Project Overview
Introduction
Rabbitat is an interactive text adventure created as a personal challenge to work within a limited scope, aiming to improve my storytelling abilities by saying more with less.
Rabbitat tells the tale of an anxious rabbit named Paige. Her first gathering mission becomes a harrowing journey as she faces dangerous threats along the way, with the players' choices dictating the story's outcome.
Project Details
Timeline: 3 months | Engine: Twine | Platform: Browser
Conception
Design Goals
After seeing how easily my early projects grew beyond the time and resources available, I designed Rabbitat as a smaller, more manageable experience built around three clear goals:
1. Design a low-scope narrative game with meaningful choices
2. Make the average playthrough last 10-15 minutes
3. Write concise passages of no more than 100 words each
Story Concept
I wrote Rabbitat as a story for ages 10+ with a wholesome vibe coupled with darker themes. The game’s rabbit motif came from my experiences managing anxiety, with the rabbit's instinct to freeze in the face of danger serving as a natural metaphor for that response.
Brainstorming
I brainstormed ideas for a scenario where the main character is "lost and afraid" and the player has to make smart decisions to survive. I wanted to include features that rewarded players' curiosity and observation skills, leading to ideas like including items hidden behind optional paths.
Development
Plot & Characters
I began development by fleshing out the story around two characters, Paige and the Chief Elder, which kept the narrative focused and the project within scope. I chose a giant python as the main threat because it is a natural predator of rabbits.
Paige’s anxiety became central to the design of the game’s choices: the Chief Elder teaches her to “stop and breathe,” and following that advice can feel risky in the moment but often leads to better outcomes. By contrast, panicking may get her to safety faster but usually comes with greater consequences.
Presentation & Visual Feedback
I built the game in Twine and used text styling to make conversations easy to follow. Dialogue is italicized to separate it from narration, and each speaker’s name has a distinct colour. Blue for Paige to reflect her timid, anxious nature, and gold for the Chief Elder to represent his confidence and social status.
I initially experimented with shaky text to represent Paige’s anxiety, but the available movement only worked along one axis, which made text harder to read. Rather than sacrifice readability, I shifted that feedback into the background. Using JavaScript and HTML5, I created colour-based states: blue for calm, yellow for nervousness, and red for panic.
To reinforce the fantasy-inspired atmosphere, I added particle effects and a mist overlay that respond to Paige’s anxiety. As her stress increases, the particles shake more aggressively and the mist moves faster. This gives players a clear sense of escalating tension while preserving the game’s whimsical visual style.
Streamlining the Branching Narrative
My original design gave Paige four ways to respond to the python: run, hide, trap it, or attack it. Each action opened a branching path, and the ending changed depending on how many supplies Paige had left and whether she had warned her people about the python before it attacked the Rabbitat. Some choices redirected the player into another branch, creating an increasingly interconnected story.
As the narrative grew, so did the number of passages I needed to write and build. Because I was learning Twine and coding while writing the game, the connected paths pushed development beyond the project’s timeline. Repeated passages also made the branches feel too similar, weakening my goal of making each decision meaningfully change the story. My solution was to streamline the structure by turning each initial action into a distinct narrative branch rather than allowing paths to overlap.
"Run" path outcomes:
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Grab dropped items = Death
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Escape with no items, Paige fails her mission
This revision eliminated duplicated passages, making the choice of how to handle the predator more impactful and bringing the game back within its original scope. With fewer passages to write and implement, I simplified development and finished the project on time.
Player Feedback
I asked playtesters to evaluate the game’s pacing, presentation, narrative clarity, and visual feedback prior to Rabbitat's launch. Their notes highlighted strengths to preserve, issues to refine, and questions that revealed opportunities for further world-building.
I made the crackleberry hint more explicit with a subtle reference in the survival notes and having the narration encourage exploration at the crossroads.
Survival Notes Hint
Encouraging Exploration
Applying Feedback
I began applying the playtest feedback by refining the game’s guidance, dialogue, endings, and visual effects. These changes improved clarity and presentation while giving Paige’s journey more emotional depth.