Moonlighter - A dungeon crawler where you play as a shopkeeper selling the items you find.

Hotline Miami - A violent beat 'em up game where you invade rooms filled with enemies to use guns and melee weapons in close quarters combat.

Baba Is You - A puzzle solving game where words can be pushed around to change the rules of a level and the objects within it.

 

 

MC Dungeons -  Another dungeon crawler where you progress through difficulty levels by levelling up your character and collect and buying better items with the loot you get.

Forager - A survival game where you gather resources to craft items to grow a base and solve puzzles.

My favourite game of the would be moonlighter because of the unique twist where you sell the items you find. As a shopkeeper by day and a dungeon crawler by night it feels like two games put into one because of the completely different sets of mechanics and systems behind each part. The shopkeeping aspect to the game makes it feel like you are constantly progressing and replaying levels more rewarding. The dungeon crawler part is interesting because some of the it counteracts the shopkeeping since a rare item may sell for a large amount and do well in the shop however, it may also be useful for crafting a good weapon which would help you progress further in the dungeon instead.

Baba is you is also very good because of the way the rule sets can interact with each other. Each puzzle is different and explores the interactions between objects and the rules you can apply in different ways. This is done well because as you progress further you can create more complex outcomes with the combinations of rules you've already explored.

Minecraft dungeons is good because of the level replayability. As you progress through the game your character gets more powerful with the loot you collect. With a higher power level you can then do the levels you've already completed on a higher difficulty to get better loot and defeat harder enemies. The interactions between the different sets of loot you can get makes the loadout you build more interesting since certain combinations work much better against specific types of enemies, whilst others can be much more general. This works well with different levels giving different types of loot as one specific level can be replayed to get a certain item set.

Week 1 Tasks
 

 

For the week 1 tasks, I used the framework and put some of the models that were given together to make new buildings and designs. I decided to split the city into two halves, urban and industrial. After placing all of the objects I then had to check that they were of a size accurate in relation to the tank. I didn't want the city to seem too big or too small so I had to keep checking whenever I added a new model. I also attempted to add lighting which wasn't easy as they kept erroring when I added too many. This made the street look more alive with directional lighting. I paired this with varied building sizes and types to make the city feel more alive and realistic.

Here are some videos of the tank moving around the space and shooting the targets with the 3 different weapon types I added. I may add more weapon types in the future as I have learnt how to convert and combine meshes on unreal.

 

 

Edited December 16, 20241 yr by Jake Astles

Week 2 Tasks

The week 2 tasks took a bit longer because the damage and health system had to be redone so the player can heal. Additionally, making new weapons took a while because I had to make new child classes of the weapon swap object and new custom models, particle effects and blueprints for each individual weapon. The flamethrower weapon was the simplest to create once I fully understood how the timeline worked. Similar to the rail-cannon weapon, a lot of the issues were fixed by tweaking the particle effects and how long they last etcetera. However, the railcannon is still a work-in-progress because the charge animation isn't attached to the player properly and will be left behind if the player moves while charging the cannon. It also needs to have the beam extend slower and the penetration of objects tested since it has been programmed to destroy itself after going through three objects but I can't be certain it works yet. Lastly, I added a healing zone where the player can get a health refill, this was relatively easy and just required a clamp and a negative damage output. The hardest part was getting the particles to look right. 

Edited December 19, 20241 yr by Jake Astles

Week 3 Tasks

This week I made the enemy parent class and 2 child classes by using the "AI Move To" and "Aim at Player" modules. Combining this with the "Hull To Face" node I could get the enemy to follow the player and always face it's aim in the players direction. The "Hull to Face" node allows the enemy's body to twist in the direction that it's moving in via a smooth motion. I got it from the player blueprint because this is how the main tank rotates, using a custom event with "Rinterp". Additionally, the fire point and bullet spawner meant that the enemy could chase the player and shoot at them. I may add some enemies with multiple fire points and different move speeds in the future. I also had to add a large navmesh so the enemy's AI would know where to path find. Lastly, I added 2 children to the parent class. One of them moves randomly using the "GetRandomPointInRange" node and the other one chases the player using the aforementioned "AI move To" node. I might later add an enemy that doesn't move and detonates on death. Lastly, I added two diamonds for the model and rotated one inside of the other. Then put a flashing laser material on the base diamond make the whole thing look more futuristic and alive.

Edited January 10, 20251 yr by Jake Astles

Week 3 Stretch Tasks and Week 4 Tasks

I added a minelayer that randomly moves around and fires at the player slowly. It can lay up to five mines before waiting and then putting another five in different locations. I also added a patrolling enemy that moves between any actors added to its movement array. I think this will be useful in the future when I may want enemies to guard an area containing something the player may want.

