Parliament of Hell

In 2024, I received a £30,000 UKGF grant fund to develop a historical fiction point and click adventure game about a forgotten LGBT+ gothic horror writer.

For six months I directed the game prototype taking responsibility for the narrative, art and level design of the project. This culminated in a released vertical slice on Steam.

My responsibilities when developing Parliament of Hell covered:

• Writing and scripting the game encounters in Ink

• Implementing the levels using the Tiled level designer

• Creating art and animation specifications for the two full time artist employees I was managing

• Providing feedback for artist WIPs for animation, sprites and environment assets

• Presenting milestone submission video wrap-ups to the UK government funding body

• Managing employee schedules

• Producing and budgeting the project’s timeline

• Working with UK business admin and payroll (PAYE systems and HMRC accounting)

• Demoing the game at conventions and events (Nordic Game, Develop Brighton, RADAR festival)

• Searching for talent and engaging in the recruitment process

While this passion project was a culmination of years of research into the history of gothic literature, what I learnt from the most was being put in a position of management responsbility over a team (with 6 in total, including contractors), and having to keep on track of total project production goals.

I hope to be able to continue development over the project in future with additional funding schemes, but I learnt a lot from it and we released a phenomenal vertical slice which you can play now!