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Give me this kind of collectable note over a conveniently placed safe combination every time.

Petty, escalating revenge narratives can work well in environmental storytelling. (I also love the fact that the driver here seemingly couldn't fit their car into just one of these spaces - they needed both.)

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The real reason they drive so slowly.

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Even when they're not outlandish, most adults subconsciously draw from cars conclusions about a person's lifestyle, character, self image, financial situation, priorities, awareness of environmental issues, family situation, attention to detail, taste, ostentatiousness, appetite for risk, etc.

You can picture the owner of the car. You know who wrote the message. You know what he did. And you know he can't afford the repaint right now, so he had to drive it to the store anyway. All that narrative information was delivered to you in a few seconds.

If in doubt, 'how did that get there' is always a fun little story to uncover.

It was believed this unlucky man survived the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 AD, only to be crushed by a slab of falling masonry. He wasn't. He actually died of asphyxiation from the gas of the pyroclastic flow. Centuries later, in 1800-1900, a looter tunnel caved in, causing the block to settle here.

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An attempt was made. I like the idea of starting with this, then adding more and more objects every time there's a change in the world state.

Act 1: The tyre tracks. Act 2: The hole in the ice. Act 3: The footsteps leaving the scene.

Pretty good if the smited household is the focus. Potentially more interesting if the recent storm/disaster/event pealed up part of the street and created an entrance to a new playable area.

"The snow's melted. Let's go for a drive." A nice idea when nothing's going right for the chronically comically unlucky character.

For memorable locations and navigation landmarks in video games and TTRPGs, scale is powerful. You can emphasize it with an unexpected context. This is the 17-foot 3-inch copper face of the Statue of Liberty after it was uncrated on Bedloe's Island (now Liberty Island) in 1885.

This is an ad related to the poster on the wall, but it's worth thinking about the layers of your in-game city. What did the subway's creators have to avoid while building? What is directly above and below a station? And how would those strata interact if structural integrity was compromised?

Did a character just arrive? If so, how much can you tell us about their journey without a word of dialogue?

Andy Heather @andyheather.bsky.social · 24/06/2026

If this is an environmental storytelling interactible, it's fun. If you're playing as Batman and this was left for you by the Joker, it becomes amazing.

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I'm a huge fan of the environmental story that refuses to be pinned down - aka 'slippery stories'. They can leave the player staring in bewilderment and amusement for far longer than a story that resolves easily.

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I always thought this one would be great to use in an evacuated/depopulated location where the dog is an NPC and the player can interact to give it a treat. A tiny interaction that communicates the abandonment, but softens it with a little moment of connection and kindness. #SaveTheCat

'Monolithic corporate chain vs local community's inimitable brand of pure insanity' is a struggle that always fascinates me - especially when it results in poster bearing a corporate logo alongside the words: "HAUNT YOUR OWN HOUSE".

Typical. Truck drivers are, as always, considering efficiency and the environment while 'management' insist on being spoilsports.

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I love this for so many reasons: 1. Unexpected architectural phenomena are a thread of their own 2. The message itself walks a fine line between snark and genuine decency 3. I love the idea of an environmental clue, answering the question, "... yes, but how could x have possibly known about y?"

What I wouldn't give to learn more about "recent events".

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Environments full of jerry rigged solutions tell the player about a community's economic state, about its needs, and about which supplies are abundant and which scarce. Are the people resourceful? Do their solutions make you smile? Or is the space an assault course of delapidated death traps?

A simple one-story residence featuring a guttering downpipe improvised from empty plastic soda bottles joined together end to end.

Things embedded in/sticking out of buildings are pretty common in games: - they tell a story about the location - they're great for setting the tone - they provide a memorable landmark to help players navigate - they add interest by reconfiguring the layout, making navigation feel less railroaded

"Do you know how high you were driving, sir?"

Undermining the architecture and spaces we take for granted is a great way to introduce a feeling of the liminal and remind the player of the fragile facade that strains to separate us from chaos and entropy.

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"I know I'm not the handiest person in the world, but it's just a running toilet. How hard could it be?"

"What do you mean? It's a 4x4! it's made for off-road driving. Look, I'll show you..."

