Game loops

Progress

Core pillars

Wall Jump

Mushroom Jump

I added two types of enemies to give more variety to players on how to defeat them. The first one can be defeated with jumping on the enemy head while the second one must be defeated using a special attack.

Through playtesting and feedback these variations kept the player engaged more and improved the players experience and overall enjoyment of the game.

I wanted to create a design document that i could always refer back to, even if I could never implement all of the mechanics in the document it was a good base to work off of, as it stapled the core pillars and game loop before I even began to implement in engine.

Explore

Find

Collect

I established a core loop in order to have a rhythm to gameplay and engage players throughout gameplay.

Fluid Movement

Progression

Exploration

The movement mechanics are essential to the game. It allows players to move from platforms to progress through the levels and explore levels to the fullest

To progress to the next level players need to find all the souls in that specific area. players can only progress to some areas by using specific jumps

The main objective of the game is to explore the level looking for lost souls and collecting them. The player will have completed the game once all the lost souls have been found.

Click the PDF icon to see my in-depth design document

Story Breakdown

Souls are the essence of human beings, and it is the one immortal part of humans that continues to live when they die. The Heavens and the Underworld fight to claim these souls constantly as the more they have the stronger their kingdom becomes.

You wake up unaware as to what is going on but encounter the figure of Death. Before you can get away he commissions you to collect the human souls he's lost. If you don't Death will take your Soul.

Onboarding

Onboarding was essential to show the player what the aim of this game is having an NPC to interact with allowed the player to understand what their task was to complete the game.

Jump/ Wall Jump System

Adding variation to movement was my main goal in this project. The player not only had a simple jump, but a wall jump, and special mushroom springboards.

Each level centred around a specific type of jumping.

Varying mechanics keep players engaged as much as possible, by adding these different movements and also varying enemies in the later levels it keeps players engaged with something new every level. No one wants to play the same repetitive gameplay every time they progress so adding variation was essential to improve the player experience

Tutorial level where the player understands their goal to collect souls. It is a safe environment for them to understand movement of the character.

Level 1 Where the player must utilise the wall jump and avoid platform enemies. They must also keep an eye out for the souls they must catch.

Level 2 where the player can have fun bouncing on the springboard mushrooms. They must utilize this and must also use the previous mechanics learnt. This level was a bit more difficult with more types of enemies that are harder to defeat.

Enemies

Level Design

The game contains 3 levels. A tutorial level, a level surrounding the wall jump and a level surrounding the springboard mushrooms. I made the environment the game was set in as much like an enchanted forest as possible with large trees/mushrooms and fireflies flying around. For the environment I took inspiration from games like Legend of Zelda: Breath of the wild and Genshin Impact.

Pre-Production

Full Video Playthrough

Tools and resources

Soul Seeker was a solo university project i undertook.

In this side-scrolling platformer, players are commissioned by death to collect as many souls as possible to escape from his clutches.

My Roles:

Design initial concept
Produce an in-depth design document
Pitch idea to fellow students and lecturer
Implement mechanics and enemy AI in Unreal Engine 5