Quick Facts
– Developer: Glass Prison Games
– Release Date: 6/13/17
– Platforms: PC
A beta build of Highwater can be downloaded and playtested here!
About Highwater
Highwater draws inspiration from stories where the greatest conflict is human beings in the face of nature. Set in a long abandoned city plagued by a relentless storm, the player must survive with the hope of eventual rescue. Staying warm, staying fed, staying healthy—none of these things are simple when faced with the ever rising waters alone.
The entire city is procedurally generated—from the overall city layout, to the building structures, to the item placement in the world—providing a different experience from game to game. The player must scavenge for items and craft them into things that can be used to survive a little longer. Driftwood could be used to build a new raft to help navigate the flooded streets, or burned to stoke a fire for warmth. With a wide variety of items and methods of combination, the player is given flexibility in their method of survival.
The greatest antagonist to the player is, of course, the storm. Highwater contains a dynamic weather system generated based on real life weather models. The player can learn how to read the storm by crafting barometers and weather vanes. The storm intensifies and calms with time, greatly affecting the player’s world, including the ease of navigating rafts, the player’s well-being, and the wildlife that spawns. During the worst of the storm, it may be extremely dangerous to travel in the water, but in the relative calm after, items washed out of buildings makes scavenging easier. The waters are constantly rising, forcing the player to move to higher ground.
In additional to survival, the city provides an expansive space for the player to explore. We wanted to create an atmosphere that evokes a sense of loneliness, and for that, the best setting would be a place like a city, which feels particularly unnatural when emptied. The only voice the player hears is the radio’s, which provides weather reports and mysterious messages from before the city fell. The only contact that the player has is with the remnants of the people who have long abandoned the city. In the old journals or messages on the wall, the player may find glimpses into how the inhabitants faced the storm.
There are those who prayed for it to end and those who tried to find a scientific answer to why something as impossible as a never ending storm could exist. The player themselves can also choose which path they wish to take. They can pray to idols for safe passage, or rely on meteorological instruments to read the storm. We want both choices to be equally valid, and for the line between the supernatural and the mundane to be blurred.
Whatever the player chooses to have faith in, however the player may choose to survive, we hope for this to be an immersive survival experience that makes them want to struggle to the very end.
About Glass Prison Games
Glass Prison Games is a 12-person game development team consisting of seniors at Drexel University. We’re currently working on Highwater, our senior design project. It’s a collaboration between students in the College of Computing and Informatics and the College of Media Arts and Design. Meet each individual member of the team here (team page link). Using our combined talent and previous experience working on games at Drexel, we hope to create an immersive and emotional experience for players to enjoy.
We’re passionate about creating games that don’t just entertain our players, but connect with them on a deeper emotional level. We feel that the best way to create an immersive game is to give the player something they can relate to, and in Highwater, we hope that the players can relate to our character’s feelings of isolation and the seemingly monumental task before them.
If you’re interested in following the development of Highwater, you can see our blog here.
Or, if you’d like to download the most recent build of the game, you can do so here.
Images
Logos and Icons
Highwater Logos
Glass Prison Games Logo
Glass Prison Games 