Browser game created during a hackathon by KION STROKI, based on the work «Wedding of Water.»
We have created a detective puzzle that allows the user to immerse themselves in the history of the original work without revealing the main plot twists.
The player must take on the role of an investigator to reconstruct the events of a murder, cross-reference witness testimonies, and determine where, when, and under what circumstances the crime occurred.
But finding the culprit is only half the battle. Every decision has consequences, and in the finale, the player will discover not only the truth of what happened but also how their verdict changed the fate of an entire village.
Game Mechanics
It’s simple—you drag and drop the cards, arranging them in the desired sequence. The control is done solely with a mouse. On a phone, you use a simple swipe gesture with your finger or a tap to interact with the interface.
How to find the sequence?
Before each new level, the Goddess of Water, the witness to the crime, gives testimony. The player must listen to it, memorize it, and only then can they place the cards.If it is not possible to memorize all the information at once, the game includes a hint function. This can be accessed directly within the level.
You can zoom in on any card by tapping it.
There are a total of three levels. Each one provides different details about what happened. After playing the entire game, one of four possible endings will appear.
What determines the ending?
Based on whether the level was passed correctly or incorrectly. The game does not explicitly tell the player whether they passed a particular level correctly or incorrectly. If the level is passed imprecisely, only certain details that affect the final resolution will be obscured from them. This is done so the player does not feel like a loser, but rather wants to replay the game multiple times to discover all the possible events. Importantly, the game does not reveal the true resolution. To learn it, you must visit the website ➤ KION STROKI.
Later, users can share screenshots of their endings on social media to compare results with each other.
Inspiration
We conducted research on the Chuvashia region. We compiled a mood board featuring local landscapes, as well as photos from their national holiday, Akatuya. The background music selected is a traditional motif from the area. The graphic design was inspired by the cover series for «Songs of the Land, ” and the narrative story originates from an initial novella.
Development and Scalability
We see the potential for project development in expanding the story and increasing the number of game levels. New events, characters, and plot twists will allow for additional branching paths and endings, making each playthrough more varied. Additionally, the investigations can be made more complex—for example, by adding new witnesses, hidden details, and more ambiguous testimonies. This will enable the player not just to reconstruct the chronology of events, but also to independently find contradictions, compare facts, and draw conclusions.
The project’s main advantage is its versatile format. The mechanism for reconstructing a story using cards can be adapted to almost any literary work by changing the visual style, atmosphere, characters, and the nature of the puzzles to match the chosen setting. Thus, the project can evolve from a standalone game into a series of interactive literary investigations, where each work offers a new narrative while retaining the familiar mechanics for the player.
The entire concept was developed by us independently, and the prototype was tested on our colleagues. All imagery and narrative text were also created by us.The water goddess and the frame were sourced from the materials provided by KION STROKI. The music is from the internet. The voiceover and code were generated by a neural network.We are also considering the option of providing a detailed concept of the work for recoding by KION developers.
