Decaying Orbit

Decaying Orbit serves as a reflection on the influence of choice, focusing on the choices we make in our daily lives that may be considered mundane. Primarily taking place in the “moments between moments,” the standstill we each experience, the game asks the player to question if these choices are truly insignificant, or if they can have long lasting effects. By using this mechanic of choice, told through a Twine, interactive narrative game, we utilize the unique characteristics of the video game medium to let the player experience a story that could not be told through other media. 

The story itself, reflecting on how humanity would respond to a cataclysmic, world ending crisis, is particularly timely during the pandemic. Playing through three acts, the player has a new conversation in each act, where they must interact with another character. Through this interaction, they discuss what we owe to each other, and reflect on each person’s individual responsibility to help in this crisis, a direct parallel to pandemic response measures. Additionally, this in-game crisis, which leads to extreme climate change and environmental disaster, reflects the world’s delayed response to our own climate crisis. Taking place over thousands of years, we are able to explore the repercussions of inaction and show how humanity may end up going down different paths. The player plays not as the world leaders who make the big decisions, but as the regular people who must live their lives through this disaster and find meaning in the standstill.