GAME PLAYTHROUGH
Summary
Narrative and Setting
Red Terror is a single-player 3D indie horror game where you play as Avery, a new farmer based in the outback during the 1880s. After moving in they are approached by a fellow farmer warning about a rumour of a monster and a ritual to defeat it, though Avery doesn’t listen. After the monster attacks Avery’s chickens late at night, they must scour the farm for the ritual objects mentioned by the man to banish it.
The game takes place in the 1880’s with limited access to technology, the farm is not hugely successful as the outback is bare and not great for large fields of crops, this is also reflected in the farm house and shed, which are both made of simple materials in a non-complex approach. The farm itself makes the majority of its money from the production and selling of animal and livestock resources. The environment contains various Australian plantlife as well as rusted old farming equipment scattered around the play area.
Level Layout
Top down view of level
The level was made to resemble an old farm from the time period of the game as well as having a unique POI for each item the player has collect. This left me with 4 main areas:
Level Objectives
The main objective for the game is to banish the monster, this is done through placing specific items on an altar in the middle of the map. Once all are collected the monster will appear and be banished. This allowed me to correlate each item to its own POI, having gameplay be smoother in terms of exploration and item collection, though still enjoyable as most are hidden within each area.
Documentation and Prototyping
The main prototype I worked on during development was the light system, later being improved by the programmers on the team. This system worked by having a dedicated button "Dim" the lantern in the player's hand. The monster was then changed to have light sensitivity, being drawn to the light if the player gets too close.
LIGHT DIM MECHANIC
Another mechanic I was able to work on was the altar and it's interactions in-game. Through some trial and error it was decided that player's would collect the items around the level, place them on the altar and once all were collected the monster would die and players would be sent to the end credits.
Greyboxing and Iteration
The first versions of the greybox for the level were completed with fences as the core layout, allowing me gage the scale of the level while implementing the around the map seamlessly. During development I was also tasked with creating two variations of the level while still keeping this same path layout and letting the team vote on which played, felt and looked better.
TOP DOWN CONCEPT SKETCH
VARIATION 1
VARIATION 2
After finalising the layout, POI locations and monster pathing, I then moved on to set dressing. Thanks to the amazing artists during development, I was given a lot to work with.
INSIDE OF BARN
INSIDE OF HOUSE
WATER TOWER
HAY SHED AREA
Post Mortem
In the end I was quite proud of the team for what we were able to complete by the end of the 2 weeks, with only a few issues that I noticed popping up. The main issues I found were communication and rapid prototyping. I spent the majority of the project working alone, making communication and understanding of what needs to be completed and current milestones of the team difficult. If I had included myself in more discussions and made meaningful notes of where the team was at the game and my work load would have smoothened out.
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The other issue was rapid prototyping. Though I was able to complete the mechanics given to me in a short time, there were a few that got cut that had a lot of time put into them. This lead me to feel a little disappointed that my prototypes didn't make the cut, though this happens with every game during it's development.
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Points to take away from the project:
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Become less attached to prototypes and personal work during development
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Communicate more effectively and consistently
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Allow myself to make mistakes
Misc Images
