An Open World Driving Game that I worked on during my 3rd University Year
My goal when working on Drifting was to come up with convenient controls that didn't require the player to have both hands on the keyboard in order to enter a drift. That's why I decided to set the drifting to 1 single key, which will shift the mass of the vehicle forward, and once the player applies a turning direction (left or right), the vehicle will shift its mass to that direction, resulting in a drift.
I also implemented the first iteration of the air control by giving the player an option to turn the vehicle in pitch and yaw when they are not colliding with a terrain. Air Control was essential for our vehicle as its something often used in real life when performing stunts. It also gave the player more movement options.
I designed all 9 objective missions and 6 time trials. To manage that amount of content I setup a mission design document and pipeline for the team to track the mission development and assist when needed. I also designed the mission paths to lead from one to another, essentially creating a linear game feel that made sure the players went over each mission without having to constantly look for them.
In order to implement the missions , I worked closely with the gameplay programmer, who set up all events and data tables that I needed in order to implement a variety of missions. During this process, I iterated on the missions, shaping them after every playtest and making sure that every mission had a purpose and place in the game.
During the polish phase, I created a cinematic sequence for every mission intro and checkpoint. My goal with the cinematic sequences was to explain the objective to the player and guide them to their next checkpoint.
Another task of mine during the development of Til Nord was to encourage player exploration. Players were not exploring the world, missing out on interesting POI’s and creative environments.
To fix that, I took upon myself the task of better distributing the snowmen collectable (a snowman that gets destroyed once you drive over him) and designed a ramp collectable (a passive mission that required the player to jump from 20 ramps).