Threads of Return is a Unity-based 2D narrative game exploring how choices to leave or remain in one’s hometown shape identity — expressed through branching dialogue, NPC-driven perspectives, and eight multi-ending outcomes across a slow-paced, reflective village environment.

The project originates from a personal experience of returning home after ten years: the place was unchanged, but felt unfamiliar — suggesting that estrangement arose not from the environment, but from a transformation of the self. This prompted questions about the meaning of “home” and its relationship to identity.

In Threads of Return, the player explores a hometown rendered as a hybrid of photography and hand-drawn illustration, inspired by the tactile warmth of Heena Baek’s Cloud Bread. There are no missions, rewards, or win/lose conditions. Instead, conversations with NPCs — each grounded in real interview responses collected by post from ten participants — gradually shift the player’s position along three identity axes:

• Rootedness ↔ Drift — Where do I belong?
• Self-Preservation ↔ Adaptation — Do I protect who I am, or change in response to the world?
• Memory ↔ Forgetting — Do I carry my past, or move toward becoming someone new?

These accumulated values form a final identity profile that maps onto one of eight endings, each representing a distinct way of relating to place, self, and time — from One Who Remains at the Edge to One Who Can Belong Anywhere. None of the endings is framed as better or worse; they function as interpretive reflections of the player’s journey.

A short prologue film opens the game, showing the protagonist returning home by bus. The final act takes place in the player’s old childhood room, where letters written by neighbours — shaped by the real interview material — await.