PROJECT A.N.U.B.I.S
Built in Unity
Team Project
My Roles: Systems Design, Level Design, Game Design, Programming
Timeline: 2 Months
Video is WIP, will be available at a later time
Overview
PROJECT A.N.U.B.I.S (I’ll be referring to this as “Anubis” from now on) is a summer project worked on by a handful of students from the Game Design course at Sheridan College.
Anubis is a fast paced movement shooter inspired by games like DOOM. The main hook of the game is that there is no ammo or health pickups, instead you must hack into enemies to "take over their vessel”. When you hack into an enemy, you take their health, weapon and abilities.
The game takes place in cyberpunk Egypt; inspired by ancient Egypt and infusing it with the cyberpunk theme. All enemies, environments, level design, and visual direction were heavily inspired around this theme.
Video (WIP)
Project Goals
Have a functional fast paced movement shooter
Have an engaging movement system for the player
Have a thrilling set of mechanics that act as a vertical slice by the end of summer (2 months)
Design Pillars that Guided My Approach
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Run, Think, Shoot
Run to traverse and dodge bullets.
Think where to relocate or what enemy to hack.
Shoot the enemies.
If the player isn't doing at least one of these things, the design is failing.
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Non-Stop Movement
We wanted the players to constantly be moving. Gameplay mechanics and systems were all designed with this in mind.
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Parkour & Height Variation
In the interest of high movement, we wanted the player to be able to traverse areas with many elevation changes to encourage interesting movement.
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No Time to Wait!
Any gameplay mechanic or level structure should never make the player stop or wait. The player should always be doing something that is of high excitement.
If you’re short on time, basically, for this project I…
Researched movement shooters to form an understanding of what makes them tick to influence my design
Let setting and themes about geography, culture, and history influence my design
Adhere every design decision to the design pillars we established
Document to help make sure everyone on the team is on the same page
Make metrics zoos and architectural guides to guide level design
Program systems to make the game work
For something more in-depth, scroll down.
Process
Due to the different disciplines I was apart of, I’ll talk about each one individually.
Game Design
Research Stage
The first week of development was dedicated to researching the genre. We wanted to make a movement shooter so we studied successful movement shooters to see what makes them tick.
We decided to look at games like DOOM and ULTRAKILL.
We did some research on the target demographic, and they tend to like over the top violence, high excitement gameplay, and a very passive narrative that doesn’t intrude on gameplay. We designed our game around this audience.
Doom Eternal: Constant Movement
OVERKILL: Constant Movement
The Hook of our Game
We developed the hacking mechanic as our central mechanic/hook for our game that makes our game stand out but still adhere to what people enjoy about movement shooters
Essentially, the hacking system is a way to “possess” the enemy type. You would have to hop between bodies to regain health, get ammo, and swap weapons/abilities as there are no health pickups, ammo or weapon drops. This promoted aggressive and on-the-move gameplay, which adheres greatly to our pillars.
Letting Players Express Their Movement
After research and determining our pillars of always moving, we wanted to give the player many different ways to express their movement so it never became stale and suited multiple playstyles. Anything and everything should relate back to our central pillars.
Run
Fast to encourage aggressive gameplay
Sliding
Faster than a run a
Once started, can’t change direction
Dash
A quick lunge in the direction the player is facing
Consumes stamina
Jump
Can have multiple jumps depending on the enemy type hacked
Ground Pound
In air, launch your self towards the ground. Upon impact launch yourself back into the air OR begin a slide
Consumes stamina
Combined…
It leads to an effortless, intuitive and engaging experience that is supported by our game’s pillars.
Setting & Themes Inspiring Design
The team determined on a cyberpunk Egypt theming, so we started getting reference to inspire our design. Taking inspiration from things outside of games such as setting can greatly inspire a team
I did research on Egyptian mythology for our enemy designs. For example, Apep is the god of chaos. Embracing this, her movement is meant to be unpredictable and disrupts player behavior.
Egyptian mythology greatly inspired our design and has allowed us to make designs that are more meaningful.
Some reference we got for enemy and weapon design.
Below is every enemy type I designed for the game from high level, conceptualized on a shared Miro board. The artist on team made the concept art, I made their concept, description and stats. Click to download a PDF of this for better viewing.
Document
To help everyone get on the same page, I developed a document that outlines our core gameplay loop. Some of the PDF is incomplete and is a little rough around it’s edges.
In retrospect, there should’ve been more diagrams and visuals to help communicate my design.
This was one of the very first documents I ever produced, and I have learned greatly from it.
Click on the button to download the PDF.
Level Design
Unfortunately with the need to help with the programming due to the small team size, I didn’t get to do as much level design for this project as I wanted to :(
However, I was still able to get some of the basics done.
Metrics Gym & Architectural Style Guide
In the early stages, I developed a metrics gym that documents basic movement metrics where we can test movement and document our metrics.
I also developed some basic architectural structures and styles so that it may be referenced during any greyboxing stage.
Metrics Gym
Architecture Style Guide
Level Design Philosophy
Levels should use varied height to add interesting movement and keep players in a flow state. Lower areas with more walls and ceilings provide safety while higher areas offer power.
This creates an interesting risk reward scenario where players want to be higher up to attack and moving lower down to retreat.
Player is lower in the level, so less enemies and more concrete walls and ceilings to break line of sight.
Player is higher in the level, so more enemies and less line of sight breakers, but puts players in a power position.
No Cover!
I was very careful to not include traditional cover to hide behind within my levels. There should be no clutter that inhibits movement.
Arena
I developed a small arena that follows the level design principles established.
Learning Outcomes
Research and develop for a certain demographic of audience
Get inspired from culture, history and geography
Design a responsive first person move set
Communicate my ideas through documentation
the rest of this page is
UNDER CONSTRUCTION!
What will be here (eventually)
My contributions to the enemy systems and AI to the project