No Worries: An Uncozy Escape Room Experience 

Designed by Tori Smith

15-minute solo, multi-media escape room experience, emphasizing environmental storytelling.

Take on the role of a young woman as she tidies, decorates, texts her friends, and solves a puzzle or two on a time crunch.

 

Project Summary

A solo thesis developed for the NYU Game Center MFA program, No Worries takes the associated aesthetics and mechanics of digital “cozy” games and pushes them to the point of “uncozy”, exploring relationships and tightly wound anxieties of emerging adulthood and intimate space. The expectation to be polite often overcomes the need for emotional honesty, illustrated again and again in the sentiment of text messages reading “No Worries”.

As the sole-creator, I owned experience, puzzle, and narrative design while collaborating with designers from other NYU departments (audio, set design, etc.) for a holistic immersive experience. Specific skills exhibited in No Worries include:

  • Puzzle & Escape Room Experience Design

  • Research, writing, editing, and narrative design

  • Materials research and fabrication, including graphic design, set design, and construction

  • HTML, CSS, & JavaScript programming for an accompanying “text chat” phone element

Dialogue Sample: JavaScript

Developed an automated, interactable phone text messaging simulation element, playable in the browser on mobile, tablets, and desktop. Used HTML, CSS, and JavaScript to start a 15-minute countdown timer and auto-send NPC text messages at preset times. Player can type out any response, but upon sending, the sent message text autocorrects to “No Worries”.

Web Texting Element: https://torilynnsmith.github.io/No-Worries-Web/

Puzzle Dependency Chart: Escape Room Environmental Storytelling

In a departure from typical escape room design, players are not required to complete puzzles to have a successful experience. Puzzles are integrated through foundational tidying and decorating cozy game mechanics, interacting with the environment to “unlock” narrative content. The following puzzle solution flowchart created in Miro outlines the critical path for exploring the environment and solving the end game puzzle.

Credits

  • Music Composition by Cassiel McEvoy

  • Set Design by Vicky Butler

  • Lighting Design by Alexandra Palocz

  • Special Thanks to: Doors of Divergence, Lee McGirr, Beau McGhee, Nyusha Iampolski, Rook Liu, Beckett Rowan, Logan Clare, Karl Horn, Danny Hawk, Lawra Clark, mattie brice, and Naomi Clark

Featured at the NYU Game Center 2023 Spring Showcase, The Lower Case 2023 Opening Exhibition, and Boshi’s Place Tableau Vivant 2023.