Phone Booth Foul Play

About this project

Role

Ideation, Story, Visuals, Development

Tools Used

HTML/ CSS, JavaScript, Photoshop, After Effects

Overview

April 2024 & Ongoing

Phone Booth Foul Play came up as an idea I had during a narrative workshop class. I had always enjoyed puzzle and murder mystery experiences, as well as the detective noir genre. I had always wondered what I would do if I ever had the chance to make my own interactive mystery narrative, so I decided to challenge myself; I would attempt in weaving together both a narrative, physical media, and my web development skills to create a hybrid experience.

Ideation & Development

I had my general idea for the plot, but to make a murder mystery work, I had to create a lot of documents to plot out the story, characters, puzzles, in-game time line, and twists. But that wasn’t all. I also needed to create checklists and more documentation regarding what web features I wanted to include (such as a working digital rotary dial to represent a phone booth, voice acting, transcripts for accessibility, etc.) and what physical documents I needed to create to allow the players to weave the story together (such as suspect files, evidence, props like a locked briefcase and wallet, etc.).

After all my documentation and researching what makes a game of this genre engaging, difficult, and overall rewarding, I had developed a one-pager to better frame my ideas, goals, and how this project would turn out. This includes information such as the plot, general audience, the items and website I would need to develop, as well as a basic timeline of the work I would complete:

Project Type

A Web Murder Mystery Experience

Date Completed

WIP Game Blurb:

“You call the police. They pick up. You explain the situation, and they say they're heading your way. Right as the officer on the other end says you should head home as it's been dangerous to be out alone recently, the call cuts out, and is replaced by a panicked voice.

With the voice at the other end of the phone and the documents at your disposal, solve puzzles, close a cold case, and uncover the true culprit behind a series of all too similar murders, in Phone Booth Foul Play.

A short (and somewhat heart lighted), but engaging murder mystery story that takes place inside of a London phone booth. You’re the main character, as you use both physical/real world documents and an interactive webpage to engage with the story. Teamwork is the dream work, as this can be played with any number of people. However, a good range to ensure everyone can have fun would be 2-5 players.”

All the development and design work that I needed to be complete for Phone Booth Foul Play:

Developed and wrote an entire storyline, ciphers and logic puzzles, as well as multiple endings depending on player actions and choices.
Wrote a Hints Guide if players found themselves stuck on the puzzles.
Designed and wrote 30+ files worth of physical documents and evidence for gameplay
Designed, animated, and developed a fully interactive website with atmospheric elements
Wrote, casted, and recorded voice lines with actors for in-game characters that would react and respond based on player input
Shot and edited 2 different videos for project and public use/marketing

The Deliverables, Beta Version, & User Testing

On April 30th, I completed the Beta Version of Phone Booth Foul Play. The Beta Version includes a fully interactive website with voice acting, physical files/evidence, physical props, a teaser video, and a trailer for it’s eventual release on Kickstarter.

Currently I’m user testing with a wide range of ages and skill level to make the difficultly of the game suitable for beginners of the murder mystery genre, yet still enjoyable for veterans a well. After exposing the project, trailer/teaser, and game to multiple people, I’ve now been considering creating a Kickstarter for the project to both publicly release it, and implement some of the features I otherwise wouldn’t have been able to include due to budget constraints. As well, I hope to find a creative solution to make this concept fully digital as well, so it can be played anywhere from any device.