Matthieu BAILLY
Game Designer
Essay
(French)
Resume
(French)
Resume (English)
Stranded Island
A 3D mobile game about adventure, exploration and exploitation of resources on deserted islands.
The player commands a mysterious character stranded alone on an island, and will meet Lily and many other characters who will help him go from island to island to discover the secrets of a lost ancient civilization.
Game produced by Ethereal Games, Game Design realized in collaboration with Vitéra Y and Taïs Prié.
Genre
Adventure
Support
Mobile / Unity
Date
September 2023 - March 2024
6 months
Roles
Game Designer, Game Producer, Game Tester
Context ​
Stranded Island is a mobile game project I was able to work on during my 6 months at Ethereal Games. For the first time, I joined an ongoing Game as a Service type production, so my contribution in Game Design only concerns part of the game's features. In addition, part of the designed features were not integrated into the game due to lack of time, but can still be viewed here!
I was thus able to discover how to design and develop an ongoing mobile game for a casual audience.
Stranded Island is available on Google Play Store and AppStore and reached 5M+ downloads.
Download
Here is a download link to play the game, scan it with your phone!
Game Design
You will find below all the game concepts to which I contributed during my time at Ethereal Games.
Some concern new content, while others aim to edit existing features to make the game more attractive.
​
For the following documents, I've often used "bullet points", which allowed me to briefly list and sort feature details, hence the list format. This document presentation proved efficient to communicate my ideas to developers during integration.
​
Most of these documents are in English to facilitate communication with international teams, with which Ethereal Games works. However, when the documents were intended for the internal team, I would write them in French so developers could understand them easier.
New Content
-
Character customization
In order to allow players to feel more involved in the game, it was decided to create a customization system for the main character, with several customization elements that had to remain simple. I designed this feature alone based on other mobile games. This feature is now integrated into the game, although there are differences with the documentation.
Related documents:
Design Document (EN)
UI Design Document
(EN)
-
Events
The following events were all designed to create retention and keep players coming back to the game. This request was made by the creative director, who then chose which events would be implemented in the game and which would not.
-
Atlantis
The intention behind this feature was to extend the game experience beyond the end of its story with infinitely repeatable content, linked to a Battle Pass. This content has taken the form of Atlantis, an event that opens periodically, and allows players to obtain rare rewards and upgrades for their equipment even after the end of the game's story. This feature was created with Vitéra Y, Quentin Milana and Taïs Prié and was integrated into the game.
Related documents:
Design Document (EN)
Foundry Document (FR)
-
Reminiscence archipelago
The intention behind this feature was to extend the gameplay experience beyond the end of its hard mode called Dream Mode with infinitely repeatable content related to badges, like Atlantis. This content took the form of the Reminiscence Archipelago, which consists of offering players an infinite number of procedurally generated islands to complete in order to obtain decorative badges on their profile. This feature was designed with Taïs Prié, but was not integrated into the game due to technical and time limitations.
Related documents:
Design Document (EN)
Generation Document (EN)
Modifiers
Document (EN)
-
Artifact Seeker
Artifact Seeker is a periodic event designed to be played by all players regardless of their progress in the game, reusing the core gameplay of the game. The goal is simple: find artifact pieces by clearing vegetation from a island designed for this event. When an artifact is completed, a reward is given to the player, and a big reward awaits players who complete all the artifacts. This event was designed with Taïs Prié and was not included due to lack of time.
Related documents:
Design Document (EN)
-
Treasure Hunt
Treasure Hunt is a periodic event designed to be played by all players regardless of their progress in the game, reusing the core gameplay of the game, much like Artifact Seeker. The objective is to find as many treasure chests as possible, which are hidden under the vegetation on a special island within the duration of the event. The resources for removing vegetation are also limited, forcing the player to come back regularly hoping to hit the jackpot by finding all the chests. This event was designed with Taïs Prié and was not included due to lack of time.
Related documents:
Design Document (EN)
-
Social features
The following features are intended to strengthen the social aspect of Stranded Island. This request was made by the game publisher, in order to make the game more profitable. At the time of writing, none of them have been implemented, as other features took higher priority.
-
Player ID Card
​This feature aims to give the player a card representing their favorite character and their progress, so that it can be shown to other players through the social features below. It includes a profile picture of a character with a frame, the player's pseudonym, as well as a collection of decorative badges. This feature was designed in collaboration with Taïs Prié.
