Lost Colors by Zijian Lu
Capstone 2022
A journey of accepting failure and self-reconciliation.
Description
Lost Colors focuses primarily on the player’s personal experience with maladaptive perfectionism. The experience of this project lasts about 10 minutes, and the game uses the strong interactivity of 3D games and a custom physical controller to enhance the player’s sense of involvement so that players can be released from any state of life, into this void to feel the pure exploration of self-definition. Players will be able to explore the path, trigger the lost memories, and find out the way to the portal. In the end, the game will lead players to review the decisions they made and the whole journey of exploration. The gameplay and end review stage encourage players to reflect on the traits of maladaptive perfectionism, shift from a results-oriented to a process-oriented mindset, and embrace failure. The main message of the project may vary for different players because it is trying to build a more personal and free experience for each individual. Players can freely travel around the world, leave different color trails, and collect various memories. There is no single, absolutely correct path to explore the game. By providing players solid emotional support and interactive experience, Lost Colors could guide the audience in approaching the main topic of maladaptive perfectionism more deeply.