Ashes to Ashes

Ashes to Ashes is a narrative-focused 3rd person action-adventure game where the player acts as an undead gunslinger in a ghostly Wild West seeking to avenge their own murder.

Platform: Unreal 5

Date: 2022-2023

Role: Narrative Lead

My Role - Narrative Lead

As Narrative Lead, I designed and implemented narrative systems within Ashes to Ashes. I was responsible for writing dialogue, recording voice acting, implementing narrative systems, and working cross-discipline to maintain the narrative vision of the game.

One of the challenges I faced was making sure any narrative systems harmonized with gameplay. To accomplish this, I did the following:

Wrote enemy barks to give AI personality and reinforce narrative context.
Maintained a Narrative Bible which helped maintain good communication between those working on the narrative with the rest of the team
Developed a "flashback" narrative system to show immersive cutscenes from the main character's past while shielding them from gunfire, creating strategic breaks in the action.
Directed 10 VO sessions to give life to the dialogue so that the player did not have to pause frequently to engage with the story

Post Mortem Analysis:

One of the issues I saw in the narrative of Ashes to Ashes was that there was not much incentive to find the "flashbacks" around the levels. They also forced the player to stop progressing, which helped control the flow of gameplay, but also seemed to frustrate players since they had nothing to do while the cutscene played.

I would re-allocate my time as Narrative Lead to leaning more into the moment-to-moment gameplay. The bark system along with the in-game dialogue was immersive and helped to tell our story more naturally.

I would want to work alongside the rest of the design team to have a more robust quest system that focuses on player action and further developing POIs to support our chaotic gunslinging mechanics.

My Role - Narrative Lead

As Narrative Lead, I designed and implemented narrative systems within Ashes to Ashes. I was responsible for writing dialogue, recording voice acting, implementing narrative systems, and working cross-discipline to maintain the narrative vision of the game.

One of the challenges I faced was making sure any narrative systems harmonized with gameplay. To accomplish this, I did the following:

Wrote enemy barks to give AI personality and reinforce narrative context.

Maintained a Narrative Bible which helped maintain good communication between those working on the narrative with the rest of the team

Developed a "flashback" narrative system to show immersive cutscenes from the main character's past while shielding them from gunfire, creating strategic breaks in the action.

Directed 10 VO sessions to give life to the dialogue so that the player did not have to pause frequently to engage with the story

Post Mortem Analysis:

I would re-allocate my time as Narrative Lead to leaning more into the moment-to-moment gameplay. The bark system along with the in-game dialogue was immersive and helped to tell our story more naturally.

I would want to work alongside the rest of the design team to have a more robust quest system that focuses on player action and further developing POIs to support our chaotic gunslinging mechanics.