It takes more than one: designing connection and cooperation into a serious game about family and crime

In the HOLA seminar, we created a cooperative serious game developed around a single design brief: make human connections visible. The result is a hybrid crime game about a family drama, an inheritance, and a suspicious death. The players can only solve the mystery together, because each player has only part of the information.

HOLA playtesting session with participants gathered around the game materials working through the mystery together

Client: Medien- und Filmgesellschaft (MFG)
My Role: Game Designer
Timeline: 6 months

The Problem

The assignment was to make something abstract tangible through play: human connections, the invisible ties between people, and how they shape decisions and loyalties. Translating that into a game experience meant finding a format where connection is not background detail but the actual substance of the challenge.

The Solution

HOLA places players in the middle of a family drama. There has been a death, an inheritance is at stake, and the household of suspects includes a butler, gardener, chauffeur, secretary, and more. Each player holds information the others do not have. A physical set of character envelopes, clue documents, cipher props, and a companion smartphone app creates a puzzle that can only be solved by pooling knowledge and working together. The connections between characters are not just the story. They are the game.

Who I worked with

App Developer
Game Designer
Marketing Manager
Game Developer
Narrative Designer
Graphic Designer
Project Manager

My Contribution

What I worked on

The game systems were designed from scratch, covering cooperative mechanics, how information is distributed among players, character relationships, the investigation structure, and the rules that govern what each player knows and does not know.
All physical game assets were designed and produced, including character envelopes, clue documents, investigative props, and a cipher wheel that was modeled and 3D printed, as well as the visual identity, packaging, and rulebook layout.
The game was tested through play tests and iteratively balanced based on observed friction points and player feedback, with workshops held throughout the development process to refine the design collaboratively.

Process

My approach

Workshops and concept definition

The project began with workshops to work out what kind of game experience could genuinely communicate the theme of human connections. The team explored different ideas before landing on the cooperative crime game. The choice was deliberate: in a family drama, connections between characters are not atmosphere but the actual puzzle. Players cannot solve the mystery alone because each one holds only part of the information needed to understand what happened.

Workshop session where the HOLA team explores game concepts and defines the cooperative structure

Game system design and asset production

Character envelopes, clue documents, coded messages, and a companion smartphone app were structured to ensure that no single player could piece together the full picture alone. Physical assets were crafted to match the aesthetic of the story: aged document styling, handwritten character labels on textured card, and props that feel like genuine investigative material. A cipher wheel used in one of the game's puzzles was modeled and 3D printed to serve as a tactile object players could physically engage with at the table.

HOLA game assets including character envelopes, the 3D-printed cipher wheel, clue documents, and the companion app

Playtesting and balancing

The game was tested in play test sessions with groups who had no prior knowledge of the game. Each round revealed moments where information flow broke down, where a puzzle was too vague or too obvious. Observations and feedback from each session were used to adjust the distribution of clues, refine individual puzzle mechanics, and tighten the rules until the game consistently delivered a satisfying experience.