ASHES TO ASHES
Released: August 2024
Platforms: PC (Windows)
Team Size: Solo
Skill Focus: Narrative design
Project Length: 6 weeks
Engine: Unreal Engine
Download and play the game on itch.io.
ABOUT THE GAME
Ashes to Ashes is a visual novel about warfare, disease, and the interrelationship between faith and science during a time of crisis.
Set in a fictional steampunk world dominated by warring imperial powers, you control Dr John Mortimer, a former army surgeon dispatched to the besieged port city of Embermire. As the siege drags on, living conditions in the squalid and overcrowded city worsen, leading to the outbreak of a deadly and highly contagious disease known as Iron Lung.
Fearing the spread of the epidemic, authorities place the city under strict quarantine and refuse to evacuate the sick population. Caught between religious fanatics and oppressive technocrats, you must attempt to find a cure for the disease and lift the quarantine before the city is breached by besieging armies.
IMAGE GALLERY
DEVELOPMENT BACKGROUND
This game was developed over the course of six weeks as part of the narrative design unit at AIE. The project entailed designing a game story and then producing an interactive fiction game covering about 10 - 20% of the full length narrative. In total I wrote roughly 50 pages of script with over 18,000 words (although some sections were repeated with slight alterations due to the branching narrative structure).
I decided early on to develop a visual novel as I felt this was the best way to test my writing skills and to add as much narrative depth as I could to the project. While brainstorming premises for the story, I was thinking hard about ways to make player choices feel meaningful and consequential with just text-based choices, and eventually settled on the idea of an embattled doctor trying to save lives during an epidemic.
This then helped me to hone in on the core theme of the story: “Is faith or technology more important to a people in crisis?”. With this theme I wanted to challenge the player to consider the utility and danger of both - does religion act as a source of strength or drive people towards irrational acts of extremism? Is technological progress just as likely to bring about the means for our destruction as our salvation?
The narrative was primarily inspired by the plague of Athens, a terrible epidemic that devastated ancient Athens during its war with Sparta in the 5th century BC. The disease killed upwards of 25 to 30% of the population in only five years and triggered a widespread breakdown in social norms and religious beliefs. A gripping account of the events is given by the historian Thucydides, a native of Athens and survivor of the plague, and his account touches on similar themes - in times of great crisis, when the thin veneer of civilisation is stripped away, what does human nature really show itself to be?
Design Documentation
STORY STRUCTURE
The narrative adopts the seven point story structure, although it diverges into multiple endings around the second major plot point. This is where the player must make a difficult decision regarding what treatment method to pursue and how they think they can best save lives. The game’s plot structure is laid out below:
CHARACTER PROFILES
John Mortimer
The player character - an intelligent yet increasingly cynical and war-weary medical doctor who previously served in the Northumbrian military as an assistant surgeon. He remains a high-ranking officer in the Northumbrian medical corps but has gradually become disillusioned with the kingdom’s conduct in the war.
As a young man, Mortimer pioneered efforts to treat wounded soldiers using new technology such as precision tools and anaesthetic drugs. During a past military conflict, Mortimer also successfully developed a series of antibiotics to combat the outbreak of an infectious disease known as Purpurea fever among soldiers. These actions elevated his status with the Northumbrian military and the royal family.
Mortimer has arrived in Embermire to help combat the outbreak. This is partly due a desire to utilise his expertise to develop an effective cure and partly due to his own medical curiosity to study the epidemic. Due to his renowned status in the Kingdom of Northumbria, he has been provided with a royal edict by parliament granting him influence over the city authorities.
A man of science, he remains deeply skeptical about the city’s religious influences and the growing divisions between its superstitious and more scientifically minded citizens.
| Strengths | Weaknesses |
|---|---|
|
• Intelligence and savviness • Intuition and perceptiveness • Natural curiosity • Drive and determination
• Pragmatic mindset |
• Emotionally distant and unrelatable • Cynically minded and pessimistic. • Unempathetic and cold-hearted at times. |
| Desires | Needs |
|
• Demonstrate the power of technological innovation to resolve any problem. • Mark the triumph of man over nature through eradication of disease. • Elevate his social standing as a leading practitioner in his field. • Pioneer the development of new medical techniques and technological advancements. |
• To recognise the utility of faith in inspiring hope and bringing people together. • To develop greater empathy and respecting the beliefs of those different to him. • To understand the meaning of sacrifice and belief in a higher cause. • To learn how to have hope and faith that things will work out even when the odds are stacked against you. |
Ava Albright
A young woman who serves as a nun at the Our Lady of Hope Abbey in Embermire. Born in the Kingdom of Northumbria, she travelled to the city to support missionaries in their work in spreading the faith to the unsettled areas of the continent, but later found her calling at the abbey.
