Where are the Grackles?

An Interactive Picture Book

Overview:

Where are the Grackles is an interactive puzzle game where players use clues in the text and in pictures to decipher a code with the goal of unlocking a gate.

Players assume the role of a gardener attending to a mansion and have had their master key stolen.

Role: Game & Puzzle Designer

Team size: 2

Project Duration: 4 months part time

Tools: Figma & paper

Published: June 2025

Contributions:

Design and iteration of 17 puzzles
Provided edits to story progression and locations
Conducted playtest sessions
Researched target interest groups

Design Goals

Create a lock and key mechanic for a physical book
Design a repayable experience that rewards mastery
Design puzzles that combine both text and picture elements

The Rules

Pages can only be turned to numbers depicted on the picture page
Players must crack the code in 30 page turns or less

The Goal

Explore the mansion collecting clues & codes
Unlock the gate and gather your keys

Designing New Player Onboarding

Simple & Sweet

The player onboarding is designed to get players accustomed to the world, mechanics, and their goals all in one page. The significance of this first three pages are immense. If the player doesn't understand the rules & mechanics nothing is stopping them from flipping through each page like a traditional book, robbing them of an experience and the satisfaction of problem solving. (Thank you to my Dad who flipped through the prototype like a traditional book).

The first three pages serve as a tutorial for the player. The player moves linearly like a normal book getting familiar with how the numbers on the picture correlate with the page they turn to. With each page turn I re-enforced the traversal of space as if they were really traveling through rooms. Each successful room traversed is a positive re-enforcement for them and a little win at each step. Early wins proved to keep players engaged for the full duration of the experience.

Level Layout

Each door had to lead to another room, so this map served as a reference point ensuring pages/ doors led to the correct path.

Each room is labeled with a number that corresponds to the page they appear on. This is a super important thing to get right, as if it were wrong, the whole game breaks.

Prototype to Final Product Process

Paper Exploration
Figma Mockup
Iterate
Test Print
Playtest
Iterate
Final Print

The process for making the pages was to select a location from the map, write down the other locations connected to the room, ensuring I have the correct corresponding page number, and paper prototype puzzles & theming. After the paper prototype I would create a Figma mockup. After a few iterations in Figma, those panels would be formatted for printing and exported.

Two test prints of the book were made before fully sending it for production. The final version had a total of 17 Puzzles.

Designing Difficulty

One of the most challenging parts of designing these puzzles was finding the right difficulty.

Pain points for users often came from trying to remember the path they've taken and trying to optimally backtrack through the world.

As a result once players became frustrated by the backtracking they would often jump around in the book, flipping to pages in order to speed up the process. - This was not good.

What was the solution? Including more doors that connect to more rooms made it easier for the players. It seems a little counter intuitive to include more navigational options for players if they were having difficulty remembering a smaller amount of options. But having more options for the player allowed them to more quickly explore a wider range of the environment. Essentially they can fail faster and also reset faster.

Paper Exploration

Figma Mockup

Test Print

Production Version

Puzzles Puzzles Puzzles

There are two main puzzles in the experience:

Macro puzzle: Decipher the 3 digit code for the gate

Micro puzzle: Select the correct path in each room

Each Micro puzzle is solved by choosing the correct path. The correct path is hinted in the text, picture, or both. The Macro puzzle is solved by visiting the numbers on the lock and paying attention to the symbols in each room.

Closing Remarks

This project was a super fun way to explore design outside of digital experiences. Players spent around 30-45 minutes in their first attempt and cut that time in half upon subsequent playthroughs. Even if players were able to beat the game in under 30 page turns they would often try to optimize their route to the critical path of 20 page turns.

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