Uprooted

Uprooted is a 2D platformer that forces the player to sacrifice their abilities in order to progress through the world. As a fully POC team completely new to game development, it was important to us to draw from our own experiences and those of our parents to inform our gameplay mechanic—ability loss. This mechanic informs our chosen themes of assimilation and sacrifice common to immigrant narratives, evoking a sense of loss and displacement. With each sacrifice of an ability, the player's experience of traversing the world is further complicated. Previously easily accessible terrain becomes much harder to get to, symbolizing the uphill battle many immigrants must face in doing even simple tasks in an unfamiliar country.