Week 2.2: Game Proposal – Swarm

Game Name: Swarm

TL;DR

You are trapped in an off-world research lab. Most of the scientists are dead, killed by an escaped ‘experiment’. Your mission: locate survivors and get out, fast!

Game Mechanics

You are an elite, no nonsense, special forces hero who gets the job done. You must explore the research facility to locate any survivors and lead them to safety before the non-player characters (NPCs) kill them. Your only weapons are your gun, your determination and your unerring belief in the mission.

Survivors are rescued by tagging them whereupon they are immediately transported out of the facility.

Equipment:

• Primary weapon – Rifle, single attack
• Secondary weapon – Grenade, area attack
• Tag gun – zero damage, used to tag scientists
• Armour
• Health pack (quantity TBD)

Genre

This is a first person shooter/dungeon crawler, in the style of Doom, Quake and Duke Nukem and combines elements of Lemmings and Galaxian. It is set in an off-world research facility with multiple levels of increasing difficulty.

A third-person mode could be added is there is sufficient development time available.

Player Fantasy

“I’m the stuff of legend; an alien butt-kicker who’s gonna grease every slime ball mutant on this rock. They’ll be a stain under my boot before they know what killed ’em.”

Platform and Controls

The game will be designed to run on a PC.

Two control options will be provided:

• Mouse and Keyboard
  Mouse: aim and fire primary weapon
  Keyboard: control movement, swap weapons, pick up and drop items, use smart objects
• Controller
  Analogue sticks: aim and move
  Trigger: Fire primary weapon
  Buttons/D-pad: swap weapons, pick up and drop items, use smart objects

(** If possible within the development time available)

Spatial Abstraction

The game is played in a 3D world consisting of rooms and corridors. The player must search each room to kill the monsters and rescue the scientists.

Avatar

The player controls a single character. In first-person mode, only the primary weapon and Heads-up Display (HUD) are visible.

If third-person is added, a 3D animated character will be the player’s avatar.

Camera Perspective

First person with provision to add third person at a later date.

Goals and Scores

Primary goal: survive for as long as possible. The score will be determined by the number of scientists rescued.

To complete a level the player must survive and rescue at least one scientist before the oxygen supply is depleted, and find the entrance to the next level.

The player will lose if any of the following conditions are met:

• All scientists in the level die
• The player dies
• The oxygen runs out

Progression and Variety

Player Progression

The player gains experience (XP) for every NPC killed and every scientist rescued. When sufficient XP is earned the player will level-up and receive a slight improvement to their stats.

OPTION: Let the player choose which stats to improve.

Game Progression

When the player has rescued all surviving scientists on a level they can proceed to the next.

TODO: Work out how to prevent players from rescuing 1 scientist and leaving the others to die in order to quickly progress.

Successive levels increase in dificulty using one or more of the following buffs/nerfs:

• Number of NPCs
• NPC health increased
• NPC speed increased
• NPC spawn rate increased
• NPC armour improved
• NPC attack pattern changes (the Galaxian element)
• Fewer health packs available

Tension and Rest

NPC battles will be fast and furious. The player will need to be quick on the button to survive and need to continually advance as the NPCs will continue to spawn until the spawn point is reached/disabled.

Each wave of NPCs will follow a swarm attack pattern, similar to Galaxian aliens, in an attempt to overpower the player with their numbers.

Once a room is cleared, the player can search for hidden items (if any) and heal.

Obstacles and Penalties

The player does not have enough ammunition to complete the level. To survive, they must advance and locate an ammo crate before they run out or risk being overwhelmed and eaten by the NPCs.

Starting ammo for each level will be a function of the number of scientists in the level with a penalty applied for every scientist lost in the previous level and the number of restart attempts.

If the player is killed by the NPCs, they can choose to restart the level with an ammo penalty.

If the oxygen runs out the game is over.

Movement speed and weapon accuracy are halved when the player moves and shoots simulaneously. The player cannot run and fire.

Resources

The two resources in the game are time (represented by oxygen level) and ammunition.

Each level has it’s own life support and therefore it’s own oxygen supply. Once the player enters a level, the oxygen will start to be consumed. If the level is restarted, the oxygen level is reset along with all the NPCs, i.e. the level is returned to it’s initial state. Oxygen cannot be increased.

