Lyra Edwards

I took heavy inspiration from similar games I have played such as Enter the Gungeon and Hotline Miami, taking elements such as their interesting weapon mechanics or style choices for my own use. I started off by creating a path leading out of the starting zone, and begun creating my first, very simple enemy: Syd the squid. This enemy was largely to act as a supporting enemy, with a few dotted around as environmental hazards during busier fights. All it was really capable of was firing a shot of ink forwards periodically, which would be destroyed after travelling too far, or collidign with a wall. I created a health component and projectile scripts to lay the foundation for very simple combat. I wanted to focus on having a functional game before adding deeper mechanics. Once these were made, I ensured that the enemy could hit the player with projectiles, and begun work on the players weapon system.

The weapon system was the aspect of the game I wanted to spend the most time on refining, I planned from the very beginning to have a series of upgraes players could find that gave weapons new functionality, this was something I managed to do, giving each weapon the ability to be used in several ways. Possible upgrades included new bullet effects such as fire damage, alternate fire modes, stat upgrades, no reloads etc. This allowed players to be able to have a relatively unique feeling weapon each run, they were free to experiment and find what works for them personally. I made sure each upgrade, including combinations, worked and felt fun, if I expand on this framewrok in the future, I plan on adding many more upgrades to enhance this unique feeling. These upgrades were acquired by colliding with a weapon upgrade item, which could be found either scattered around the level, or as a rare drop from enemies. A UI element would then display the two choices and when one was clicked on, it would upgrade the players weapon.

I added several more enemy types to the framework, including a boss. There is a bear that charges at you upon getting close to it or damaging it, swinging a sword when close enough for medium damage, this served as the game's main enemy, so I gave it a decently high damage stat. There was also a "Cursed Greatwood", a large tree that would see the player and begin spawning waves of bats, if not dealt with, it could be very easy to be overwhelmed by them, especially with slower firing weapons. It had high health, but no form of attack itself, so could be managed simply with a bit of strategy. The bat enemy spawned was a simple, low health, low damage enemy that charged at the player, destroying itself and damaging them on impact. I used them in a few places in the framework in order to aid other enemies and create some more unique feeling fights.

Then there was the boss: A large Minotaur. I sourced sprites from online and created a script, more fleshed out than the typical enemy one, to allow the boss to chase the player, attacking periodically. Attacks would be chosen at random from a group dependent on the distance from the player. From upclose, it could swing its axe overhead, spin it round 360 degrees, or simply jab at the player. From a high enough distance, it would opt to instead either charge at the player, stopping on hit or after 3 seconds, or spawn a wave of bats to assault the player. The bats served as a great way to add another element of challenge, while also serving to help the player by providing them with essential resources such as health and ammo, so they still have a fighting chance if the boss fight was long. Each attack had it's own damage, animations, behaviours and timings, giving a unique sense and ensuring the fight felt very differently when handled from different ranges.

I went on to add a few more features such as HUD, messages direction the player, a locked door to access the boss, menu screens, etc. By the final submission date, I was left with a framework I was quite proud of, I had added a wide range of features not present in the framework, and was able to showcase some of the skills I have picked up working on the previous 3 prototypes. I plan on working on this project further in the future, the next things I would do would be to improve the hitboxes of attacks, add new weapons, many more upgrades, unique interactions between upgrades, new enemies, and abilities such as a fire attack, shield or dodge roll. This was the final prototype for the module, and served as a good highlight of everything I have learned over the semesters, I now feel much more comfortable with the Unity engine, and have a relatively broad knowledge of how various features and plugins work, and how I can use them to enhance projects.

Overall Grade: 1st