While working on Kameran, my main focus for the narrative of the game was creating the story behind the monster itself. In the game, the player is forced to face an invisible Jötunn. It’s more of an animal than a human. It’s a highly territorial Jötunn that is composed of prey it eats and consumes. For example, if it eats a deer/elk, it will use the antler of the deer for body parts. The Jötunn is a pack hunter, with one Jötunn being an alpha. The pack chose the burial grounds as its original home because they could scavenge body parts of fallen people. The ancient civilization realized that the Jötunn will only continue to grow if they continue to feed off of the fallen so they decide to kill the Jötunns. Due to how powerful the Alpha Jötunn was, they couldn’t kill it but instead they had to seal it away. In the end, the civilization sacrifices themselves to stop the Jötunns, hence why they are now gone.

After Egon discovers the camera in the dig site, the Alpha Jötunn is released again. Due to how long it has been sealed, the bodies at the burial grounds are no longer usable for the Jötunn to feed on, so it decides to travel to a new location for prey starting with the current location of the camera. The alpha Jötunn is very intelligent for an animal. It’s smart to know when to attack, stalk and it enjoys tormenting its prey. When Egon blinds the Alpha Jötunn, it is permanently damaged and it becomes blind. Due to being blind now, it is forced to change its hunting tactics and must rely on hearing to hunt its prey. Over time in the game, it gets stronger throughout the game as it is learning and adapting.

The first iteration of the basement started with a simpler design. The starting point of the level is a narrow hallway leading to a doorway. After the player goes through the doorway, they come across a mostly open floor basement with three main areas: metal shelves, tables and library. The library is just a separate area of bookshelves. The tables are spread out in a chaotic mess to show how the monster in the game has messed up the basement. The metal shelf area is designed to act as a maze that changes after the player goes through it. When the player reaches the workbench after going through the shelves, the metal shelves layout will change due to some of the shelves tipping over, creating blockades and new paths. The player is able to open up new routes using the camera to get through metal shelves.

After playtesting, I found a few issues with this design of the basement. The first main issue is the amount of dead space there is in the basement. Players would avoid the table area and head straight to the metal shelf area, leaving a large area in the basement empty almost. The second main issue is that the metal shelf area didn’t feel too challenging to navigate.

The second iteration of the basement removed the table areas and replaced it with more metal shelves, creating a larger metal shelf maze with more hazards that the player must navigate to get through. This solved the issue of the dead zone in the map but new issues arose after playtesting. The first being the visuals of the map was bland with the amount of empty shelves. The second issue was the open layout with the shelves. Players were able to take pictures of objects from across the map, including the work bench at the end of the level.

For the third iteration of the basement level, we decided to change from an open floor layout to a closed layout. Kameran is a horror game and the open layout was not creating the horror experience we wanted. The open layout didn’t make our monster as threatening as we wanted. Eliminating the multiple lines of the sights made it so the players had to rely more on audio in detecting the monster as well as a more claustrophobic feeling when exploring the level. We expanded the size of the basement as well to create new pathways for the player to navigate in order to avoid the monster. After reaching the workbench in the basement, the entire basement level will change and will introduce new mechanics. The lighting changes to a purple hue and vines will now appear in front of the player that blocks their path, forcing the player to find a new escape route. This section of the basement is designed to force the player to panic and create suspense as the monster is stalking the player. By expanding the size of the basement, we were able to have new routes for the player to navigate for both versions of the basement.

The upstairs level is designed as a tutorial and the final level as well. The goal is to create three rooms where the player is able to loop the monster without making the room feel unnecessarily large. The tutorial section format is to help introduce the camera mechanics before the player encounters the monster.