Elevator Music
Elevator Music (2013) is a cyberpunk mystery adventure, and my entry to the 2013 Indiecade/Oculus VR Jam. You play as an elevator operator, Ulysses, hunting down clues in the physical and digital realms to unravel the story behind the mysterious Omnihedral Incorporated. Elevator Music was created in three weeks for the Indiecade jam, where it won third place in the selected developers category. It was shown at the Oculus booth at Indiecade 2013.
In designing the game, a major concept I wanted to play with was the interplay between the elevator and the office spaces. I wanted the elevator to be a warm, safe retreat from the cold, vast and twisted halls of Omnihedral Incorporated. This concept guided my approach to the visual and aural design of these spaces. I latched on to the idea of over-the-top cheesy elevator music that was not quite right. As you move on through the game, the elevator music slowly evolves, revealing a twisted quality that was lurking beneath the surface at first - the true nature of Omnihedral Incorporated.
All of the graphics are procedurally modeled, and the game's central puzzle is deciphering the system inherent to the environment. The cubicle layouts of the office spaces are procedural patterns revolving around different regular polygons -- Omnihedral Corporation is run by people who have an uncanny interest in geometry and the platonic solids. My grandmother, Anne Tyng, was a great architect and mathematical theorist who was fascinated by geometry, so this was a bit of an homage to her.
