Octodad

Description

Octodad is a third person adventure game about destruction, deception, and fatherhood. The player controls Octodad, a dapper octopus masquerading as a human, as he goes about a day of his life. His existence is a constant struggle, as he must master mundane tasks with his unwieldy boneless tentacles while simultaneously keeping his cephalopodan nature a secret from his human family. The player controls Octodad like a marionette, dragging his arms and legs around while his body flops along. The player’s goals are often simple household chores made difficult and interesting by the flailing, tenuous control they have over Octodad’s body. Being an octopus also has its strengths. Octodad can slip through tight spaces, grab objects with his suckers, and knock things around with tremendous strength. But if the player does things too out-of-the-ordinary, Octodad’s family will grow suspicious and realize what he really is. If they do, it’s game over for Octodad!

History

Octodad started as a student project under the team name DGE2 (DePaul Game Experience 2) at DePaul University and was created by a team of 18 people within a time-span of 4 months. Our goal with the project was to produce a game from idea to release to be ready for the Independent Games Festival student competition. We entered the competition on November 1st, the same day that the game was released to the wild. We found ourselves pretty overwhelmed by the press attention that followed and on January 10th, 2011 we found out that we had actually been chosen as an IGF Student Showcase Winner! This means that out of 283 games we placed in the top 8 for the student section. We took the game on the road to the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco, CA and even managed to scrounge up a nice Microsoft Kinect demo for people to try out on the show floor.

Features

• Emergent comedy through slapstick gameplay.
• Quirky style and family values even a mother will approve of. (A cool mother.)
• Professional fatherhood training you won't find anywhere else.