Remake StrandWilds - Update 1.
Important Update
I am now officially Lead Game Designer at AfroDuck Studios!
I would have liked to provide an update for this project a little earlier than this but was busy with onboarding and other life events.
Things that I have began to learn so far:
Using Unreal Engines animations.
Unreal Engine’s Blueprints.
Unreal Engine’s Chaos Vehicles.
Unreal Engine’s Terrain
Unreal Engine’s particle system.
Game Design
For the overall design of the game, I kept it quite similar. However, I stripped the game back of unnecessary features such as upgrading the vehicle and will put more of an emphasis on environmental storytelling. Due to this, I am assessing whether or not to remove features such as “time reset” mechanic if during testing it put players off exploring the map as I understand that there may be a negative feeling with player’s progress getting removed every time a reset happens. Removing the “time-reset” mechanic is unlikely though as it is the basis of the story and would require the story to be redone.
The vehicle has been changed from a hoverbike to a 4x4. This was done for two reasons, the first being that it is simply easier to make a normal vehicle than a hoverbike. The second reason is that I had an a vehicle model already for a 4x4 car, whereas I did not for a hoverbike (that fit the art style, I was going for). The car works a lot better than the hoverbike even if it still needs tweaking.
Similar to StrandWilds1, in StrandWilds2 you encounter pieces of paper lying around the environment. An issue that was found once I had released the game is that players could not find the pieces of paper as the map was too large and the papers, too hard to find. Therefore to fix this, I will emit a pale light from the papers when the player is far enough away to indicate that a paper is here. This will ensure that players find the papers and thus learn the story of StrandWilds and avoid frustration. When the player approaches the paper, a prompt will pop up asking the player to interact with it. The player can then interact with the paper, where the paper itself can have drawings on, can be flipped around and even a voice over (if I decide to have one), thanks to an asset.
Level Design
When Designing the levels, I was inspired by the deserts of Gobi, Mongolia. The vast stretches of desert as far as the eye can see. The flaming cliffs and their vibrant orange. The remnants of the great wall of china poking out through the mounds of sand.
I will try to incorporate some of the elements of the Gobi desert into the level design. In the original StrandWilds, the cliffs engulfed the playable area. However, for the remake, I want to make the environment seem more believable. Therefore, I will incorporate cliffs but rather as a cluster, possibly used to hide secrets. I will incorporate a lot more visual storytelling as well, remnants of the past that the player will encounter.
For right now, I created a procedural terrain with a sand texture on. This looks like a desert from ground level. However, I will have to make some small hand-crafted changes to the terrain in order to break up the repetition. The map will be made within the next update of the game. For now, I wanted to get the basis of the mechanics built into the engine. Then I will begin to plan the map, block it out and then fill it with assets.
Art
For this project, I wanted to keep the art style consistent and therefore will be sticking to asset packs as this will maintain consistency and quality. I will also be focusing more on the visuals of the project. In the last project, the visuals were all done by me and I am not an artist. Therefore StrandWilds ended up looking a little rough. For StrandWilds2, I would like the player to be more immersed in the world and therefore thing such as a beautiful environment, small touches such as visual effects when player steps on sand and better lighting. This is also affected by the fact that the game is mainly a narrative experience and therefore, due to the lack of mechanics, the player will notice the environment and the visuals a lot more than if the game had a lot more gameplay mechanics. Games such as Journey, Abzu, What Remains of Edith Finch and other games like these are examples that visuals are important in a narrative experience game.
Animations
One of the biggest challenges that I had last time with making StrandWilds were the animations. This is mainly due to the fact that I had never done rigging of a model and weight painting before and therefore encountered a lot of very frustrating issues. I have (some) practice in it now and took advantage of asset packs and Mixamo to help with saving time with this as it is not a skill that I feel that I need to prioritise, although learning new skills is always useful.
Extra Note
It may seem that a lot of decisions were done for convivence / ease. This is mainly because, this is a project that I intend to use as a portfolio piece for a game designer portfolio. The main challenge for this project was to see if I could make the project enjoyable as the previous version was not. This means that aspects such as Art, animations and to a degree programming will utilise asset packs or shortcuts. I do have some experience in these areas, but I am not proficient enough to do it to the quality that I desire or in sufficient time. I want the design of the game to really shine through rather than anything else.
Whats Next
Adding In Checkpoints
Designing a rough map
Finishing the Game Design Document
Adding animations for exiting, entering and driving the car.
More VFX
