typically found in Japan’s home structure. A big open room for sleeping, cooking, and other activities.

Room 6 – A wheat farm used to sustain the small-town. The player can obtain wheat here.

Room 7 – Another small house, but this time with a small samurai sword. The player can bring this to the two NPCs practicing on the north side of town.

Room 8 – Another recreation of the town, but this time with famous ramen. The player can take the ramen back to the time-traveling cat to end the game.

From McCloud’s Understanding Comics, I utilized time frames to convey my story through my bitsy game. While my game does take inspiration to use time frames, other elements such as transition help compliment my usage of time frames. As stated by McCloud, “each panel of a comic shows a single moment in time”, thus, my game tries to reflect his argument (pg. 94). For example, the time frame at the beginning of Room 2 and the end of Room 3 can be symbolized by transitional help and color making it a showcase for traversing a river. A change of color symbolizes time passing while a “wavy” transition reinforces the journey across the sea.

Understanding this concept helped form my bitsy project into a more cohesive story further exemplified by McCloud’s concept of “closure” (pg. 63). I believe the transitions in place from room 2 to 3 help the player visual the next environmental step. Furthermore, having a reflecting transition to assist with player closure helps reinforce the “single overriding identity and forces the viewer to consider them as a whole” pg. 73). Overall, I was pleasantly surprised by how much of McCloud’s concepts helped form my bitsy story and I plan on using his concepts for future projects.

The lesson I learned from the theme park readings that helped me design my bitsy game was to make a story around the environment. Much like the Disney park rides structure their amusement park around stories, I took the initiative to include elements that would signify Feudal Japan. Either a Torri gate or Mount Fuji, elements like these help build the world, thus, helping the player visualize the timeframe they are currently inhabiting. Furthermore, the layout of the levels was influenced by the Imagineers concept of directing the consumer or player around the park. For my bitsy game, I tried to reflect a structure where the player is guided along with the level and redirected to places the player should be at. Although room 4 opens to a wide area, I used their park’s structure to clearly line out the directions that players should be considering. With a four-directional pattern in the room, the player has the option to “explore” up to four directions. Only one direction, however, is available but it helps the player visualize their next step. Another reason for this type of structure in the game was to have the player explore the main hub of the town and hopefully explore the two houses. In sum, I used their park structure to assist the player in both stories and in their decision-making process.