This document is the project proposal and development document for the final major project game of my degree. I gave the designation “Kessler” after the man who proposed the Kessler syndrome, which is an end-of-the-world event involving space debris in orbit.
“Kessler” Is a 2D Side-scrolling Walking Simulator Designed to show the potential future of the Kessler syndrome, which is a scenario purposed by Donald J. Kessler that states the density of objects in Low earth orbit (LEO) is high enough due to space debris that collisions could cause a cascade in which collisions create debris that can create more and more debris increasing the chances of further collisions making, which makes it more and more unsafe to leave the planet without risk of collision meaning that humanity could get stuck on earth being unable to leave.
The player plays as a person by the name of Donald (named after the man who proposed the scenario) who is 20 years old and has lived in an underground bunker for his entire life. and after those 20 years of questioning and receiving no straight answers from the adults in the shelter who also have no idea why they are in the bunker (due to them also being bored inside the bunker) all they know is due to the posters on the walls of the bunker that it’s safer to “STAY IN TO LET LIFE BEGIN” and the only message that’s been past down through the generations in the vault “it’s for your safety”
Research
For The research I completed for this game, I Looked into space debris, what it is? what causes it? as well as primarily looking into the Kessler syndrome and looking at what it is, who proposed it etc. I discovered what the Kessler syndrome was after researching what cause the number of space debris particles and pieces in orbit to increase by 32% in the first two months of 2007 according to a book extract I found through Google scholar.
As it turns out On January 11, 2007, an aging Chinese Feng Yun 1C polar weather satellite orbiting above Earth was struck by a kinetic kill vehicle carried on a ballistic missile launched from China’s Xichang Space Centre. It was a successful anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons test that showed that the Chinese could, in the future, knock down U.S. satellites. The Chinese ASAT test is the largest debris-generating event in Earth orbit ever recorded.
The strike created a lot of debris increasing the number of space debris in orbit by 32% its catalogued 917 pieces of debris. Yet that figure represents only what’s traceable; NASA’s Orbital Debris Program Office estimates that more than 35,000 pieces of debris larger than one centimetre were also created. This area of research led me towards the extinction of humanity type event on that I have based this game.
Links to research/development
Architecture Field Trip - Florida ****
Space Debris and Kessler syndrome
Furthermore, in terms of research, I wanted to set the game in a specific location of the world and over the Christmas of 2022 I was lucky enough to have gone on a trip to the sunny US state of Florida which made me a perfect idea which was to have the game be set in Florida due to Florida being home to NASA’s Kennedy space centre.
This was also perfect since the ending of my game includes the player traveling so much that they stumble across an abandoned rocket and launch themselves into orbit (or attempt to at least) and since Florida is where Kennedy space centre is located I thought it more likely the player would find a rocket left there than in another country/place like Paris for example.
Whilst in Florida I took photos of buildings and different architecture and as part of this research I drew them using the reference images I took to make the places look run down and abandoned as they would be in a post-apocalyptic setting like the one my game will use.
