Adulting

Growing older has nothing to do with feeling grown up.

»Adulting« is an interactive visual novel tackling the topic of being an adult. It is a third person side scroller and a single player. It's unique style combines two-dimensional as well as three-dimensional art to reflect the look and feel of comics and graphic novels. Set in different apartments it should give the player a closer look into the lives of the three main characters.The goal is to embed the feeling of insecurity that accompanies the term »being an adult« in the form of a visual, interactive story and to enable the recipients to deal with this topic individually but also socially. The game takes around 20–30 minutes, depends on how much time you invest in mini games and reading the dialoge carefully.

The game is an experience focusing heavily on storytelling and featuring engaging mini-games as well as point-andclick interactions with dialogue. The story focuses on three characters, each with 3 acts of the story whereas the storylines are linear. The setting is a multi-apartment building. All those light interactions and additional dialogue focus on different problematic aspects of our three characters who should represent different age groups who are struggling with different aspects of being an adult. Furthermore it features point-and-click events which trigger short animations or dialogues giving the characters and environments more context.

Throughout the story the player will encounter light mini-games that they must complete to continue progressing. It features 12 mini-games with various styles of gameplay.

Additionally the players can write messages and send them to other players. Here, own thoughts can be written down and decorated with stickers. Writing and sending these messages can take place at any time during the course of the action. With the help of a scrapbook that can be accessed at any time, the player can send messages and read and store collected paper planes.

By combining 2D and 3D art styles Adulting reflects with a hand drawn look and feel comics and graphic novels. It features hand painted assets as well as 2D character animations. This gives it a unique art style which is easily recognizable.

The topic of the perception of being and becoming an adult in society is personified with three main characters and their individual struggle with the theme. In preparation the development team invested in a 3 month long research by interviewing psychologists and collaborating with the Sigmund Freud Private University Linz as well as making an online survey with over 70 participants.

A coherent soundtrack with individual themes per character ensures that players are immersed in a calm but emotional atmosphere. Full Soundtrack is available on Spotify.

DISCLAIMER
This game was created from five students + helping hands in their master's degree at the University of Applied Sciences Salzburg as their final master's project. Since then the team graduated and they tried to improve it as much as was possible for them after their studies in their free time and with their limited programming knowledge. So please keep that in mind while playing the game and don't be too harsh on the loading times or other bugs. A lot of sweat, tears, money and love went into this project, so thank you for your support! <3

Liv is a 23-year-old single student who is pursuing a university education in the creative industry as well as a part-time job. She has financial difficulties, as her parents also have to support her other siblings financially. The pressure to get her adult life together financially in addition to education and work is growing.

Albert is a man in his mid-40s with two children. He has difficulty taking care of his two children and all his other adult responsibilities, such as his own florist store, because his partner‘s job often prevents him from being at home.

Finja is a 70-year-old pensioner who has particular difficulties with loneliness, as it is difficult for her to stay in contact with her friends, as she no longer has the possibility to travel long distances due to her age. Her family through their busy adult life also do not have much time to visit her.