Ozymandias' lawyers are frantically searching for case law precedent in relation to irony. Nature has a wonderful way of piercing human hubris. If you need a counterpoint to the seemingly untouchable autocrat in your story, remind the player that time humbles them all in the end.

The horizontal line in this image is a natural feature. This location is a depression that regularly floods then dries out, causing the distinct discoloration line on the trees. With a bit of creative licence this idea could be used to create a memorable location with a layered (literally) story.

"Life... uh... finds a way." Nature - or more often in games, some form of corruption - growing and spreading unseen is commonly used for the creeps, but don't forget it can be used to represent a shred of hope in the resilience of life when all seems lost.

This is a spontaneous dog walker's memorial in the woods. The varying age of the leashes tell you how long owners have been walking their dogs in this area, and the memorial itself tells you how loved those furry family members were. Closely linked to the 'missing person mural' following a disaster.

I call this one "Russian-Doll Capitalism". As corporations become increasingly cynical about maximizing profits + reducing costs, product quality suffers. Westerners often find premium products are reskinned items from other territories, or artificially weighted to create the impression of quality.

There was a time when images like this were indicative of a barely believable, satirically inequitous dystopian future. Nowadays, it's all too familiar and too real. Even the smog shrouding the city is imparting important information.

In games, we're lucky in that our medium encompasses most creative disciplines: music, sound effects, costume, architecture, product design, prop design, set design, writing, mise en scene, composition, acting, etc. Lighting is one of the most powerful tools of visual media, so get creative with it.

Graffiti sprayed onto a white wall combines with the shadow of a statue at night when the streetlights come on to create the appearance of a man sowing stars like seeds.

If you have a scene that evokes a powerful theme, such as division, hatred, or violence, see if you can find a way to put a smackerel of its polar opposite right in the thick of it.

Certain poses - a person prostrating themselves before another - are emotionally charged. Groveling, obeisance, bootlicking, the oppressor treading on the oppressed. Add some marble cladding, tailored suits, and designer shopping bags connoting conspicious consumption and you have a potent image.

Four Asian businessmen in suits presenting their shoes to four elderly shoe shiners with curved backs and threadbare clothes. The businessmen clutch designer shopping bags and look down on the elderly men who sit on the sidewalk in front of a marble-clad corporate skyscaper.

The same group knew language might be useless, so they also pitched simple stories told in comic-strip format and 'hostile architecture' including: a 'landscape of thorns', spikes bursting out of a perimeter wall, 'forbidding blocks', scar-like earthworks that would look menacing from above.

Five chilling sentences that might live with you forever. In 1993, the U.S. govt asked a team of linguists, scientists, anthropologists, + sci-fi writers (the Markers Panel) to create a warning system for nuclear waste sites. Language evolves. The past is a foreign country, and so's the future.

A stone tablet reading: "This place is not a place of honour. No highly esteemed deed is commemorated here. Nothing valued is here. What is here is dangerous and repulsive to us. This message is a warning about danger."

The condition and quality of children's play areas can tell the player/reader/viewer a ton about the community/neighborhood/shelter they're found in. The Last of Us used this to powerful effect.

A children's playground swing built too close to a corrugated metal barrier that has been heavily deformed by feet swinging into it. A squalid, tragi-comic play area for a deprived neighborhood.

The juxtaposition of two mismatched neighbors is another good way to evoke a story that, if it hasn't happened yet, will soon. Gary Larson had some lovely examples of this one - he was a master at telling an expansive story in a single vignette.

A lost chihuahua sign next to a sign reading "Warning Low Flying Owls".

Andy Heather @andyheather.bsky.social · 02/06/2026

Narrator: "Domestic cats roam an average of 40 to 200 metres from home every day. But not this day."

A single cat pawprint in the snow by the back door.

Andy Heather @andyheather.bsky.social · 02/06/2026

When the world is absurdly corrupt, the only appropriate response is an equally absurd one.

Andy Heather @andyheather.bsky.social · 02/06/2026

Another fine entry in the 'exasperated sign' category. It's a great way to tell the player what kinds of batsh*t events have taken place in a location. It can also tell you whether the propietor is good humored, uptight, or complete exasperated.