The Evolution of an Idea: The Origin Story of Of Mice and Tales

Every game has an origin story. Not just the story within the game, but the story of how the game itself came to be. The whole purpose behind Corkboard Studio is for me to document the entire creative process of me creating a game idea I cannot get out of my head called Of Mice and Tales. This origin story is one of constant evolution, of listening to the idea and having the courage to follow it where it wanted to go. 

Phase 1: The Seed - Mother Mouse

A few years ago, in my high school computer science classroom, the first version of this game existed as a humble project called Mother Mouse. Built in Microsoft MakeCode Arcade, its goal was purely educational: to teach my students the very basics of game design . It was a simple maze game about a mother mouse finding her pups and avoiding a cat. It was small, it was contained, and it served its purpose. But even after the lesson was over, the idea of Mother Mouse lived on, sparking conversations with former students about what it could be . It felt like a story that deserved more. The initial game was lightning in a bottle and became a huge hit. In subsequent years, those eager students would ask when we would make a bigger, better version of Mother Mouse, but it never moved past the idea stage. 

Phase 2: The Ambitious Dream - A Gritty Survival RPG

But when you let an idea simmer, amazing things can sometimes happen. Over time, I started to iterate on the concept, imagining a whole host of what-if scenarios about what the spiritual successor of Mother Mouse would look like. The first relatively fleshed out idea was envisioned as a full-scale, open-world survival RPG. The fantasy was a gritty one: you were a single mother mouse, and the world (a giant human house) was a vast, dangerous place. The focus was on the grim reality of survival, of finding food and shelter while trying to protect your young and forge a legacy against all odds. This was an exciting, ambitious concept, but as I started to design the world, I began to feel a sense of friction. A human-sized home is, from a mouse's perspective, full of huge, empty spaces. I wrestled with the question: how can I make something as ambitious as this idea with dozens of complex, interconnected systems of senses and game mechanics? The answer...I couldn't. But the idea of building a legacy, maybe even a line of mother mice seemed intriguing. 

Phase 3: Finding the Heart - The Cozy Sticker Chronicle

The breakthrough came when I realized what I was most passionate about wasn't the grim survival, but the story of the family itself. The focus shifted. I stripped away many of the harsher survival elements and leaned into a new core idea: a "Generational Sticker Chronicle". The goal was no longer just to survive, but to create a beautiful Family Sticker Book that told the unique genetic story of your dynasty. This introduced the sticker-based genetics system, the Courtship Ritual for creating new traits, and a greater emphasis on cozy discovery over desperate survival. It felt more manageable in scope and the art style was a deliberate choice because it was a style I felt confident I could achieve. The image that sealed the vision for me was a cute mouse illustration made by Spicy Mochi.

This sticker book idea with that kind of art style felt much closer to the game's true heart, rather than a gritty survival game. The aesthetic was a warm, illustrated storybook, and the core loop was about collection and legacy. But there was still that lingering friction, even after creating an elaborate 70-page game design document that detailed the various mechanics and systems I thought the game needed. The cozy, charming sticker system felt at odds with the vast, open-world exploration I had originally planned. The two ideas were living in the same house, but they weren't quite talking to each other. And a question kept swirling in my mind... how do I make a giant, human house feel alive and engaging for the player? How can I represent couches, refrigerators, etc. at a scale that can translate reasonably well for a mouse? It felt like a massive design and technical challenge, and something about the mixture of an elaborate scent trail system I was still holding onto just didn't match the feel. It felt off but I couldn't really understand why. 

Phase 4: The Revelation - The Storybook Board Game

The final piece of the puzzle snapped into place recently, born from a focus on the game's art style and overall feel. I realized the "storybook" aesthetic shouldn't just be a visual theme; it should be the core mechanical structure of the game. I had still been holding onto some of the survival mechanics that I really liked, but they no longer fit the vision for the game. I had to let them go. They would be technically challenging for me to implement as a solo developer and were the very things holding back the idea.

Instead of an open world, the game is now presented as a beautiful, interactive board game overworld. Not a linear board game like monopoly, but a web of interconnected nodes, points of interests, and secrets to discover. The player guides their mouse from one location to the next, like moving a token along a path. Each location is a unique, self-contained, skill-based mini-game or challenge. The image below is a macro-level view of the idea swirling in my mind right now.

This new direction solves several things for me all at once:

• It eliminates the "empty world" problem and focuses the gameplay on a constant stream of fun, engaging challenges.
• It perfectly matches the charming "sticker on a game board" aesthetic.
• It creates a "Cozy Metroidvania" structure, where progression is gated by the unique traits of the heirs you breed, making the genetics system more meaningful than ever before. You will be able to travel anywhere in the house that your mouse has the necessary skills or traits to access.

This feels like the true identity of Of Mice and Tales. It's still feels very ambitious, but feels much more achievable than previous iterations of the idea. It took a long journey of iteration to get here, from a simple maze game, to a gritty RPG, to a cozy-survival hybrid, and finally, to this. It's a game about tiny lives, big stories, and the joy of legacy, one sticker at a time. 

This is the vision I am so excited to build, and I can't wait to share more of its development with you here on The Corkboard. I won't promise this is the final evolution of this idea, but I feel very excited about this new direction.