Related documents:
Design Document (EN)
Pseudonym Document (EN)
Picture Document (EN)
Badge Document (EN)
-
Community Center
The Community Center is a building in the Hub, central to the social features because it brings them together in one place. By interacting with it, the player has access to a menu showing hub visits and the social points shop. This feature was designed by myself to optimize the UX of social features.
Related documents:
Design Document (EN)
UI Design
Document (EN)
-
Hub Visits
Hub visits allow a player to visit another player's hub, giving players an incentive to decorate their hub. The intention is to encourage players to share their hub on social networks to attract new players on the game. Visits are enhanced with other features related to them, such as the Community Chest which encourages longer visits with a small treasure hunt and Likes which reward players whose hubs are appreciated by other players. This feature was designed with Vitéra Y and Taïs Prié.
Related documents:
Design Document (EN)
Chest Document (EN)
Likes
Document (EN)
-
Social Points Shop
The Social Point Shop allows players to spend their Social Points to get various rewards. Social Points are earned by performing actions related to social features such as visiting a hub, finding a Community Chest, or liking another Hub. Social Points are limited per day, but earning points by receiving Likes is not subject to this limitation. This feature was designed with Vitéra Y and Taïs Prié.
Related documents:
Design Document (EN)
Points Document (EN)
ShopPrices
Document (EN)
-
Friends (scrapped)
​A friend registration system was planned but abandoned due to the game's particular save system which could potentially corrupt files. This system would have made it possible to encourage players to invite their friends to the game and to be able to easily find them for social features. Special privileges and character sharing were also here to support the friend system. This feature was designed by myself.
Related documents:
Design Document (EN)
Privileges Document (EN)
CharaShare
Document (EN)
-
Material requests (scrapped)
​One idea to get players interacting with each other in addition to hub visits was to create material exchanges between them. The following features are iterations of this idea which evolved with the other social features, before being abandoned for the same technical reasons as the friends system. These features were designed with Taïs Prié.
Related documents:
Design Document (EN)
DropBox
Document (EN)
TradingPost
Document (EN)
OrderBoard
Document (EN)
-
Preview Gameplay Segment
​This feature is a short segment of gameplay before the first level, which places the player in the context of the game's story and gives them immediate access to end-game tools to learn how to play, hence the "preview". The intention is to give a foreview of the end of the game to make the player want to progress until then. This feature was designed by myself and has not been implemented at the time of writing this.
Related documents:
Design Document (EN)
-
Farms and Mines
​Farms and Mines are buildings designed to accompany the new Hub islands and social features, allowing the player to harvest cooking ingredients and semi-precious stones respectively, directly from the hubs. These buildings produce materials over time and have limited storage, pushing players to return to the game to recover the materials produced to optimize their production. This feature was designed by myself and has not been implemented.
Related documents:
Design Document (EN)
-
Main Character Upgrades
​This feature aims to improve the main character's statistics as the player progresses through the game's Dream mode, as the player could already improve other crewmates with gifts. As this is the main character in the game's story, they benefit from generous stat boosts that make them unique: each completed Dream Mode chapter grants him 3 skill points, spread across all of the character's skills. This feature was designed with Taïs Prié and has been implemented in the game.
Related documents:
Design Document (EN)
Reworks
-
FTUE
This rework aimed to make the First Time User Experience (FTUE) better paced, richer and reduce the time where nothing happens to keep the player active and intrigued for at least 1 hour during their first session on the game. For this, I was able to create several timeline and timestamp documents in collaboration with Taïs Prié, including the desired modifications. These documents then served as a reference for developers who were able to apply new content and changes in the game.
Related documents:
Timeline Document (FR/EN)
Timestamps Document (EN)
-
Hub Islands
Hub Islands are designed to be an improved version of the hub already present in the game. These are divided into several areas that can be unlocked by the player by spending gold coins, after which he can build on the unlocked land. Another particularity is that there is one Hub Island per chapter, and therefore 5 themes available to install the hub. These changes are intended to make the hub more interesting and personalized. This rework was designed with Taïs Prié, and have partly been integrated into the game.
Related documents:
Design Document (EN)
-
Gameplay loop
​Following feedback from the game publisher, it was decided to change the gameplay loop within an island to make it less complex without distorting the game or affecting the meta gameplay loop. In collaboration with Vitéra Y and Taïs Prié, I was able to develop a proposal for changing the gameplay loop by explaining how it works and listing the changes to be made to implement it. This was my last assignment at Ethereal Games and these changes have not been implemented as I write this.
Related documents:
NewLoop
Document (FR)
