“Be-City”, Jean-Marc Gauthier 2012-13

Description

This interactive storytelling project is an app for mobile devices that combines drawings, animations and game experiences.

The story is based on the journal of a tourist that disappeared while visiting small islands in the Pacific. The visuals and the design are inspired by a lost world of steam engines and trains. The space of the island is used as the environment for a scavenger hunt type of game.

Synopsis of the first story

In 1977, a group of tourists were lost amid an area between Wellington and the Samoa Islands. Later in time, while someone was exploring, they found a journal from one of the tourists. The journal was so damaged that only fragments of information could be found about the trip; with blurry pictures of some dramatic moments. From reading the first pages of the journal, we understand that the tourists boarded one or several trains that took them further into the mountains of the islands. A set of events leave one of the tourists, a photographer, stranded on a beach with some strange creatures.

Gallery of pictures

From reading the first pages of the journal, we understand that the tourists boarded one or several trains that took them further into the mountains of the islands. A set of events leave one of the tourists, a photographer, stranded on a beach with some strange creatures.

Synopsis of the second story.

Two decades later, an expedition is organized in order to solve the mystery. A team of scientists visits the island in order to find the itinerary followed by the tourists. They encounter many setbacks before discovering the ruins of a civilization which has developed advanced railroad systems that can bend time and send the passengers of a train into the past. The team succeeds to refurbish an old steam engine in order to explore the possibility of journeying into the past. They find a trail of clues left by the group of tourists as they travelled to Berlin in 1933...

Credits

Drawings, story, character designs, conceptual design and animations by Jean-Marc Gauthier with the help of Miro Kirov (3D models) and Sandhya Prabhat (background designs).