Whispers of Deceit

Whispers of Deceit (Unannounced Live-Service Game)

About

Whispers of Deceit is a live-service multiplayer horror game where four players explore a haunted mansion as three survivors and one traitor. Survivors must overcome the haunt that unfolds while the traitor secretly works to eliminate them.

Project Info

Role(s): Product Owner, Design Director

Team Size: 54

Timeline: May 2024 - Sept 2024

Engine: Unreal Engine 5 (C++)

Tags: 3D, Atmospheric, Horror, Live-Service, Multiplayer

Project Overview

Updated: Mar 2026

Whispers of Deceit is a live-service multiplayer horror game developed in Unreal Engine 5. It draws inspiration from board games like Betrayal at House on the Hill and Mansions of Madness. The project started as a Final Major Project by Southampton Solent University graduates, who went on to form Thunder Blossom Games.

As the project grew, the team expanded to more than 50 developers, most of whom were recent graduates or junior developers. Their goal was to turn the original idea into a full multiplayer live-service game. In this game, players explore a haunted mansion as three innocent characters and one hidden traitor. The innocents try to survive the haunts during each match, while the traitor secretly tries to eliminate them.

This was an ambitious project and the largest team I have worked with so far. Over time, everyone involved gained a lot of new skills and experience. Although the game was never published, the studio later split into smaller teams to focus on more manageable projects, with the studio itself shifting toward publishing. During the project, I worked as Product Owner, Design Director, and Scrum Master for a feature team. I also helped out as a member of the backend team.

My Role & Contributions

With 54 developers on our project, we chose a scaled agile approach using Nexus. We set up eight feature teams for development and had an operations team manage our social channels.

My responsibilities included:

Product Owner

Hosted core agile ceremonies, including sprint planning, sprint reviews, and sprint retrospectives.
Organised regular team syncs and coordinated work across multiple feature teams.
Managed tasks and workflows using tools such as ClickUp, Jira, and Trello.
Identified project risks and helped resolve development blockers.
Worked closely with team leads to improve processes and maintain project oversight.
Wrote meeting minutes and ensured communication remained clear across the wider team.
Coordinated with part-time contributors to help balance workloads and maintain progress.

Design Director

Directed the overall design vision for the multiplayer live-service project.
Ensured design quality and consistency across the team.
Organised internal and external playtesting sessions to gather structured feedback.
Refined gameplay balance and design decisions based on testing results.
Maintained and improved the Game Design Document (GDD) to ensure clarity and accessibility.

Scrum Master / Backend Team Member

Facilitated daily stand-ups and supported communication within a dedicated feature team.
Helped coordinate backend development tasks and assisted across multiple development disciplines.

Reflection & Key Learnings

Working on Whispers of Deceit taught me a great deal about both the Product Owner and Design Director roles, particularly within a large team. It was also my first experience using scaled agile practices such as Nexus, which gave me valuable insight into how Scrum can be adapted for larger development groups.

One of the most rewarding aspects of the project was collaborating with such a large group of developers. Seeing ideas evolve and watching people grow in confidence and skill over time was genuinely inspiring.

Lessons from a Large Team

Looking back, I think the team was just beginning to find its rhythm when the project came to an end. The original concept and foundation created by the Final Major Project team were strong, but transforming the game into a fully polished live-service experience would have required a longer-term commitment. Because the project was entirely voluntary, sustaining that level of effort across such a large team would always have been challenging.

If I were starting the project again, I would likely focus on one primary role rather than several, as balancing multiple leadership and development responsibilities stretched my time quite thin. I also believe the project would have benefited from more experienced leadership, as many of the developers, including myself, were recent graduates or junior developers.

Even so, the experience was incredibly valuable. Working within a large team, contributing to leadership roles, and learning how professional workflows operate at scale gave me insights that I am very grateful to have gained. Perhaps one day Whispers of Deceit may return in some form, but regardless, the experience remains one of the most formative projects I have worked on.