Entertainment Design
ArtCenter College of Design
Connor Zhang, Demi Liu, Jingyi Chen, Kevin Slackie, Shawna Zhou, Tianrui Zhang, Zifeng Ding (Game Design)
Aigul Nugumanova, Isabella Zhang, Jacob Yi, Robin Wong, Xiaoyang Ma (Concept) Faculty:
Justin Andarza, Forrest Lucas & Simon Smith ( EGAM-354 Game Design for Themed Entertainment )
Chú Mó won the prestigious Live Action IndieCade Award in Fall 2023 and the Audience Award at the alt-ctrl exhibit at GDC 2024!
Chú Mó is a gaming experience likened to playing a video game in real life. By combining aspects from both escape rooms and traditional game development, our team invites players to take on the role of up-and-coming exorcists in this game that explores themes of East Asian exorcism in a school setting.
As three freshmen class exorcism students, players must take an entrance exam. Students are expected to study up on different curses from the school’s educational database, and become experts in identifying different curses and the attributes that comprise them.
As a part of their entrance exam, students are thrown into a classroom possessed by a subdued demon who terrorizes the classroom through a multitude of effects that includes eerily flicking lights, ringing bells in a ghostly fashion, turning on appliances mysteriously, among other effects from beyond our realm.
Working as a team, students must be quick to identify and counter curse after curse, using the powers of relics, drums, and calligraphy. The core mechanics of this game include observation and communication as they must work together to fight curses and ultimately seal the demon away.
BEHIND THE SCENES
STATEMENT OF INNOVATION
Chú Mó is unique in the sense that we wanted to explore a different lenses and representation when it came to ideas of Western Culture—particularly, the idea of exorcism was a interesting topic to explore, as at the same core, both explore principles of objects being possessed and processes of ridding them from the things they haunt. However, the terminology, the tools, and practices and beliefs between both cultures are very different. At the same time, our team wanted to explore the boundaries of traditional video games with that of physical immersive theatre techniques, as well as media such as escape rooms. We wanted to blend the physical interactions one felt with escape rooms and the adventure and allure of exploring an actual place based on a setting, with that of the conventions of gameplay loops and player progression. Chú Mó in particular approaches this through its use of microcontrollers to create elements of curses that a demon could infect upon a room—from flickering lights, to eerie ringing of bells, to ceiling fans mysteriously turning on, we wanted to mask the technology as something ghostly. But to take this further, we want to integrate this as a true part of the gaming experience as opposed to a gimmick or cheap trick; players, who have taken the role of freshmen exorcism students, must observe these changes in sights, sounds, and physical objects to discover the particular curse a demon has inflicted upon the room. This directly affects gameplay as a player, after deciphering the curse name, must now counter that curse by harnessing magical stations in a way that is particular to that curse.
The Art Bible
Chú Mó at GDC
