Fuse box minigame: From concept to prototype to reality

Unsighted Agent’s voice-controlled fuse box minigame had quite the journey from concept to prototype to the current version in the game.We not only needed to design the minigame, but also factor in voice controls, and if they were fun and easy to use to control the minigame.

Initial concepting and testing idea

The fuse box minigame began its life as a 2D wire matching game drawing heavy inspiration from Among Us’s wire minigame. It required matching wires on the left to one's on the right that had the same colour/symbol in order to complete the game. The puzzle however lacked a skill element and was too similar to its inspiration, with the only major distinction being that it was controlled completely by the player’s voice. While the puzzle itself needed a complete redesign, the voice commands controlling the puzzle was the main exercise of this initial version, and proved to be a success, with the team excited to see where we could go with it.

Iteration and prototyping

Initially, we explored the 2D design space for the puzzle, looking at how we could vary the game more from its inspiration material, as well as ways we could add more skill and difficulty scaling to the minigame. More wires were added to the game, but this did not really increase the difficulty as there was still no skill element present. We also struggled to carve out a more unique place for the game as its own entity, separate from the original source inspiration for the prototype.

The above, combined with a sentiment among some of the team members that a sudden 2D puzzle in a 3D world made little sense, drove us to add the 3rd dimension to the minigame. Moving to 3D also gave us a chance to redesign some of the initial assumptions that were being scrapped anyway in the transition. The original puzzle was rewiring a keypad, which while thematic, was similar to a few other interactions in the game at the time. To make the puzzle more distinct from other elements in our game, we transitioned to a fuse box as opposed to a keypad, visually distinguishing it from other elements of our game, letting the player know what they would be doing at any given interaction more clearly.

Originally, this prototype had 3D wires, this added a new problem to overcome as the 3D wires crossed each other, they passed through themselves, creating a visually unappealing mess of clipping objects. Not good. This issue cropped up early in the prototyping, and was discussed at length while the prototype continued to develop around it. Solutions involving Shaders to move points on the wires around each other, manually offsetting wire placements slightly to control exactly how the wires crossed, and using 2D wires were all examined.

Nobody on the team was overly familiar with shaders, and manually offsetting wires would help reduce the visual issues, but not eliminate them. We were also trying to move away from the 2D concept and design space. Eventually an asset for 2D wires, lines, ropes, etc. in 3D space was discovered on the Unity asset store, that after some experimentation, we determined would help us use the Line Renderer to create 2D wires that appeared 3D, with some camera perspective control. After tweaking the assets to suit our needs, we got results that we were happy with when combined with an orthographic camera used specially for the puzzle.

Putting the ‘game’ in minigame

The other major issue from the original prototype minigame was that it lacked a skill component. It was less of a game and more of a chore for the player, obviously this needed to change.

We discussed having in-world clues around the puzzle showing which wires needed to connect to each other, or having a puzzle contained within the fuse box itself once opened that informed how to connect the wires, or even having something more akin to a sudoku, where you had enough information to work out how one wire might connect, giving you more info to connect more wires. Ultimately, we decided to go with a memory game. After cutting the wires so they can be reconnected, they will display their required connections briefly before failsafe countermeasures kick in, eliminating the information showing what connects where. The player then needs to connect the wires correctly to complete the puzzle, and should they make too many mistakes the alarm is triggered resulting in detection.

Watching it all come together

With the mechanics and spatial aspects of the minigame nailed down, it was passed over to the art team for a model for the fusebox to be designed and textured. With that done it could be assembled and placed into the game scene with its final (or nearly final at least) look and mechanics!