This week I added some changes to the flamethrower to make it deal damage more efficiently. This means that it can now penetrate objects. This is good because I can apply this to the explosion barrels to make them so that groups of them detonate at the same time. This is because the penetration used multi-trace which means that objects can now have an area of effect. I also made an explosion particle effect for the barrels and improved the flamethrower particle effect so that it doesn't go inside of the tank when it's moving. A smoke layer was added to make it look more realistic. I also spawned a similar smoke effect when the player is low on health. I gave the bullets a particle trail and added a laser sight to clarify where the player was aiming.

Lastly, an enemy that can boost other enemies was added. This was difficult to implement at first because of the way it changes the firing speed, but after some fine adjusting, I managed to give it an aura that makes other enemies near it fire five times faster. It also follows other enemies to ensure that one is always being tracked and boosted. I'll try to add a medic next, using similar mechanics. Flashing was added for enemies that have been boosted and for barrels that are about to explode, this works well on the landmines as it gives the players a visual indicator when things are more dangerous.

 

Week 4 Stretch Tasks and  Update

This week I finally finished the booster enemy and perfected the minelayer. I am proud to say that they are both fully functional. The minelayer's newly added features mean that the mines now explode with twice the radius instead of just disappearing (this happens after five mines have been placed). This is to make them more of a timed hazard. Additionally, a particle effect is created 1 second before detonation to warn the player to get out of the way. I also added a spawn particle effect and a smoke particle effect when the player reaches half health. When the player has 25% health or less they set alight, with fire, which follows them until they heal back up. 

Week 5 Tasks

This week I created the design documents for the game assessment. These consisted of a bubble map, a legend explaining the bubble map and its weapons, enemies, and difficulty levels, and a spatial bubble map which displayed where the areas would be in relation to each other and what would be included between them.

 

Edited January 23, 20251 yr by Jake Astles
Already added some content mentioned in prior week

Week 6 Tasks

This week I finished adding the camera shakes to the weapons and explosions. This used the player camera shake and world camera shake nodes. The player camera shake node shakes the player camera directly, which is good for stuff like firing weapons and receiving damage. Whereas, the world camera shake node allows you to have an object in the game that shakes the players camera in relation to its position. This is quite good for explosions which are happening at a distance from the camera.

Additionally, I fixed the system which plays particle effects depending on the health of the player. The particle effects now disappear if the player reaches the health threshold and are spawned and despawned more efficiently. 

Enemies now also have a particle effects system for their health. They also explode and fall apart/collapse on death, similar to the player.

I also added in a new area with some minelayer enemies. When the second minelayer enemy has been killed then the lava disappears and the light turns on in front of the new mini boss area. The mini boss is like a regular enemy but has a different look and fires rockets every five seconds. Additionally, I tried to make it look like it has an attack animation by adjusting the pitch of the arms by 50 whenever a bullet is fired.

I think the mini boss may need more health and a faster fire rate in the future.

Final Forum Post/ Summary Of Assessment

I think I did well in this module because I completed all of the stretch tasks and created a lot of mechanics. All of the mechanics were fully fleshed, except for the laser weapon and the final two areas. The mechanics I added were things like different enemies, new weapons, camera shakes and three new areas. I also added many new particle effects which were activated on barrel detonation, enemy death and low health and much more. The mini-boss was one of the most complex aspects of my game as I had to create a cinematic cutscene, which took a fair bit of research. The enemies were also a bit of a pain because the damage-boosting and medic enemies seemed to struggle to find other enemies without a lot of tweaking. Another new enemy I added was the minelayer, this was expanded on from the one I created in the stretch task, as the mines now play a particle effect before automatically detonating, once the set amount of mines has been placed. Another complex thing I had to do was to get the doors to work. These were very good for making my level modular and replayable because it stopped the player from exploring too far, whilst continuously expanding the area. This combined well with sets of enemies that needed to be destroyed before the doors opened and even individual enemies or objects that needed to be interacted with, such as extinguishing the fires at the end of the game. The activation enemies were also useful because they allowed me to activate other things like lights and lava, this also allowed me to prevent access to the mini-boss area and then open it up and make it obvious. Lastly, I think I learned a lot in this module because I could barely use Unreal beforehand I am now confident in creating functions, using arrays and other complex parental hierachal structures. I can also now make cinematics in Unreal and can use volumes like a navmesh to make enemies follow the player. I could improve on a few things however, I did not implement the final two areas of the game or utilise the exploding barrel or two weapon mechanics as I planned because I ran out of time. If I could do it all again I would focus much more on fully implementing one mechanic before moving on to the next. However, I think the level is fully-functional and shows off an array of different enemy types, puzzle mechanics and area progression. Another future improvement may be to add menus and more widgets to make the weapon cooldowns even clearer.

Edited February 19, 20251 yr by Jake Astles
Forums crashed at 11:59