Old River Road
A wistful autumn at a riverside home.
Sep 8, 2026 ⋮ Games ⋮ 10 min read
Goal
Having spent a lot of time developing the code for the Kireji Web framework, I haven't had a chance to revisit my roots in music and 3D environment art. The framework has the ability to support rich, interactive 3D experiences including sound, but this hasn't been demonstrated yet.
This 3D game aims to create an atmospheric, low-poly experience that offers minimal, thoughtful gameplay while also driving the development of the framework's multimedia features and acting as a stand-alone portfolio piece. Old, natural scenery in motion offers an emotional experience of longing and quiet sadness. Low-poly artwork and minimal synth music draws the user into the moment and drives home the nostalgia.
Gameplay
The objective of the game is to explore the environment and find hidden events and interactivity. Events are not intended to offer a lot of fanfare or action. Nor is there necessarily any scripted narrative. Instead, they are subtle interactive items like windows and doors that can be opened as well as plants and animals that can be interacted with.
Progression involves simply finding and interacting with all of the available dynamic aspects of the game. Each activity, once complete, is complete for the duration of the game. To experience these events again or in a different order, the player can restart the game.
Mechanics
Controls
The game offers two basic mechanics:
- Walking: the player can walk around a limited amount of environment space. This is done using the mouse and arrow keys (where available) or by tapping or clicking and dragging on the screen to use virtual thumbstick. When walking into or against walls or collision barriers, the player may slide along the boundary depending upon their angle. The player does not jump, duck or fall. The walkable terrain is fairly simple and does not require platforming.
- Clicking: the player can click or tap the screen to interact with dynamic items which are underneath their reticle. Interactive items will have a clickable surface but may have little to no visible indication that they are interactive. This encourages the player to attempt to interact with various things as they discover which items can be clicked.
Physics
Physics are rudimentary. The player is able to walk up and down stairs and will rise and fall with the terrain as they walk. Some animals will have a behavioral model wherein they can move away when the player comes in contact with them. Some items may have a visual or auditory cue when the player physically walks past or against them.
Some objects may be picked up and held. The player thus has an unseen inventory in which they are holding one or more interactive objects. This is accomplished by the click action on the collectable object. Once collected, such objects may become available for placement when clicking on a receptacle. For example, an uncut log may be collected from a wood pile, wherein it will disappear from the pile. It may then placed upon the chopping block by clicking said block. The player may then click again to chop the log into pieces.
Objects like chopped wood may appear to fall via a scripted animation rather than a physical simulation. The chopped pieces may then be collected and placed into a separate pile. Pieces that are held onto cannot be placed anywhere except for their designated receptacle, although there may be more than one valid receptacle for a single item (for example, an indoor pile and an outdoor pile may both receive the same chopped wood).
UI
The UI consists of two primary states:
- Paused: this is the default state of the game and is always shown upon first opening a new session with the game. The player is shown a menu which allows them to "resume" (or, if the game is in its initial state, "begin") the game, to "restart" the game back to its initial state, or to open a settings modal. There is no in-game audio playing during the pause screen. The current frame of gameplay is visible behind the menu in a frozen state.
- Unpaused: in this state, there is no heads up display. The player is immersed into the 3D interactive world including in-game environment audio and music.
Options
Available options in the settings menu TBD.
Story
The player is visiting an old home by the river. This is the only level of this single-location game. This home is designed based on the home that I lived in for many years growing up. There are a series of dynamic events that are based on real experiences that I had growing up. The player is a silent visitor seeing a "typical autumn day" in rural New Hampshire in a historic two-story home overlooking the Connecticut River. There are no NPCs but there are a collection of plants, animals and environment objects with which the player can subtly interact.
Environment and Interactions
Layout
The environment consists of a single property which is bounded by collision barriers on all sides. The central location of the map is the two-story home which has an explorable inside and outside connected by a single accessible doorway.
Exterior
In the exterior of the home are two garages: a newer-construction two-story, two-car garage directly to the north of the home (whose garage doors face east) and a much older single-story, single-car garage to the to the north-east of the home. There is a single dirt road leading to the home and it forms a tear-drop shaped loop going around the smaller garage, joining as a single road that stretches east.
The home sits on the east side of the Connecticut river, above a steep embankment. The player is not able to travel down this embankment, so it acts as an invisible barrier along the entire west side of the map. To the north, past the larger garage, is a wooded region which acts to bound the map along its entire north side.
