WEBVTT -- English 00:00:12.247 --> 00:00:14.510 I'm Robyn Gray. I'm the Game Director on a•part•ment. 00:00:14.537 --> 00:00:17.242 I'm Richard Emms, I'm the Lead Designer and Lead Engineer on a•part•ment. 00:00:17.594 --> 00:00:19.940 a•part•ment is really a game about relationships. 00:00:19.984 --> 00:00:24.452 The main relationship is Nick Connor, who has been dumped by his girlfriend, Madison, of four years. 00:00:24.838 --> 00:00:28.309 You spend about half the game-time wandering through the apartment they shared together, 00:00:28.352 --> 00:00:30.987 uncovering memories of their time together. 00:00:31.545 --> 00:00:34.488 In the other part of the game you play as Nick's neighbors. 00:00:34.578 --> 00:00:36.890 You get to experience their lives from their point of view. 00:00:37.039 --> 00:00:42.466 There's a widow, there's an unfaithful lover, there's an estranged father-daughter pair 00:00:42.604 --> 00:00:47.469 and there's a guy who's just moved across the country who's completely lost his support network. 00:00:49.005 --> 00:00:52.755 We very carefully and deliberately designed each of these vignettes 00:00:52.756 --> 00:00:57.176 so the gameplay, the narrative, is all tied together very harmoniously. 00:00:57.703 --> 00:00:59.981 They may or may not know each other very well, 00:01:00.020 --> 00:01:03.481 but all of them are tied together and linked by these universal things 00:01:03.531 --> 00:01:06.989 that we all experience in relationships no matter what kind of relationship that might be. 00:01:07.253 --> 00:01:11.510 We've had people play it and say it's reassuring to know that all of these people, 00:01:11.599 --> 00:01:16.141 even though they're strangers, they have their own struggles that they're trying to get over. 00:01:18.128 --> 00:01:21.019 I think text really helps people connect with these characters. 00:01:21.147 --> 00:01:24.450 We leave a lot of things to be filled in by the player's imagination, 00:01:24.451 --> 00:01:26.451 just like in a good book. 00:01:26.555 --> 00:01:29.861 You don't exactly know what these people look like, you don't know what their voices sound like, 00:01:29.862 --> 00:01:32.129 you don't know their facial quirks. 00:01:32.487 --> 00:01:35.570 You get to say, 'Oh, well, maybe Rose looks like me.' 00:01:35.737 --> 00:01:39.225 Or, 'Oh, maybe her husband looks like my boyfriend.' 00:01:39.227 --> 00:01:42.191 And that really gives you this automatic connection right away 00:01:42.192 --> 00:01:46.111 because they are your characters and they have pieces of you embedded in them. 00:01:46.989 --> 00:01:49.260 Something that we've been thinking about for so long, 00:01:49.298 --> 00:01:52.251 is trying to figure out how we can make the best games that we can. 00:01:52.289 --> 00:01:54.439 The most unusual games that we can. 00:01:54.441 --> 00:01:58.959 And experimenting with how to make people feel the things that we want them to feel; 00:01:58.977 --> 00:02:02.311 have the game's story resonate with people while they're playing. 00:02:02.311 --> 00:02:07.420 That's something that we've been really proud that we've been able to achieve with a•part•ment. 00:02:12.977 --> 00:02:14.977 We've been working on a•part•ment for a while. 00:02:15.114 --> 00:02:17.520 It's truly been a labor of love for us. 00:02:17.521 --> 00:02:20.425 This is something where we've had pretty much zero funding throughout 00:02:20.426 --> 00:02:23.989 and so we haven't been able to get it to the level of polish that we would like. 00:02:24.739 --> 00:02:26.985 Where the Kickstarter comes in is we need funding. 00:02:26.986 --> 00:02:28.986 We're a very small team. 00:02:28.998 --> 00:02:33.837 We don't have as much art talent as we'd like, we don't have really the music talent we'd like. 00:02:33.889 --> 00:02:37.429 The funding will help us cover bringing in additional musicians and outside artists 00:02:37.502 --> 00:02:39.979 to really polish it and make it the best it can be. 00:02:40.478 --> 00:02:44.270 We're really excited to bring you guys into this project, so please back a•part•ment. 00:02:44.307 --> 00:02:46.615 Please watch as we finish this game. 00:02:46.616 --> 00:02:48.969 and please play it when it's done!