SEAFEUD
Bump. Drift. Swap. & Ultra Fun.
Team Level & Technical Designer
Key Responsibilities.
At the beginning of the project, I was assigned to help the team programmers experiment with the UE Muti User Editing (MUE) feature on LAN.
I scripted a rotating Ferris wheel for our City Park track. The Ferris wheel spins, and its carts act as obstacles physically blocking the players.
This image is what the final track looks like. I detailed the MRT and completed scripting the hero Ferris wheel pieces. I also provided technical support for various triggers and volumes and assisted the team in optimizing the track performance.
At the beginning of the project, I was assigned to help the team programmers experiment with the UE Muti User Editing (MUE) feature on LAN.
Project Information.
Game Summary.
Seafeud is a third personal arcade racing game where the player races by riding on different types of fish and goes through sunk cities and ruins at the bottom of the ocean,
Its gameplay features switching, according to their strategies, between three types of fish, each of which has its strengths and weaknesses, instead of choosing a certain fish before the race starts
Engine: Unreal 5
Available on: Steam
Work Time: Jan, 2023 - May, 2023 (3 hours per work day)
Team Size: 44 people
Play Time: 30+ minutes
Features:
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Cart switching
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Floaty Driving
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Sunk Cities
My Contributions.
City Park Track
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Track Layout Iteration from whitebox to final launch
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Designed items placement that encourages players' competition with each other
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Level epic interactive landmark scripting
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Volumes and Triggers configuration including respawning and off-track dead zones
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Technical Support for hero pieces, interactive objects, MRT, and MUE
Prototyping.
Our team generated an track layout in a three-leaves shape. I was responsible for one leaf which include a ferris wheel shortcut crossing a 180 degree U turn.
I blockouted this primitive track layout in my workspace level in 2 hours and transfer it to the team workspace for further polishing.
This is the final level that is used in the game launch. We finially made it to be a sunk city park near a highway with the exactly same track design as we designed at the beginning
Our team generated an track layout in a three-leaves shape. I was responsible for one leaf which include a ferris wheel shortcut crossing a 180 degree U turn.
Level Blockout - My first responsibility in this project was blocking out our design. Because I have previous experience using Unreal, I was assigned to work on turning our teams' design into a testable level in Unreal from pre-production to actual production.
In addition, in terms of speeding up blocking out the track for all the other track teams, I reported several feasible improvements regarding the MRT editor tool while I was using the MRT editor tool.
Track Design.
Brainstorming & Initial Design -
When our teams started to conceptualize our track regarding themes and exciting designs that we liked in arcade cart racing games, I:
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acted as a host of the brainstorming meeting
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suggested using a mindmap for idea generation and a Venn Diagram to organize our favorite ideas.
Finally, we agreed to create a theme park track with a movable Ferris wheel shortcut hero piece on our level.
Detail Design - Then, we divided our design elements into individuals to narrow down their details. I took the part of the Ferris Wheel shortcut and three-way split lanes.
Because I wanted the track to include more verticalities where the player can make a choice between jumping up and down, I designed a curve with a U-shaped shortcut above it. The player can either jump down to take the items at the bottom lane for later usage or risk going through the U-turn.
For the Ferris Wheel hero piece, initially, I kept seeking a chance to make a shortcut through the Ferris Wheel because we thought it would become a WoW moment in our track, where the player can take a deep breath when the cart is thrown to the high place and dive down to the track lane again.
Unfortunately, I didn't manage to make it because of the asset workload. Also, it violated the unity of all tracks in the game because they don't have a similar mechanic. I later turned it into a moving obstacle where the Ferris wheel's carts would block the player if the observation of how much the wheel had turned was missing. Although it is not what I designed initially, it also created great fun for the player.
Technical Support.
Strike Team - Before diving into the actual production, I participated in a strike team working on researching Modular Road Tool (MRT) and Multi-User Editing (MUE) plug-ins. I was assigned to a strike team with a few programmers and artists to create a zoo-level to find out the strengths and weaknesses of MRT and MUE.
My Works:
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Contributed my MUE and Networking knowledge to the team to help troubleshoot MUE and evaluate the pros and cons
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Read through the MRT plug-in blueprint and help the team troubleshoot MRT issues
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Troubleshoot Unreal Editor Issues in terms of usage
Boost pad with two methods
Level Mechanics - To speed up the development in the early development stage so that all tracks could start testing earlier, I helped the programming team script the level mechanics.
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Jump Pad
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Boost Pad
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Movable Hero Pieces
Postmortem.
What Went Well?
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Our team got a quick reaction on requirements of every change from leads
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We experienced two requirements of changing the level theme but we still maintained our primitive design of tracks pretty well
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The team members worked effectively and were active in helping each other
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Team members maintained a good follow-up of messages while working for the level
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We split jobs smartly without causing a waste of time and force.
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We have the fun go first then have the theme fit our design
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It created flexibility when we encountered the issue that the art team lacked time to make more assets for our theme
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What Went
Wrong?
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We brought in details too early in the whitebox stage causing extra time to differentiate what parts were fun and what were not
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We forgot to keep evaluating the amount of assets we need for the level and lacked communication with the art team about it
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We ended up using most of the assets that were not designed for our initial theme to build up a new theme
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What I
Learned?
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Fun is the most important thing for a level and a game
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While making a level, it is good to have a theme as a standpoint to help you structure ideas but shouldn't go too deep into it
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Pipelines should be followed unless you have a good reason to break it
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Otherwise, it will just mess up the communication between different teams
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Although it could possibly be broken in some situations, informing all relevant people are crucial
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Reporting, informing, and showing progress are important to teamwork with high efficiency
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Informing the teammates about your design before starting to work on it is always better than telling nothing
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