Since we enjoyed working with each other so much the Primal Defense team reunited with their second title Underdevelopment. This is a 2D puzzle game that takes place inside a broken game. The players goal is to solve all the puzzles by exposing all the bugs and defeat the develop.
My contributions:
- Oversaw creation of the art style
- Created all the assets and user interface elements
- Designed and implemented the user interface
- Contributed to the sound design
- Worked on the level design with design lead
- Collaborated with team to develop game concept
- Brainstormed puzzles and overall game design with team to make paper prototype
- Created playtesting questions
Project goals:
- Create a unique puzzle game that is intriguing to the player
- Develop 2D art skills in photoshop
- Create an interesting art style for the game
Biggest challenges:
- Time and scope
- Feedback to the player
- Guiding players through the game
The process:
When the team was play testing Primal Defense we learned that people do not like to read instructions for games. On this project we wanted to find a way to teach the player what to do with them not having to read. We would have some objects move or fall so that the player would know to interact with it, we also build onto features that we had, but the biggest thing that helped our game was making the Game Dev character the narrator and gave him voice overs. This worked really well and made the game feel complete while making the player feel more immersed in the game. Through our play tests of Underdevelopment we found that some people would get confused or really stuck on some puzzles and not know what to do and the voice overs were able to assist gameplay here as well. The voice overs became a key feature in this game and really helped set the stage and make the players feel more immersed as well. Throughout working on Underdevelopment I worked in Photoshop to create assets that we would put in the game see what worked and what did not work and we would chose the final art from there. Designing the assets posed a small challenge because it is always so tempting to try and make something big and interesting whereas this game called for more simple designs. Trying different assets helped us find the right fit and style that we were going for.
Here is a link to play the game: http://mywebspace.quinnipiac.edu/djsoni/211/Project2Final/index.html
Below is a video of gameplay and to the right are some images of assets I made:
