Swept Up

The Project

In April of this year, my stepfather passed away after having lived with cancer for 5 years. Despite the diagnosis years back, his death came unexpectedly quickly after he was admitted to the hospital for a lung infection where doctors found how bad of a state he was truly in, leading to his decision to go out on his own terms days later.

At this time, I was in England, unable to see him on his deathbed except for through an indescribable video call. Because of this, my grief process following his death was shaped by an uncomfortable mix of regret, sadness, worry for my mother who was now on her own but also relief that his suffering had finally ended and joy about the renewed communion with my extended family as we all flocked to Hamburg to eventually lay him to rest.

In the wake of all these conflicting and new emotions, I felt like I needed a way of making sense of my feelings and pay respect to an incredibly wise man who always knew what to say and helped me become the person I am today in my own way. Since art seems to have been an outlet for people’s problems and emotions since the dawn of human existence, the decision to make a game, my art form of choice, seemed only natural.

But only as I read about the grief river model, at first sight one of many different models used by therapists to give a material quality to the abstract process of grieving, did I know how I could make a piece of art that would help me process my feelings, honor my stepfather’s legacy, provide an allegorical experience to other players struggling in similar situations all the while shipping it in traditional package that adheres to classic game structures and ideas.

The connection of my stepfather with the mentioned model were immediately obvious. He was deeply connected to the element of water for most of his life as he was an avid surfer, surf teacher and bought a sail ship in his later years alongside his twin brother. He even crossed the Atlantic on a 100 year old sailboat in a race just two years ago...and won! From then on, I knew that the game I would be making was to be about sailing down a river that symbolized my life, first with a companion (my stepfather) who aids the player character (me) in his journey and then suddenly without that companion, which makes sailing/life much harder, just to eventually regain control over the ship with the help of others that are picked up along the way. Gamifying the experience of loss followed by a period of struggle and eventual reappearance of direction, companionship and happiness felt like it would give me and others in a similar situation hope for the future that would await us beyond these troubling times.

While this artistic expression of grief of course cannot cure me or anyone else of their grief, I believe it has the potential to provide help with meaning making and a bit of support by letting players see their situation from further away both time- and space wise. The altered perspective on life and death that may come from such an experience could do its part in overcoming the sadness and accepting reality as it is.

Instead of rambling on about my creative process and the game’s development efforts at this point, I want to encourage you to simply experience the game for yourself. The button at the top of this page leads to a folder with both a Windows and a Mac OS build of Swept Up, as well as the game design document and the manual that was initially given to my testers, which can both also be found below.

Disclaimer: The personal, educational and non-profit nature of this project lead me to use external music that I came across in the worst times of my grief and that immediately spoke to me. However, this music is of course not licensed. I include it at my own peril, but I deeply felt that it belonged in the game, and thus decided to work it into the game anyway. I hope that, should the original artists somehow come across this project, that they would understand my decision and allow me to continue using their art, since this project is entirely non-profit. In any commercial releases, the music would naturally be removed.