Game Design

Because Game Design is really important in games; part of our curriculum is just that!
In the second semeser of my first year, we had to work on designing games.
Although this course really wasn't loved by everyone, I enjoyed it quite a bit. (But I don't want to become a game designer later)
Unpopular, yet important since you need to know how to work with multiple mechanics, story elements, etc.
Learning about "LeBlanc's Taxonomy of Game Pleasures" and "Bartle's Taxonomy of Player Types" was a key part of the course.
Linking psychology with games and how to keep the player interesed in the gameplay while having a nice learning curve is necessary in a good game.

What we had to do was simple, we learned the basics of designing levels and games all while making some uninteresting things in UE4.
After a good 2 months we got to start on the exam project; which is the project I'm showing here!
When the teachers explained the assignment, they gave us all an object that was different to one another.
We had to use this object to brainstorm around it together with 3 themes, to find nice concepts and ultimatly create a game around those.
My object was "Umbrella", the themes were "Losing", "Cult" and "Decay".

Because we had our core concept ready quickly, we had to start iterating and asking classmates for their feedback on our game and decide if we wanted to update it based on that.
That were the basics we did in that course!
The feedback sessions were my favorite; being able to play others' games and give them some feedback about features that worked or didn't work.
Of course watching your own game being played and intantly seeing what the player thinks is helpful.
There were times that people didn't had the heart of saying something, yet you could see that discomfort of features in their face.
When updating these and letting them play again, you could see them brighten up! One of the best feelings in my opinion.

What I Wanted To Achieve

The game that I wanted to make would need a simple storyline.
A Game that anyone should be able to pickup, play and enjoy.

I wanted to create an experience that makes the player value the time they have, all while establishing their situation.
Rushing the game will only make you feel frustrated, and that might be a good thing.
Being frustrated can encourage players to keep playing and actually beat the game.

The mechanics that I wanted to introduce are:
The umbrella, a way to hide from the guards.
Guards that will chase you when detected.
Different puzzles that can be solved to progress.

Guards are meant to slow the game down.
Forcing people to think because the timer will decrease when caught.
Learning patterns is something that will help the player beat the game.

The gameplay is very simple, move with either arrow keys or WASD and interact/hide with 'e'; you don't need anything else.
The goal is to "escape" the "building" you are trapped in by avoiding guards and solving puzzles.
There is a timer in the top left corner that has no impact on the gameplay, other than encouraging the player to complete the level as fast as possible.

The idea is that you can use an umbrella to hide from the guards.
When the umbrella is equiped, you cannot move anymore but you are invisible to the guards.
Make sure not to stand in the way of the guards while hiding!

When running in the flashlight of any guard, they will start to chase you.
They are faster than you so be very careful...

If you get caught, the timer will lose some seconds and you will have to retry the puzzle.
If the puzzle was completed before, it will be reset.

This was the most fun part.
As mentioned before, we had to brainstorm around some words to get some concepts of the game.
Being trapped in a building full of cult members wasn't my only idea.
Another fun one that I had was a game where you are a fireman and you have to rescue animals from a burning building on a hot summer day.

After chosing a concept, we had to make a paper prototype.
Basically making the game we had in mind, but on paper.
This prototype was looked at by the teachers and they gave us the first round of feedback.
In the video on the right, you can see how my paper prototype looked.

Then we had to start programming.
We got a top down UE4 template that served as a base for our game to take place.
This template also included the characters, basic lightning and basic AI movement.
We were not allowed to import any models, so everyones project had the same characters.
When the first build was done, we had "Feedback Sessions", showing our game to classmates and getting feedback while also giving feedback on their games.

After 3 of those sessions and a total of 4 builds, we were done!
I would've loved to do even more, but we only got 3 sessions.
In the video, I explained all changes during builds, etc.

There you have it!
This is my first project made in Unreal Engine 4.
Since this project was based on visuals only, I will only give the project on request since the code looks awful.
All code was done with blueprinting.

I'm really happy I got to learn some UE4 stuff during this course.
Even though it was really basic and blueprinting is confusing as hell, it was fun.
The biggest challenge that I had to overcome was working with the given AI.
They just wouldn't lose focus when the player respawned, so I had to improvise.

Perhaps the most important thing that I learned is to keep everything clean.
When working with the player and the interactables, the code quickly turned into spaghetti code.
The basics of theorie like how to keep the player interested during the game, will stick with me.
It's something easy and good to keep in mind for future projects.

Most of my paper prototype got implemented like I wanted too.
I did miss out on a mechanic in the end, but it isn't that big of a deal.
The feel of the game is just like it should, and that is what matters.

After some thinking I thought it might be worth at least showing this project.
It shows that I have at least some experience with UE4.
Because we didn't really learn a lot of programming here, or how to program, the code is a mess and doesn't deserve to be in Main Projects.
Don't worry, I will definitely work on a Main Project in UE4 soon!

You can play the game yourself!
I packaged it into a windows 64-bit exe.
Keep in mind, the game has sounds and will probably launch with 100% volume.
To quit out of the game, you have to use "ALT + F4". There is no quit button.

You can also just download the game using the download button below.
Keep in mind, do not touch anything and just run the .exe titled "VernimmenBram1DAE22", deleting anything or moving something might break the program.

What Is "Game Design"?

What I Wanted To Achieve

The Gameplay

The Process

In Conclusion