Overview:

In Trying Not To Pop, I designed and implemented an atmospheric solo project focused on emotional presence rather than traditional mechanics.

The player controls a fragile soap bubble floating through a quiet room. The experience centers around vulnerability, space, and softness instead of combat or clear win conditions.

My goal was to explore how technical systems — movement, dialogue, transitions, and sequencing — could be used to support emotional tone and visual clarity.

Movement System

I implemented a physics-inspired floating movement system to create a sense of fragility and weightlessness.

The bubble drifts gently and responds softly to input rather than moving with sharp or robotic precision.

This reinforces the emotional tone of sensitivity and instability.

World-Space Dialogue System

Inspired by What Remains of Edith Finch, I created a fully custom world-space dialogue system.

Each text line:

• Types character-by-character.
  
  
  

• Drifts gently upward over time.
  
  
  

• Faces the camera (billboarding).
  
  
  

• Adjusts visibility when occluded by objects.
  
  

This required solving challenges related to camera distance clamping, viewport clamping, and occlusion fading to maintain readability without breaking immersion.

The goal was to embed dialogue into the world rather than separating it into traditional UI panels.

ActionStack Integration

To manage sequencing and prevent overlapping events, I implemented an ActionStack-based flow system.

Instead of triggering dialogue or transitions directly, custom Actions are pushed onto a stack and executed sequentially.

Custom actions include:

• LockMovementAction – Temporarily disables player movement.
  
  
  

• SpawnWorldTextAction – Spawns and animates world text.
  
  
  

• WaitForWorldTextFinishedAction – Ensures dialogue completes before progressing.
  
  

This structure keeps game flow clean, modular, and predictable while avoiding reliance on scattered coroutines.

Environmental Systems

The project also includes:

• Safe Spots placed throughout the room, symbolizing emotional refuge rather than mechanical checkpoints.
  
  
  

• A wardrobe event that acts as a symbolic ending trigger.
  
  
  

• A cinematic menu-to-game transition with smooth camera motion, easing curves, and fade effects.
  
  

Each system was designed to support atmosphere and emotional pacing rather than challenge progression.

Design Thinking

I deliberately avoided traditional enemies or objectives.

The focus was on creating a feeling of fragility and careful presence within a quiet space.

Technical decisions — such as easing curves, motion drift, fade timing, and text pacing — were used to shape emotional tone.

The project represents an exploration of how gameplay systems can support subtle, reflective experiences.