The northern side of the driveway loop and the easterly straight of the driveway border this wooded region. Directly to the east and south of the home is an extent of grassy yard which can be walked. In both directions, the yard is finally bounded by a dense wooded region that wraps around the southeast corner of the property where it rises up to meet the driveway.
This leaves a single narrow passage of the driveway which is bordered by dense wood on either side. The player is not able to enter the wooded regions, leaving the only unblocked area of the map to be the driveway. The player is able to follow this driveway up to a point. The exact method of bounding the end of this driveway is TBD.
Interior
The home is a duplex apartment. The garages are not accessible, nor is the southern side of the home. The interior of the northern side of the home consists of two key areas: an upstairs and a downstairs.
Downstairs
The downstairs is accessible from outside via a small mudroom constructed of plywood. This small mudroom extends to the east of the home, near the northern wall of the home. The player must first open the screen door into the mudroom (which closes automatically) before they can open the main front door of the home (which does not close automatically). Immediately inside is a singular, connected livingroom and kitchen which is broken only by a single wooden staircase in the center. The bottom of the staircase points to the west of this living area and the top of the staircase leads east. To the north, there is a tiled region on which sits the wood stove and its connected metal chimney. There is a receptacle for chopped wood within this tiled region.
Immediately to the south of this tiled region is a coffee table set over an area rug. To the south of this is a sofa facing the coffee table and wood stove. The back of this sofa is directly against the stairs. To the west of the coffee table is a window facing out towards the embankment where the Connecticut river and Vermont mountains can be seen. To the south of the staircase is a dining table with four chairs. To the south of this is a refrigerator surrounded by cabinetry as well as a pantry door directly to the east of the fridge. To the west of the dining table is a basic kitchen setup with sink, stove and cabinetry. Over the sink, there is another window facing the river. To the east of the dining table, directly south of the front door, is a window facing the yard.
Upstairs
Upstairs there is a small landing which is terminated by the eastern wall. To the north of this landing is a door leading into the master bedroom sitting directly over the living area of the home. To the south of this landing is another door leading to a small narrow bathroom. Perpendicular and to the west of this bathroom door is another doorway leading to a smaller bedroom which takes the remaining area to the west of the bathroom. Both of the bedrooms have windows looking west over the river. The master bedroom and bathroom also have east-facing windows. The master bedroom also has a north-facing window.
In the master bedroom is a kind-sized bed with the headboard located in the center of its southern wall. Opposite the bed is a half-height bureau with a mirror attached. To the west of the bed, along its southern wall, is a walk-in closet door. The closet represents the space directly above the kitchen area at the bottom of the staircase. In the north-east corner of the master bedroom is a wooden desk with a lamp. To either side of the bed are end tables with lamps.
In the smaller bedroom, there are two twin beds placed apart from each other with their headboards against the eastern wall of the room. Each one is opposite a window overlooking the river. A small closet door sits along the southern wall of the room, placed all the way to the corner against the western wall. Between the two beds sits a cedar chest. Opposite this cedar chest, against the west wall, is a tall oak bureau.
Interactions
Plant Interactions
The player can walk through fallen leaves creating the sound of crunching footsteps. The player can walk underneath the stream of leaves as they occasionally fall from the trees around the property.
The player can collect up to one unchopped log from a wood pile outside. The player may place the unchopped log onto a wood stump which acts as a chopping block. The player may then click the log to see it chopped into pieces. The player may then collect these pieces and either place them inside the home near the wood stove or place them in a pile outside near the wood chopping area. Every unchopped log may be chopped. The wood pile indoors may only reach a certain maximum size (TBD). The outdoor chopped wood pile may contain all of the chopped pieces of wood. The chopped wood piles visually only reflect the correct number of wood pieces that have been placed into them, but not the shape of the pieces that have been placed. The model and animation for the collected log, chopping action, and chopped result are identical each time. The player may hold up to one piece of unchopped wood or three pieces of chopped wood at once. Chopped wood is always carried in bundles of three representing one chopped log worth of wood.
A Golden Pathos plant lives in a pot in the livingroom of the home. It sits on a coffee table directly in front of the wood stove. It may be clicked on to water it. It will have a periodic watering timer. If it is over-watered (watered more than once during this timer), the leaves will become yellow and wilt. If the player fails to water it during the timer, the leaves will become brown and wilt. If the player consistently fails to water it, it will reach a state of maximum brown, wiltedness. For each timer period, if the plant is watered to the correct amount, it will grow. Eventually, it will spread out over the coffee table and onto the floor in all directions. At its maximum point of growth, watering it will keep it alive but will not grow it any further.
