"The Key Tax" is a first-person puzzle-platformer game in which players desperately attempt to file their boss' taxes, navigating through challenges of endless bureaucracy.
Trailer created by Tristan Volk.
Genre: First-Person Puzzle-Platformer
Engine: Unreal Engine 4
Team Size: 16
Duration: 8 weeks
Platform: PC
Website: http://www.thekeytax.com/
Awards & Recognition: Voted "Best Game Design" by Year 2 students at NHTV Breda (2016-2017)
Engine: Unreal Engine 4
Team Size: 16
Duration: 8 weeks
Platform: PC
Website: http://www.thekeytax.com/
Awards & Recognition: Voted "Best Game Design" by Year 2 students at NHTV Breda (2016-2017)
Role(s) and responsibilities:
Narrative Design
Narrative Design
- Wrote the overarching narrative and objective focused dialogue (e.g., quest updates, player directions).
- Implemented environmental storytelling (e.g., set dressing, notice boards).
- Concepted key gameplay moments.
- Concepted puzzle-based gameplay.
The full list of gags, gameplay moments, dialogue, and puzzle designs I have concepted can be shown on request.
Narrative Design
Environmental Storytelling
The following scene depicts some good old office rivalry. A confrontation between supporters of unions versus those of privatization has occured, and the employees cope with this tension in their own way. While some defend their fort made out of office props and bear traps, others show clear signs of being fatigued and surviving through binge coffee drinking.
The Sassy Boss
In The Key Tax, you are an unimportant employee, a true slave to the system--- I mean, your boss' Chosen One. It is up to you to save her from financial despair, which she let you know through this little note. Players can interact with the notes on screen by clicking on them, after which they are presented with an image pop-up.
However, as you attempt to turn in the tax form at the tax office, you are continuously challenged by misinformation, unhelpful employees, and various other attacks on your sanity. While your quest continues, your boss grows more and more frustrated and impatient, and faxes you questionable updates on the situation back at the work place.
Dear employee,
Some supposed "tax auditors" are giving me this spiel about how the longer you stall, the happier the Treasury gets... They're giving me a headache already. Wish I could kiss them off but it seems they've grown quite attached to me. Need I remind you tax returns don't deliver themselves? Don't tell me this is too difficult a task for such a capable employee as yourself? Hm? Love, Boss |
Dear employee,
They just had the audacity to give me "one final warning". Apparently chronic non-filers will be subject to additional penalties, possibly even criminal prosecution. Do you WANT to see me behind bars? Has it been your lifelong dream to see me locked away? (In which case, SHAME on your deviant desires.) What will your friends think? Your family? Heck, what will poor future-you think when you lie withering away at the side of a highway exit because your beloved Boss couldn't pay your salary anymore? Only because YOU chose to be a lackadaisical bum today? How hard can it be? It's not like you have to go desk-to-desk anymore, stuck in an endless loop of bureaucracy. That excuse is SO last year. Boss PS I decided to indulge in some poetry writing to keep my mind sane. Well? What do you think? Roses are red, violets are blue, Where is my tax return? I'm not happy with you. |
Objective Updates
As the player is directed from one reception desk to the other, they get updates from the employees manning those stations about where to go to next. The reception desks are also home to various notice boards. These contain some additional flavor text if the player wishes to get up-to-date on recent events.
Play the Game!
The game can be downloaded at http://www.thekeytax.com/.