Hey Ghosts and Hunters,
Have you ever wondered how we come up with the concepts for all our weapons, gadgets, maps, and so on? In this series, we’ll dive into this process and how we take things from an initial concept to ready-to-play!
In this first installment of behind the scenes, we'll be taking a look at the Spectrophone! We introduced this new Hunter gadget in our most recent test in August.
The Spectrophone tracks Ghosts by giving you a specific direction to follow - it won’t tell the Hunter how close the Ghosts are, but it lets you know whether or not you’re pointed in the right direction. Your job is to keep an eye on the waveform display and locate them by following their ghostly sounds.
The initial idea for the Spectrophone was to design a gadget that plays up the ghost sound recorder/detector trope in various ghost hunting media.
At this point in the concept phase, we’re still exploring what visual cues and tech we could draw from. Visual cues are often elements that make the design interesting but can also serve to improve readability so players can easily understand what the gadget is and does just by looking at it.
As you can see above, some of the inspiration used for the Spectrophone included old phones and voice recorders, satellite dishes, and radar speed guns. Our general gadget aesthetic in MGH is very DIY, built at home with whatever was available in the Hunter’s lab. Nothing extremely high-tech, and we try to utilize recognizable pieces of tech from the 1980s and prior.
Once we arrived at some ideas we liked in the concept, we started exploring shapes in 3D. Our 3D & concept artist Felix is an absolute wizard when it comes to this stuff! (We’re super lucky to work with such a talented bunch of individuals - you can get to know some of them by reading one of our older Dev Blogs!)
Once we have it roughed out in 3D, we go through multiple rounds of feedback and discussions as a team. We felt the first concept for the Spectrophone was a bit too cartoony - it looked like some kind of laser or classic sci-fi weaponry instead of a gadget.
We also needed to keep in mind how the Hunter would actually hold and use the device. We experimented with a few options here. We tried one design where the Spectrophone was held cupped in the Hunter’s hands against their body (a bit like a Rolleiflex camera, for example).
We also tried a positioning that looked a bit like a Steadicam set-up. Neither felt quite right, so we continued to iterate. The shots above really help illustrate how the ideas evolve and grow.
We felt that the old voice recorder wheel felt out of place, and perhaps a little bit too old-school, 60s style. We decided to bring the Spectrophone tech up to the 80s and 90s by switching the voice recorder wheels for a retro cassette recorder. Starting to sound familiar?
Around the same time, we also considered the option of making the Spectrophone into a two-handed gadget instead. We were also fiddling with an idea of a neck strap that would allow the left hand to tune the knob and other controls of the Spectrophone. At this point, we felt like we were definitely heading in the right direction, and decided to continue with that design.
In the end, we decided to ditch the idea of the neck strap, and go with two gadget pieces connected by a phone wire. Although the gadget has a sound component, a clear visual read-out on the display was an important element to keep for extra clarity.
Once we were happy with the general look, it was time to animate it, start sound design, and put it in-game!
We were quite happy with the great paranormal vibe Dennis was able to create for the Spectrophone with his clever sound design. This pairs well with the display, and also serves as a nice cue for Ghosts to hear if they are being detected currently.
When the audio & animation elements have been finalized, it’s time to make some final tweaks and get to testing! Before we share the new content with the players, we go through tons of internal testing, and then we balance, balance, balance. Once the gadget has been released into the wild in an alpha test, we pay close attention to how balanced it seems and how it’s used to see if any further tweaks or adjustments are needed to ensure it’s fun and fair.
So, that’s the development process for the Spectrophone gadget in a nutshell! Thanks for reading.
Please let us know if you like this kind of content and would like to see more behind the scenes content. If so, let us know which gadgets, weapons, abilities, or maps you’d like to see most! We’d love to hear your thoughts, so hit us up on Discord & Twitter!
Happy spooky season y’all! 🎃
Tinny 👻
Community Manager