So I’ll start with mine.
The story of my game actually started with three ideas.
When I heard the jam theme, “Don’t trust anyone,” I started thinking: What could I make with that?
Police officers? I don't know.
Maybe a story about a lawyer? Not really.
A really unfair platformer? Nope.
I wanted to make something stranger.
That’s when I came up with the idea of a tomb raider who has the terrible luck of finding cemeteries infected with zombies. Every corpse could potentially attack you.
And that’s where the “Don’t trust anyone” part comes in.
The problem was figuring out how to connect that idea to an economy system that would actually make the game interesting.
That’s when I came up with the gameplay loop.
First, you travel from cemetery to cemetery in a truck with a guy who sells you different tools. These tools help you figure out whether a zombie is asleep or starting to wake up.
Every corpse has a chance of being a zombie, but they don't all behave the same way. Some wake up almost immediately, while others take longer.
You have to learn how to identify the signals using the tools you buy.
There are two types of signals: normal and intense.
A normal signal tells you that the zombie is starting to wake up.
An intense signal means: GET OUT.
Because if you take something from the corpse while the zombie is awake, it will attack you.
And that's basically the whole idea behind the game.
You enter a tomb, use your tools to figure out if the zombie is still asleep, take an object, check another one, and keep looting while trying not to wake the corpse.
It's a small gameplay loop, but that's what I wanted the game to be about.
What makes it more interesting is that you can play in completely different ways.
You can be extremely careful and stealthy, or you can be completely reckless and take risks.
That's also why I came up with the vaccine.
The vaccine is the most expensive item in the game because it gives you one of the biggest advantages you can get.
For example, there might be an extremely valuable object inside a tomb. If you have the vaccine, you're basically saying: I'm getting that object no matter what.
And that can completely change the situation.
So that's the idea behind my game: you buy tools, use them on corpses, loot whatever you can, and try to get out before the zombie wakes up.
Now, about the actual story and lore...
I originally wanted to write much more of it, but honestly, I simply didn't have enough time.
I didn't even have time to finish all the designs. I made some of them on my phone and then transferred them to my computer as best as I could.
I spent basically the entire day working on the code, and at night I had to work on the art and design.
And believe me, I wanted to make the game much more detailed visually.
I don't think this is the best art I could have made, but honestly, I'm still really happy with the idea. I really like how the game turned out.
As for the lore of the game, here's what I had in mind:
You owe a huge amount of money to a mafia boss.
Because you owe him so much, he forces you to raid cemeteries because it's the fastest way for you to make enough money to pay him back.
The guy who sells you the tools is actually the one who collects the payment. At the beginning of each level, you pay him a fee, and once you pay it, you're allowed to move on to the next cemetery.
I didn't have enough time to make the transition between cemeteries, but that's how the story is supposed to work.
And here's where the mafia boss gets really clever.
He's making money from you in two different ways.
First, he's profiting from the objects you're stealing.
But he's also working with bioterrorists who are testing a mutant virus on corpses to bring them back to life.
They're turning the corpses into zombies.
They needed someone to act as a guinea pig — someone who would unknowingly test whether these zombies would actually wake up and attack.
Unfortunately for you, they hired the mafia boss.
And he saw an opportunity to make money twice.
You think you're simply paying off a huge debt by raiding cemeteries.
You don't know that you're also being used as part of an experiment.
That's the story behind my game.
Now I want to hear yours.
I don't care if your story is extremely long. I actually love reading this kind of stuff.
This is what gives a game its flavor.
So go ahead.
Tell me the story behind your game. 👀
And if you'd like to try my game too, here's the link:
