SpaceRunners is a multiplayer networking PC game school project.
It is playable with 2 to 6 players.
It features asymmetric gameplay where one player plays as a space overlord
and the others play as space runners.
The overlords' goal is to destroy all the runners
while the runners goal is to collect objectives on the map.
The overlord can use a massive laser burst from its' "eye" to temporarily
disable platforms runners can stand on. With a fairly large size, infinite
length,
a short charge-up and cooldown time, the runners can survive by parkouring
off
surfaces and using their ability to enable a single disabled platform.
For this project I teamed up with
Kee Shen
who handled the networking and UI for this project.
The game is available to play and for download on my itch.io page. I hope
you enjoy it!
Genre:
Action, PvP
Platform:
PC
Project Duration:
2 months (Nov - Dec 2020)
Team Size:
2
Role:
Designer, Gameplay Programmer
Contributions:
Level design, mechanics design and implementation.
Software Used:
Unity Game Engine
Languages used:
C#
The challenge of designing asymmetric gameplay is an interesting one. By
limiting ourselves
to very simple mechanics, we overcame the balancing issues that arose
from asymmetric,
player versus player gameplay with varying player count.
As my partner wanted to do a competitive PvP game, I decided to use a
simple
parkour system for the "runners" he had already conceptualised, which I
refined.
I decided that since we wanted to have asymmetric gameplay, why not give
the other
player (now the space overlord) an overwhelmingly large advantage? A
giant laser
that can wipe out sections of the map for our sci-fi game seemed
appropriate.
Through playtesting we refined the size of the laser and adjusted
cooldowns so
it was fun for both the space overlord and the runners.
Runner perspective 1
Space Overlord perspective
Runner perspective 2