Forget me not
There are roughly four versions of Forget Me Not by Heinrich Lichner throughout the project. The first is the lullaby version in the first cutscene. This is a simple toy piano with just the melody that helps anchor the player and provide a base emotional foundation. This then mirrors in the nightmare portion of the project where the song is significantly slowed down and then reversed to create a sense of unease while also providing a clue that parts of this nightmare are not real. There is then the toy piano version where the player must then create the melody themselves. It helps to showcase the isolation Chloe feels as the lack of sheet music shows she had to learn it herself by ear from the music box playing the song in the beginning. She can only play the same 13 notes over and over again, not progressing and not moving forward. The final iteration of the song plays in the credits. This version is the full composition played on a grand piano. This is meant to represent the future for Chloe, maturation and eventual growth. She will have to continue to be independent but this experience will teach her so much.
Colors Mom
I had assigned the color red to anything in connection with the mother. Red is a warm and fierce color. She is ambitious and hard-working as shown by it being her office in the house. Considering how the mother has a greater connection to Chloe is makes sense that her color would be the more natural one. Anything and everything that the mother touched was red from her mug and chair in the office to the coffee maker in the kitchen to her toothbrush in the bathroom. Even the halls are a dark shade of red to represent the ever-presence of her throughout the house. She is the structure of the family. Dad
The father is meant to contrast the mother so the perfect compliment was blue. The father is distant in this family so having a cold color that also stood out against the red was important. His blue is few and far between in the house, just his toothbrush and the rug on the top floor. He is not totally absent but is almost just a decoration, something easily removed. Chloe
The mother is red, the father is blue, the child is purple, a combination of the two. It also represents the delicate relationship between the parents as at this point they are only still together for her. It also foreshadows the independence she will have to gain after the parents’ divorce.
Stars
Glow-in-the-dark stars were a staple of my childhood room. They allowed me to bring a bit of space into my room. They were the last thing I saw at night and the first in the morning. In this project, they also represent the beginning and the end. They clue the player in on the fact that a majority of the experience is a dream or an active imagination. They are the first thing they see in the initial cutscene and they are one of the last things when they make their reappearance in the final hallway.
Books
There are two bookshelves on the top floor. Both hold Chloe’s books hence why she fixes them and pulls their spines to the edge of the shelf like a librarian. Books were my preferred means of escape and they were some of the most preciously treated objects in the house. In the project, they do not provide much interaction besides comfort. Fixing them gives the player a small distraction from their situation. Some playtesters only pulled out a few and went back to exploring the house while others would take the time to pull out every single one of them.
Drawings
Creation is a sort of escape for many children of divorce, especially when there is no way for them to act out. Along with music, the horizontal drawings throughout the playroom and Chloe’s bedroom represent four different sections of realization.
The first section is the light landscape section with the road and wind turbine drawings. These are scenes pulled from her everyday life as she goes out with her family. She is focused on what is around her and her life in the present.
The next animal section with the drawing of three fish, a bird with an egg, and a penguin with just an igloo. This represents her growing isolation from three to two, and eventually to one. The environment becomes colder from the envelopment of the ocean, to the security of the nest, and the cold of the snow. During the time these drawings were created, Chloe is starting to sense that something is wrong in her family.
The last section in the playroom is the imaginary landscapes with the ocean sunset, the city skyline, and outer space drawing. These are drawings of escapism. Chloe has yet to really experience these places beyond television and books so these places are an escape from the reality she is familiar with. They still have color but they are leaning more towards dark and nighttime color schemes.
The final section is in Chloe’s bedroom. These are her most recent drawings and their placement in the bedroom represents the lack of energy Chloe is feeling as she cannot even be bothered to move them into the playroom with the others. These drawings are a complete shift from her previous drawings. At this point, she knows of the tension between her parents but the one family drawing that is still in progress on her drawing table show her hope that it can be fixed. This is the only drawing with people in it.
Final Hallway
The final hallway in the basement is the last clue to the player about what is really going on in the house. As soon as they step onto the last floor, It easily becomes obvious that what they are seeing is completely in their mind, a part of their imagination. The stars from the beginning make a reappearance, the hallway starts to warp and grow, the monstrous voices start to scream louder. As they move closer to the final door their vision gets worse as the world around them blurs and slows. In contrast, their hearing gets better as they start to recognize the voices as two people, their parents. This hallway is a culmination of all the buildup throughout the project. Here it is at its precipice and finally comes crashing down upon them.
Fix-It Interactions
A very common experience of children of divorce is the belief that they can fix their parents' relationship. Throughout the house, there are various "fix-it" interactions that allow the player to fix parts of the house. Some examples are putting the dishes from the counter to the sink, getting Mom's coffee mug ready under the coffee maker, and putting away some toys left in the hallway. Other interactions give more insight to the degree that the relationship is breaking such as picking up the
thrown remote and putting it back on the table and taking Dad's toothbrush that was separated and putting them with the others. Depending on the number of interactions the players fulfill, certain endings will play. If they don't do enough, the ending shows Chloe finding the first time her parents are fighting. If they find them all, the ending shows that this is not the first time. If I were to have continued this project, I would have included voice acting. This would help to make the ending more impactful because in ending one it would have been in the child's voice but ending two it would be a more grown voice. This would help to showcase that in ending two it has been more time since they had started fighting. This would then establish a theme that it is not on the child to fix their parents’ relationship, something that many children of divorce need to hear. That it is not their fault, it is not their job.
