Arbitrea is an experimental mobile app game, that was conceptualised and executed by a team of 5 students (including me) as part of our semester project on Experimental Game Interaction, Fall Semester at Malmo University, Sweden. Rodrigo Jimenez and I were responsible for the visualisation and graphics for the same, some of which have been added below.
Arbitrea is an intrusive, role-playing game which demands the player (The Emporer) to make important decisions regarding his Kingdom at any time of the day, without prior notice. The game intrudes the players ordinary life, calls at odd times, blocks other important features such as messaging, calling and cameras on the user's phone such that,
The game decides when it needs to be played, not the player.
The player is given a basic introduction to the empire he now leads and the ministers in his cabinet. The ministers call the player at randomised times and inform him of certain events that require his jurisdiction.
Based on the decisions made by the player, the kingdom is evaluated and progresses or degresses accordingly.
The emporer is advised by his immediate cabinet of Ministers that both inform and help with current events in their sectors.
Baron Bartholomew Thorp, Minister of Agriculture.
Duke Ludvig von Krane, Minister of Finance.
Ser Godfrey Brion, Minister of Defense.
Lady Laurent Fontescue, Chacellor and Advisor to the Majesty.
The Court Jester who makes jokes about the Kingdom's status at regular intervals.
Previous style trial for Minister of Agriculture
Each minister is given a unique voiceover on accepting the call.
After the voice-over, the game screen opens up in the app with the information regarding the event and the options laid out to the Emporer.
Though not visible to the player, each decision taken by him affects a scale of the three constants for his Kingdom: Money, Food and Happiness.
As soon as two of the constants reach a negative on the scale, the player is assasinated and the Kingdom is usurped.
The player does have an option to reject a call from the ministers, which causes a loss of a few points but more importantly,
the more the player rejects the calls, the more frequent the calls become.
Icons for each event that the player must overcome. Some events appear as a series, depending on the decision taken by the Emporer.
Promotional video for the game
Big thanks to the whole team involved in making the game:
Rodrigo Jimenez
Marcus Johansson
Ondrej Mynarik
Tim Tuvestam
and Teis De Greve for the cameo in the video!
