gaming projectgaming projectgaming projectgaming projectgaming projectgaming projectgaming projectgaming project
Overview
Game Design
Animation
Process
Conclusion
Contributors
Stephan Church - Game Design / Artist / Level Design / Storyboard Writer / Programmer
Timeframe
Jan 2021 - April 2021
Programs
Animate | Illustrator | Photoshop | Unity

Before I started this project, a good friend told me a story about how he survived hardships through the power of faith and community. With him being an avid gamer, I thought of no better media to retell his story than a videogame. This project is the foundation of that idea. For four months I learned C# coding and incorporated all I knew about art, animation, and design into creating a prototype to show the gameification of fighting an inner battle. The demo only alludes to deeper concepts that I hope for the final project to showcase.

In the future, I plan to go back to this title and really capture that original story my friend offered to me, but for now it serves as a quick demo to show different art & design concepts in relation to game design. This version of the game was a Senior project during my time in NCSU.

   



gameplay gameplay
gameplay gameplay
gameplay gameplay
gameplay gameplay

Download the Demo

Game Design
Introduction

The Game is designed in two styles, the overworld chat and the combat styles. I chose to have battles on the overworld to save time on development and create a sense of cohesion. Below are conceptual images made during the planning stage.

overworld
overworld
overworld
overworld
Level Design
I focused on creating a mostly linear piece that included various different environments. Because the level space is more ethereal, it allowed for freedom in design elements. Overall I put a focus on feeling over physicality. This leaves some interpretation to the events of the game.
overworld
 
Animation
Character Animation

I mirrored my animation style for Living Planet to put the focus of my studies into learning C#. Most animations took anywhere from 2-7 hours based on the complexity of the animation

Battle Animation

To help juxtapose the difference between the chat and battle states of the game, I created animations specific for battle (including a transition animation into the battle state).

Transition

Battle Idle

Battle Run

Enemy Animations

I only had time to work on one enemy so I decided to focus on building a boss encounter. I generalized the animations so that the scripting could be malleable.

Attack 1

Attack 2

Transformation

 
Process
 
From the beginning of the process, I was on a time crunch. The question was never could I capture this vision in the four month time span, but to what extent can I get this vision out. In the document below I go over my design process from ideation to actualization.
Conclusion

The goal of the project was to formulate a concept and execute that concept into a working demo. I used this opportunity to create the basis of a project that I've wanted to start for a while. This project forced me to learn C# which had a been a huge barrier up to this point.

I now feel more confident in creating more elaborate demos to help showcase ideas. This has aided in my ability to work on Living Planet and opened new opportunities in the way I solve wicked problems in the design world.