Mission Failed Recovery Screen

1. Summary

A non-diegetic mission-failure recovery screen that overlays a darkened gameplay backdrop after a fail state. It communicates the failure, explains the immediate cause, and offers recent-save loading plus hide, restart, and main-menu exits.

Overview

The Mission Failed Recovery Screen is a full-screen modal overlay shown after a hard fail state. It darkens the paused gameplay scene with a red-brown vignette and presents a stark white grave marker with a raven as the central failure symbol.

The left column carries the usable recovery controls. It starts with the MISSION FAILED title, then a recent-save stack where the top save uses a thumbnail and PRESS TO LOAD affordance. Below it, the screen offers the main choices: LOAD, HIDE, RESTART, and MAIN MENU.

The bottom-center text repeats MISSION FAILED and adds the specific failure reason. In the captured example, the cause is James Cooper died., tying the recovery UI directly to the mission-critical character death that triggered the fail state.

Job Story

When a mission fails because a critical condition is broken, I want a clear recovery screen with recent saves and restart/navigation options, so that I can quickly choose whether to retry from a save, restart, inspect the scene, or leave the mission.

Classification

• diegesis: Non-diegetic
• functional_type: Management screen
• component_type: List/grid

Wireframe

+--------------------------------------------------------------+
| darkened gameplay backdrop with red vignette                 |
|                                                              |
|  MISSION FAILED          [large grave marker + raven]         |
|  -----------                                                  |
|  [save thumbnail]                                             |
|  PRESS TO LOAD                                                |
|  [save row: mission + age]                                    |
|  [save row: mission + age]                                    |
|                                                              |
|  LOAD                                                        |
|  HIDE                                                        |
|  RESTART                                                     |
|  MAIN MENU                                                   |
|                                                              |
|                         MISSION FAILED                       |
|                         [failure cause]                      |
+--------------------------------------------------------------+

Components

• Screen title: MISSION FAILED in the upper-left column.
• Decorative separator ornaments above and below the left menu stack.
• Recent-save cards: thumbnail, PRESS TO LOAD, mission/save label, and age text.
• Primary recovery actions: LOAD, HIDE, RESTART, MAIN MENU.
• Central failure illustration: white grave marker/cross with raven perched above and ground debris below.
• Bottom status: repeated MISSION FAILED label plus exact fail reason, e.g. James Cooper died.
• Modal background treatment: dark transparent panel, blurred gameplay backdrop, and red/blood vignette edges.

Parameters & Audio

Navigation

• Entry occurs automatically when the mission fails. From the screen, the player can navigate to a recent save, the load menu, a hidden/inspection view of the failed scene, a restarted mission flow, or the main menu. Selecting load or restart leads through the loading screen before returning to gameplay.

Dependencies & Logic

• Requires the mission-failure state to be raised by gameplay rules, such as death of a required character.
• Requires access to recent save metadata: thumbnail, mission/save name, and elapsed age.
• Load and restart depend on save-game availability and mission reset/loading systems.
• HIDE depends on retaining the failed gameplay scene behind the modal.
• Bottom failure-cause text depends on the fail reason emitted by mission logic.

BDD Scenarios

Edge Cases

• No recent saves available: LOAD and recent-save cards should be disabled, hidden, or replaced with clear unavailable messaging.
• Save load fails: the player should receive an error and remain on a safe recovery path rather than returning to invalid gameplay.
• Multiple failure causes occur together: the bottom cause line should choose the highest-priority actionable reason.
• Very long mission/save names should truncate without overlapping card borders or action labels.
• Controller/keyboard focus must remain trapped within recovery choices while the modal is active.

QA Notes

Mechanic Links

• Tactical Stealth Mission Loop - The mission failed recovery screen handles breakdowns in the loop and returns the player to retry or reload after failure.
• Trial-and-Error Save Iteration Loop - The mission failed recovery screen provides recent-save loading and restart options when a hard failure forces recovery through the save iteration loop.
• Enemy Perception and Alarm AI - Mission Failed Recovery Screen appears when perception or combat consequences produce a hard fail state such as detection leading to critical character death.

References

1. 1.

   Desperados III (L182-186 of 283) Game UI Database screenshot description identifies the Mission Failed screen, grave/raven icon, recent saves, and load/hide/restart/main-menu options.Screenshot 29: Failure & Game Over Tags: Failure & Game Over, Post-Game Menu

2. 2.

   Desperados III Primary visual evidence used for bounding box detection, context crop, focused crop, layout, labels, and failure-cause text.

3. 3.

   Desperados 3 Let's Play Gameplay Walkthrough Pt 3 Higgins' Estate [1440p w/ Commentary] (39:20-39:30) Gameplay range used as supporting evidence for recovery loading/resume behavior after a mission failure sequence.