Dev Blog - Starbound

Originally posted 12/14/23 on my game dev website

Hello again! The past few weeks, I’ve been working on a narrative design project. My assignment was to create an interactive narrative in three weeks using Fabella, a web-based tool that allows you to create audio stories. I wanted to tie it into my level design project, Amtharus, so created a story about a younger Karis before she has her own ship.

Starbound is my first interactive story, and it was a fun challenge to balance player choice with the set goal Karis wishes to reach. Though what Karis wants doesn’t change, how she gets there, and who she meets along the way is up to the player.

If you want to play through the story yourself, you can do so below! Otherwise, you can skip down to hear about my process designing the narrative and my experience using Fabella.

Spoiler Warning!

From here on I’ll be talking about my process, so if you don’t want to spoil your playthrough of Starbound, first listen to the story above.

A quick note for those of you who are interested in using Fabella for your own stories. I disabled the microphone option to make it easier to play in a web browser, but Fabella does have speech-to-text capability.

The Setup

To make it easier on myself for future editing, I first wrote a rough script of the story, which I then added into Fabella. After selecting the voices for my characters, I tested where I could modify the narrative based on certain conditions and where I could add branching paths. If you select Karis’ favorite boots at the beginning, for example, Tilly comments on them at breakfast. They’re also tied to whether or not you chance upon the discovery of an archaeologically significant room in the back of the cave (one of several paths you might find yourself on based on your choices).

I also experimented with how the player’s actions affect certain relationships. If you end up waiting for the train with Kendall, another student at the academy, you can choose to listen to his music. If you say you like it, he’ll potentially join you at the lecture you’ve been excited about later that day. And if you don’t like his music, he’ll start ignoring you. Either choice has repercussions within the narrative.

It was a challenge to give enough choices without creating too much work for myself, as more branches meant more written dialogue and sound effects. Also, as the story follows a specific character, it’s difficult to know if the player will experience the same emotions that Karis does. My goal was to give enough backstory so that the player can empathize with her journey, but whether I succeeded will ultimately be up to the user. :)

The Sounds

Games are always better with sound, so once I had the dialogue set, I added in as many sound effects as I could to enhance the experience, including music and ambient noises like in the flight bay or when crowds are talking nearby. What I could find free on Pixabay was often limited, so I edited many sound effects in Audacity to get as close as possible to what I wanted. I have a new appreciation for sound engineers!

My favorite audio in the narrative are the advertisements I created for Theran Corporation, a fictional company in my story, that play on the train. I wrote the script and used ElevenLabs for the audio (the intonation is much easier to get right) and paired it with a song from Pixabay. I thought it was a fun way to give more information about the world, and provide an opportunity for the player to see how Karis feels about Theran Corp, as you potentially encounter someone who works there later in the story.

As much as I enjoyed being able to generate audio with Fabella for the story, I found the lack of intonation for many of the voices quite limiting. There are several moments where the character should express strong emotion, but instead delivers the line in a neutral voice, which risks taking the player out of the story. It’s something I’d love to fix.

Quick note for anyone who’s interested in Fabella, they do offer voices from Replica Studios, which are more expressive, but unfortunately none of them were the right fit for my characters.

The Images

I don’t have any kind of budget for my school projects, so I’ve limited myself to images that are free to use, then create what I need in Canva, like the character portraits you see in the web player.

Final Thoughts

Overall this project was a fun experience! Fabella was quite easy to use, and it brought the story to life in a very cool way. Without my deadline (and trying not to overscope), I would probably expand the environmental descriptions in the dialogue and add more conditions to further customize the story. I’d also continue my hunt for better sound effects.

I hope you enjoyed Starbound and this glimpse into my game dev journey.

Thank you for reading!