Hey, Bela here. This probably won’t come as a surprise, but I was hugely inspired by Limbo. At the time of its release I was very into drawing with charcoal, so this new game with its monotone grainy sunlight and pitch black play area was perfect in my eyes. I didn’t know games could look like that. It was simply presented, with no UI to artificially tell you what you are or how many eggs you found. I was hooked by the mystery and beautiful setting. But at the end of the journey you find a girl. And then it all came crashing down for me, because I was reminded that I was playing a platformer with a new skin. We don’t know who the girl is, but to me she’s just another princess at the end of a treacherous 2D hellscape where all platformer protagonists seem to find themselves.
For all of its design perfection (which I study religiously), Limbo was missing Story. I feel like I can relate. Little Bug had no Story for a long time, in fact, it was originally just a 2D walking simulator:

Story has been a challenge for me… mostly because I have no confidence as a writer and second guess all of my plot choices. I realize that for my whole life I’ve been developing a sort of personal language using drawings, sculptures and music, rarely with understandable words, because straight up saying how I feel is terrifying to me. Giving feelings to Little Bug’s characters and choosing words for them has been terrifying as well, but these words can be powerful pieces of the game’s design if I let them - they can add a layer of purpose more meaningful than any of our game mechanics on its own. So with the help of my team (Hana and Iman, you both are amazingly patient with me), we worked on it.

Above is a peek at an in progress scene in Nyah’s apartment with her Mom. Next, we’ll take key dialogue pieces from Nyah’s mom and periodically have strange creatures repeat them, stuck in a loop that Nyah must undo. It’s our hope that this way we can avoid cut scenes, leaving the player with full control through out - neatly tying story to fun.

So you have this to look forward to: picture helping this creature from walking into a wall over and over again while it’s saying “Great! Now your Sister’s crying!”

There’s a whole lot more I’d like to cover here, and I think I will at some point, but for now I hope that gives you all some insight into how we are handling Storytelling in the full game.