Kintsugi is a 3D puzzle game where your goal is to build again some beautiful potteries that have been broken into pieces.
The game was made for Global Game Jam 2020 with the theme “Repair”. This jam was particularly interesting to me as I was working with mostly unexperimented game developers, most of them being first-timers in game development.
Each level is set on a table in a backyard, where a pot has been broken in pieces. The goal is to build it back like it was before.
The player can pivot around the table, take a piece, rotate it in their hand, and try to place it on the pot in reconstruction. If the piece fits there, it automatically places itself on the broken pot.
This makes Kintsugi a real 3D jigsaw puzzle game, focused around observation rather than agility.
We decided to make Kintsugi a relaxing game and worked towards that goal in the gameplay decisions, but also in the world setting and music.
I pitched the game and created the design rules, as well as the documentation and UI design for the game.
Being the most experienced, but also the game designer and pitcher, I loved working with newcomers to game development. My main focus was on helping them learn, and have fun on their first game while avoiding the crunch effet often created in very short game jams. That explains the simplicity of the concept and the levels.
I spent a lot of time processing the pots in Blender, breaking them in pieces in an interesting way, and integrating them in each level so they are playable.
Global Game Jam
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