OPTION: Rate of oxygen consumption is determined by number of NPCs and scientists on a level.

Ammunition is a consumable resource. The player does not have enough ammo to complete the level and must find more during the game.

Decisions

The player must choose their path through the level. Some doors will be closed and others locked. The occupants of a room behind a closed or locked door cannot be determined until it is opened.

The player must choose when to tag a scientist and when to shoot NPCs. Switching weapons incurs a time penalty leaving the player vulnerable for a short period of time. NPCs will attack scientists in the same room and must be tagged for rescue before they are killed. Scientists can heal the player if not under attack and before being rescued.

The secondary weapon is an area attack and will injur/kill scientists and NPCs alike.

Simulation and Chance

• NPC swarm pattern
• Primary weapon accuracy based on Gaussian distribution and modified by weapon’s dispersion and player’s accuracy
• Critical hit has random chance of causing NPC to explode, damaging anything/anyone nearby.

OPTION: Add exploding props to level

Storytelling

Backstory revealed through mission briefing at start of game and the beginning of each level. Further information can be obtained by talking to scientists before tagging for rescue.

Cut scene for win conditions and Easter Egg.

Art Direction and Style

TBD but with dynamic lighting if possible within timeframe.

Animation and Visual Effects

Sound Design

Background Music

• High tempo, energetic rock music for battle scenes.
• Low tempo, soothing music after each battle.
• Suspense music when exploring to create tension.
• Upbeat, energetic music on pause menu and scene change.

Sound Effects

• Groans and murmurs when exploring and NPC near (think original Tomb Raider mummy sound effect)
• Bass-heavy gunfire
• Bullet impact — wall, flesh
• Footsteps
• Explosion — secondary weapon and NPC critical hit
• Door open/close
• Door unlock
• Weapon switch
• Tagging scientist
• Use health pack
• Scientist transport
• ‘Dead man’s click’ when no ammo
• Weapon reload
• Clock tick when oxygen level nearly depleted

Reflection

I originally wanted to produce a Steampunk mystery game as I find the entire scene fascinating from both a fasion and a narrative perspective. Then I worked through the material for this week and read a fair chunk of Game Feel , looked at the scope and realised I was seriously overcommiting as I suspect this will be a heavy module. I also reviewed my previous attempts at game development (here, here and here) in light of this newfound enlightenment and realised, at best, my efforts were a depressing, moribund vanilla in a tutti-frutti world. They lacked excitement. They lacked energy. They lacked wow. I felt the Steampunk idea needed a lot more idea development to make it fly and chose a different approach instead.

This post, in particular the material above, captures the idea I settled upon. It’s a bit of a mash-up with elements of Quake, Galaxian and (hopefully) Lemmings. I’d also like to include the GOAP AI system I developed for my Search for a Star submission if time is on my side although that may be ambitious.

This is still a big project to complete by April 30th and as yet I’ve not generated the sizings — that should be ready in the next few days as I elaborate on the main idea. It ‘feels’ achievable and there are opportunities built into the above brief to add and remove scope. I plan to use this strategy to ensure I hit that date with as many features as possible whilst still delivering a minimum viable game that embraces all the material of this module. To help with this I intend to use stock assets from the UE4 marketplace and other libraries for about 90% of the scene, characters and sound. As this module is also about embracing other skill areas I will also make my own assets as well. I especially want to try 3D charater and environment, simple animation and creating a few sound effects. Indeed, I’ve set two personal development goals for the former, here: https://scaryblankpage.com/journey/2021-q1-90-day-goals/ 

I don’t for one moment expect this module to be easy but it certainly has great potential to be a lot of fun.

If I succeed I’m hoping to see a step change when compared to my previous offerings. To do that, I need to hit the sweet spot, Zone 1 on Figure 1. The idea I’ve presented here has the potential to get there. It has real-time control and spatial simulation, it’s the polish that was lacking from my previous attempts and my goal now is to make provision for the time to really ‘juice it up’ .

List of Figures

Figure 1. SWINK, 2017 Levels of Game Feel (Swink, 2017,8) – Redrawn from original, THORN, 2021

References

Photo by Dragos Gontariu on Unsplash