The screenshot of the game Territorials
Brief Introduction
My role in this project mainly involved creating concept art, intro cutscenes, and the early tile sets. I also participated in making the early version of the level design. Overall, I drew illustrations and implemented them in the Unity engine.
Number of team members: 7 people
Tools used: Procreate, Unity, C#, Visual Studio, LeanTween (plugin)
Link to this project (itch.io): https://flamesgowhoosh.itch.io/terratrials
The Unused Concept
The Concept for the Industrial level
Early Conception
The whole semester was divided into 6 sprints to set up milestones for the production.
In the beginning, I was working on the concept art by imagining a world different from the prototype: a lone outpost, organic enemies, and an organic world. Rather than the unused version, the current conception depicts the surface of the outpost and the inner space before entering the organic world. The color palette of the industrial tile sets is composed of desaturated cold colors to contrast with the organic world.
Making the Industrial Levels
Later, I was assigned to create tile sets and the level design for the industrial levels. Pixel art is what the team agreed on to maintain unity in the art style. While creating drafts of the design for the industrial levels, I spent time researching references. I drew the industrial tile sets and expected to iterate them later so that we could test them in the game as soon as possible. Then, I shifted to work on the intro cutscenes instead of working on the industrial levels.
The example of industrial level design
Designing the Intro
Starting from the middle of the semester, I was making the cutscenes of the intro. Initially, I understood the task as creating a graphic novel, which was not interactive and dynamic enough for a game with action elements. The theme of the game is the silence and solitude of the lone adventure. I proposed five panels of twenty-two cutscenes initially, which were shortened into three panels in the interest of time.
The finalized intro cutscenes in 3 panels
Iteration
The content is consistent with the narrative of a spaceship running out of energy, floating in the universe, and finally falling into a planet that is a trap. Then, I implemented it by programming on C# scripts. The structure of the scripts is to build a phase machine to control the position and alpha value of the cutscenes. Hence it is an "animation" performed by scripts and still images. As the player pressed the Space key to represent the confirmation, the next cutscene played. The first part of the intro is symmetric, telling the lack of energy and decrease in speed. The most dynamic part is breaking the atmosphere, which is my favorite. The last part delivers the feeling of loneliness in the adventure and introduces the player to the main character and the place where all takes place.
the Cutscenes in Draft
the Process of Implementation
the Final Product
In the end, I re-implemented the cutscenes as raw images in UI with LeanTween, a tool to create smooth animation in the script. I also helped set up the PowerPoint for the final presentation and designed three tutorial panels in the game.
