A
The Deacon of Dark River
Name
Thora Magnusdottir
Education degree
Kandidat
Fagfelt
Design
Institute
Design and Visual Interaction
Program
Visual Game and Media Design
Year
2025
The Deacon of Dark River is an interactive story based on an Icelandic folk tale. This thesis project retells the chilling ghost story using interactive storytelling, high-contrast visuals, and immersive sound to explore themes of love, death, and the supernatural in Iceland’s haunting winter landscape.
To create the project, I have made a vertical slice in Unity 6.
I have worked on programming, tech art, sound design, game and level design and art direction. The main focus of the project has been retelling the folktale through a digital medium, allowing new audiences to interact with traditional folktales.
The story unfolds naturally through the environment, using a carefully paced blend of voice-overs, character dialogue, cinematic cutscenes, and environmental storytelling. Every element, from scattered objects to lighting and weather, contributes to the narrative. I built the core systems from scratch in Unity, including custom tools for dialogue sequencing, screen fading, and player input control. The project combines these bespoke systems with curated found assets to create a cohesive, emotionally immersive experience. Rather than relying on explicit explanation, the project encourages players to observe, listen, and piece together meaning as they explore.
