Outer Wilds' Alex Beachum's Cool Weird Emotional Prototypes

Our guest Alex Beachum turned his thesis project into the mind-bending smash Outer Wilds. Inspired by greats such as Zelda and Antichamber, it blazed new ground by having a nonviolent (though definitely mortal) player. We discuss emotional prototypes, four distinct mysteries and the IGF - this week!

Highlights

[00:00:30] Emotional Prototyping: Designing with Feeling Alex Beachum discusses the idea of building an emotional prototype for a game, capturing the vibe before mechanics—like roasting marshmallows as the sun explodes. This became the emotional core of Outer Wilds. 

[00:17:30] The Origin of the Supernova Mechanic: The moment that inspired the iconic supernova loop in Outer Wilds—watching planets explode in slow motion—originated as a student prototype focused on ambiance and inevitability.  

[00:09:00] Building a Space Game Without Combat: Alex wanted to make a space exploration game without combat, inspired by Apollo 13 and 2001: A Space Odyssey. The idea was pure exploration—“not to conquer, just to understand.”  

[00:10:30] How ‘Outer Wilds’ Was Almost a Roguelike Originally envisioned as a roguelike with randomized elements, Outer Wilds shifted to a fixed solar system with a time loop to better serve its story and design goals. 

[00:08:00] Zelda, Myst, and the Indie Inspirations Behind Outer Wilds: Beachum references Zelda, Myst, and Antichamber as key influences. The design philosophy emphasized knowledge as power, like discovering rules you could’ve used all along. 

[00:53:00] The Ship Log: Making Mystery Manageable: Alex explains the design of the ship log, which breaks the story into four “curiosity webs” so players can uncover the mystery in any order. A masterclass in open-world narrative structure. 

[00:39:00] From Stop Motion to Indie Stardom: Alex recounts how his childhood love of stop-motion and magic tricks evolved into a passion for visual storytelling and game design, eventually leading to Outer Wilds. 

[00:42:30] Working with Family: Sibling Storytelling: Alex collaborated with his sister Kelsey Beachum, the writer of Outer Wilds, on the narrative. Their sibling dynamic added cohesion to the game’s emotional and story depth.

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