The White Trail

A psychological horror game taking place between 1967-1999, where you play as a detective and work alongside a journalist named Cynthia Lauderdale to solve disappearances in the Lockwood National Park, where people have gone missing specifically on the White Trail. You encounter all sorts of entities and abandoned buildings and you have to solve each mystery, as well as find missing people.

Can you provide examples of your preferred style?
The basic mechanics of The White Trail work where each “room” of the trail is randomized and you can encounter buildings as a room type (Ex: A room type being you’d see the abandoned chapel in the distance and would approach it). These buildings can house creatures, which the more you encounter a creature on the White Trail, the more their page in their notebook gets filled out.

The notebook page feature tells you what the mechanics of the creature is, as well as notable signs of its appearance and behavior, as well as missing people it is connected to. During your runs you are able to access a notebook on the left side of your screen when you are within a safe area, where there are three sections.

Section I starts off blank when you start the game, and this section is for creature. You have to encounter each creature a total of five times to complete their data section, and the more you encounter the creature, the sketches of the creature get more detailed. When you encounter different sites on the White Trail, you can search it for clues to collect information on missing people. There are typically five clues within an area, and when you approach one of the clues, a small magnifying glass icon would appear and the player’s character murmurs dialogue while taking note of the information.

This leads to Section II below:

Section II starts off blank except for one profile, which is Gloria Lamb, who you have come to look for. As you explore more of the White Trail, you collect more identities on other victims of the trail, typically finding identification tools such as a name sewn into the back of a piece of clothing, lockets with a photo, engraved jewelry, blood analysis, hair chunks or a medical ID. Section II contains details on the victims themselves, as well as tying into what monsters could have caused their disappearances based on analysis.

Section III, the final section, is lists of creatures and victims, where the player makes connections to figure out what all the victims had in common with the creature. This also allows the player to determine the threat level of each creature, from low, medium, to high. An important factor to your runs are your stats, Health, Hunger, Thirst, Stamina and Paranoia. Health is your overall health, which you can take damage from being attacked by a monster. When health is critically low, the screen blurs, colors desaturate, and breathing becomes labored.

When health reaches 0, they die. Hunger, your character can go hungry as they explore further on the trail, so eating is a necessity. Your character will faint on the trail if they starve. As it gets lower, stamina regeneration slows, and the player moves more sluggishly. Thirst, your character can go thirsty on the trail, so drinking water is a necessity as well. Thirst depletes more quickly than hunger and affects stamina regeneration, movement speed, and decision-making abilities (blurry vision, slower responses). Stamina increases the player’s speed temporarily but they have to recover for a short amount of time. Paranoia, after each encounter, your character’s paranoia will raise, which causes them to hear or see things. Maxed out Paranoia results in audio and visual hallucinations and the sound of a rapid heartbeat. When they’ve calmed down, their paranoia will lower and they will be fine.

In what capacity are you hiring?
For a personal project

Where are you in the hiring process?
I’m planning and researching

What type of work is this?
Single job

What experience level is needed?
Junior: $25-35