Ava has lived in seclusion with the other nuns and is devout in her faith, strongly advocating pacifism and neutrality in the ongoing conflict between the Dominion and Northumbria.
Ava becomes the first person to be identified as having a natural immunity to the Iron Lung disease, which marks her out as a person of interest by the city’s medical professionals.
Ava’s care and devotion to the sick has transformed her into a beacon of hope for the more superstitious to rally around, believing that she has been granted divine protection and is a sign that God is on the side of the citizens of Embermire.
Ava is both skeptical of the motivations of the city’s governing technocracy while also opposing the violence advocated by Father Matthys.
| Strengths | Weaknesses |
|---|---|
|
• Kindness and compassion towards others. • Dutiful and loyal to her ideals. • Brave and willing to sacrifice herself for others. |
• Narrow-minded and unwilling to see others’ perspectives. • Emotionally driven and struggles to make rational decisions. |
| Desires | Needs |
|
• To provide comfort and hope to those suffering from the disease. • To spread the faith to others in the hopes they embrace the promise of salvation. • To fulfill her duties and obligations as a carer for the sick. |
• To recognise the value and importance of making logical sacrifices for the greater good. • To accept the benefits of technological progress and not view it as a threat or counter to her religious beliefs. |
Nathaniel Matthys
The extremist head of the Church of the Holy Trinity in Embermire. Born and raised in the city, he believes staunchly in Embermire’s independence and opposes both Dominion and Northumbrian influence. The war has slowly driven him to more radical positions, asserting that the epidemic is divine punishment directed at the city’s technocratic elite for their plundering of the continent and the blood they have spilled over control of its resources.
Matthys advocates for zealous action aimed at overthrowing the pro-Northumbrian government and driving out the Dominion invaders, frequently inciting the citizens of Embermire into violent action. He is the main antagonist of the story, who attempts to disrupt the player’s efforts to investigate the source of the epidemic based on accusations of blasphemy and sacrilege.
A major target of his vitriol is the atheistic professor Elias Wainwright, whose controversial works on human biology conflict with the teachings of the church and are seen as undermining Matthys’ own influence.
| Strengths | Weaknesses |
|---|---|
|
• Deeply charismatic. • Forceful in persuasion. |
• Egotistical and full of self-delusions. • Megalomaniacal and driven by power and control. |
| Desires | Needs |
|
• To bring an end to the epidemic by appeasing the wrath of God. • Seizing power in the city and removing the current leadership. • Eradicating both the Dominion and Northumbria military presence. |
• To moderate his radical beliefs and develop greater insight. • To realise the error of his ways and the violence he has sown. |
Elias Wainwright
Elias Wainwright was a professor of microbiology at Avalon University in Embermire before the outbreak of the war. He was an outspoken atheist that drew much condemnation from the church and is a frequent target in the sermons of Father Matthys due to his outspoken views on anthropology and human biology.
Wainwright is also a hypochondriac that is deeply paranoid about contracting the disease, resulting in him living in extreme isolation, even though his laboratory tools would be invaluable to the city’s medical professionals in studying the pathogen.
He is highly knowledgeable about microorganisms which makes him acutely aware of the disease’s threat in a way most citizens, particularly the clergy, are not.
| Strengths | Weaknesses |
|---|---|
|
• Highly intelligent and knowledgeable. • Technologically competent and industrious. |
• Fearful and timid, frequent sufferer of anxiety. • Cowardly and lacking in conviction. |
| Desires | Needs |
|
• To survive the epidemic and not become infected. • Find a way out of the city, by any means. |
• To develop courage and selflessness. • To see the good that science can do to others. • To overcome his fear of death. |
Gideon Haig
General Gideon Haig is the commander of the Northumbrian forces occupying the city. He believes the refusal to march out from the city and fight the Dominion army head-on is cowardly and dishonourable. He is fully committed to the war effort but is increasingly motivated by glory-seeking and elevation of his military career rather than the deliverance of the suffering population in the city.
Haig insists the disease is the result of Dominion saboteurs inside the city who are deliberately poisoning the water supply, a theory that has gained traction with the soldiers and city police and is often used as a justification for their severe crackdowns on civil disorder and social unrest.
Haig also has no qualms about frequently using violent force and deadly riot control techniques against Embermire citizens to maintain order, including experimental gas grenades and fully automatic machine guns.
| Strengths | Weaknesses |
|---|---|
|
• Charismatic leader and public speaker. • Skilled in military tactics and war strategy. |
• Vain and egotistical. • Driven by self-interest and personal prestige. |
| Desires | Needs |
|
• Successful defence of the city from attack. • Taking the fight to the Dominion army. • Maintaining order in the city. |
• Sacrifice individual pride for the public good. • Lay down arms and accept loss of power. |