In the Online World, player can either walk or use one of several transport methods to explore the area. As long you have electricity to keep the device working, and internet access of course.
But be careful, as there is a very dangerous group called Anti-Hate Speech, or AHS. Whatever you say online can be recorded and used against you. And the members of AHS don’t play games. Censorship is their weapon, and sometimes even worse.
Since around 2010 Social Media has single handedly managed to fracture the society as never before in human history. The disruption is so severe we are seeing record high suicide, depression and mental health issues. But because Sillicon Valley will never stop the monster they have created, I think making a game about it would be perhaps something to show what Big Tech has done to every single person who has ever created an account in their casino empire. It is time to seriously talk about it.
As I mentioned before, Split Social has 2 Genders and 3 Races to choose from, and you cannot change them later in the game.
You can play as male or female. And you have a choice between white, black and asian. Each one has unique pros and cons, such as physical and mental stamina. Also the female story progression vastly differs from the male one.
Biology matters.
The first battle idea was to use the turn-based combat. So you touch someone or they initiate the contact, the battle screen pops up. Very classic Japanese RPG style. I played Pokemon a lot in my teens, so this system makes perfect sense. BUT unlike many turn-based games, here you have fight using timing based commands, like in Mario and Luigi RPGs/Paper Mario. Which means you cannot do same damage each time you attack, but each hit is counted based on the performance of the move. It is very simple sequence of directional arrows to press at right time, each is displayed like in rhythm games. Though this is only during the player’s turn, because as soon as its the opponents turn, the condition is reversed, and you have to either mirror the arrow marks or hit them in reverse, so if it’s left you see from the enemy, you hit right. There are many types of situations, all based on the opponent and player’s skills.
Also, in the real world battle the turn changes perspective of the characters, so each turn it’s a fresh start.
A lot has changed since the battle idea was introduced in 2021.
Of course this is only the real world battle of the game. The online world is very different, and so the battle will be explained later 🙂
Here is original art made by one artist back in 2021/2022. We ended up changing everything since then.
Here is the final art
This is player’s house, and it will change as there is an age system, that splits the game in various eras, such as childhood, teen and adult eras.
So you can see the different ways the player can explore the world. In the real world, there is more of the physical danger, and in the online one its more of the psychological danger. The bars in top left corner represent the health of body and mind.
At first I wanted to have the whole game be in this low effort hand-drawn style, so even when player switches between the real and online worlds.
But in 2022, I decided to split the worlds by having different aesthetics. One is going to be all hand-drawn , which represents the real world. And the digital one is all pixel style.
I always wanted to have a choice between the 3 races/2 genders from start of the game, so like in Pokemon games. As time went on, we did not focus on everyone equally, due to time constraints. So the main playable type for the demo is going to be White Male.
These are the young adult versions of the game protagonists. Notice the bright noses on all of them, the lore is going to be kept secret for now, but you will see it in the demo.
Antoonscape 