Hello Stalkers!
The last few weeks have been extremely intense for us, in connection with the premiere of the Mega Patch and work on bug fixing. However, thanks to this, we brought you the game 95 percent ready. And there is very little time until the full version is released. That is why we decided to focus on these and subsequent reports on specific elements of the game that have undergone huge changes in recent months, if not years. Some of them can be seen with the naked eye, while some need to be told in a broader context.
In today's report, we'll focus on what makes up the core of Chernobylite - the story.
A double-bottomed story
We all know very well that the game consists of many elements: graphics, music, sound design, level design, gameplay, etc. However, we have never concealed that in Chernobylite we attach great importance to the storyline. After the reactions of all players, we can see that the story has drawn a lot of attention. It means we hit the point. However, as the premiere of the last Mega Patch showed, there is nothing that could not be improved.
We’ve mentioned many times that the entire story has been thoroughly redrafted and corrected by us. We didn't just do it for aesthetic reasons - we did this because we wanted to highlight the different layers and aspects of the Chernobylite story we wrote as much as possible. This one is focused on the figure of Igor - a man who tries to solve a mystery from the past and understand his role in the events that took place many years ago.
The attempt to find his beloved Tatyana is not only literal, but also metaphorical - it is a desire to face the past full of riddles and understatements. Just like Tatyana herself. Do we really know who she is? Are the memories of the main character about her real, or are they just his imaginations, fantasies? How do Igor's memories of Tatiana relate to her actual image? A seemingly simple story about a man who is looking for his beloved, with time becomes more and more complex and multi-threaded. Nothing is black and white.
What about side characters? They also play important roles in this game. Because Chernobylite is also a story about dealing with trauma, about trying to give it some tangible dimension and meaning. Each of the characters met in the game experiences something like this. They have to deal with the past and they do it for better or worse. We also have the question of identity. What defines a man? His actions? His past? His origin? His agenda?
To fully exploit the potential of the Chernobylite scenario, we had to make a lot of corrections and changes to the game. We wanted each of the characters to have a personality, and not just an extra in the background. Each of the encountered characters has been rewritten - each of them has new backstories, a new, distinctive way of expressing themselves. They have their own individual attitude towards the player. In addition, we have not only rewritten the plot, but also the dialogues that have been rewritten line by line. In this way, we wanted to better emphasize the mood that we wanted in the game from the very beginning, and also to better reflect the character's individuality. The effects can be seen especially in the dialogues between NPCs and Igor in missions and in the base.
Ariadna
The world of Chernobylite is also made up of other factors that are part of the narrative layer. For example, Ariadna - a mysterious device resembling VR goggles, which is located in Igor's room. With its help Igor can visualize the effects of his investigations that are to lead him to the truth with the disappearance of his beloved.
Ariadna is the heart of the Chernobylite gameplay. All the missions that Igor performs are only an excuse to be able to search the area around the power plant for clues and evidence related to the events of years ago. After collecting all the things needed for the investigation, Ariadna analyzes them and then uses them to virtually simulate the events. Thanks to this, Igor can see the effects of his investigation with his own eyes - memories of events from several decades ago, in which the collected evidence played a key role. This is definitely a more convenient and practical solution than using threads and pins on a cork board.
Only one question remains: how did Igor get such an advanced device? It wasn't like it just appeared in his room. We wanted to expand this thread a bit with Igor's dream, in which it was also important to show who is behind Ariadne's creation.
But wait a minute. Something is wrong. This level is very similar to a level from another game. Specifically, the one from Get Even where Cole Black tries to reconstruct his memories!
Not only that: Ariadna looks like a goggle that someone put on Cole when he was unconscious. Thanks to them, he can visit fragments of his own memories, undergoing "treatment" under the watchful eye of a mysterious observer from a dingy psychiatric hospital.
Goggles are also an inseparable element of the encountered "patients" of this charming place.
So is it possible that the Chernobylite and Get Even worlds are somehow related to each other? Are Igor and Cole characters from the same universe? Maybe yes, maybe no… We encourage you to see for yourself. It is especially worth looking for clues scattered around the game or listening to the dialogues in Igor's dream. You might be surprised.
That's it for today!
Take care, Stalkers!