Animal Interactions
At some point during gameplay, a bat will spawn in an upstairs bedroom of the house. The bat can be heard flapping its wings when the player is in the house. If the player goes upstairs, the sound will be louder. When the player is in the same room as the bat, the sound will be the loudest. The bat will fly away from the player if the player becomes too close. It will not fly out of the room. The player may free the bat by opening a window and using the bat's avoidance behavior to "push" the bat towards the window, where it will eventually fly out. The bat will not return.
At some point during gameplay, a moth will spawn in the downstairs entryway/mudroom of the house. The moth will be fairly large so that it is clearly visible. It is a Polyphemus Moth. It will land on the floor in the mudroom and flap its wings. If the player opens the front door, the moth will fly inside. It will fly upstairs into the bedroom and rest on a windowsill. If the window is opened, it will not exit the house. The moth will flap its wings less and less until it becomes lifeless on the windowsill. Eventually, the moth will die, indicated by its wings being folded together and it laying on its side. If the window is opened, the wind will cause the moth to fall out of the window. It will despawn at this point.
At some point during gameplay, a bear will cross the dirt road leading up to the property. It will cross from the woods on one side of the road and into the woods on the other. This will be triggered by the player walking this dirt road. The bear will walk directly into the player's path and look at the player. If the player moves towards the bear, it will run immediately into the woods. The player is not able to enter the woods. If the player moves away from the bear, it will turn back towards the woods and walk there. If the player stays completely still while the bear is standing in the road, the encounter will be longer. The bear will look at the player and may occasionally look around before returning to look at the player. Eventually, the bear will then continue walking back into the woods.
Object Interactions
As mentioned, the player is able to chop and collect wood, including depositing the wood indoors. There is also a wood furnace/stove indoors next to the indoor chopped wood receptacle. The player may click to open the door of the stove. The inside of the stove will then become a receptacle for chopped wood. This consumes the chopped wood. Eventually, the player will run out of chopped wood if they continue to do this. If the player does not add wood, the light from the stove dims, resulting in a colder and more desaturated-looking indoor environment. Eventually, the fire may go out, resulting in a completely dim and cold-looking interior. The player may once again add wood at any time to reignite the fire.
Train tracks sit down the embankment to the river, in between the home and the river's edge. As a periodic table event, a train passes by the home on these tracks. The train is audible from anywhere in the map, but loudest when standing outdoors directly at the embankment. The player is not able to go down this embankment but they are able to click on the train as it passes by, resulting in the train blowing its horn.
Engine and Art Style
Engine
The game is designed to run optimally on low-end hardware. It uses the Kireji Web Framework's gltf-game abstract to handle all movement, collision and WebGPU-based 3D rendering. The entire game will be created as a single file in Blender and exported using Khronos Group's own glTF exporter using the option which separates the .gltf JSON file from the .bin binary file and textures. This aligns with the gltf-game abstract's specification.
Art Style
The textures will be set to use nearest-neighbor style sampling for the textures and the textures are designed to be very low resolution so that pixels are prominently visible in the final result. Objects will be low-poly and rely heavily on these low-res textures for detail and story-telling. Lighting will be mostly static with some technical art tricks used to handle dynamic lighting for the fire in the wood stove. The atmosphere will be late evening, with the sky having an amber color which casts out into the exterior and compliments the various autumn foliage colors.
While warm in color from the sunset, the exterior should still feel chilli, as the game takes place in Autumn which is typically quite cold in this region, especially this close to the river. The interior of the home is designed to feel warmer, like a refuge from the natural outdoors. This is driven largely by the wood stove's flickering light but also by a warm light placed over the dinner table and warm lamps found in both bedrooms and at over top of the stairs.
Sound design will be minimal and either entirely synthesized using the native sound API in javascript or - only where necessary - audio clips with very low sample rate can be used. There will be constant ambient sound from the environment, including wind, insects, and distant animal noises in the surrounding woods. The train will make a characteristic rushing sound as it comes by which rattles the house audibly when inside. Some interactions like windows, doors and wood will provide audible feedback. A nostalgic gentle music plays in the background. This music is designed to be minimal, wistful and somewhat sad.