Highrise Guardian
I was working as the Lead designer, Gameplay engineer and the Director of a team of 11, and in charge of:
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Gameplay design (core combat mechanics, weapons, player abilities and perks, game modes, loadouts, UI, interactive objects, etc.)
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Technical implementation of our custom player ability system in C++ and player abilities in Blueprints with multiplayer framework
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Coordinating team meetings and tasks and setting up the timeline, milestones, and playtests
Gameplay Video Trailer
Game Concept
Introduction
Boots on the ground while firing above the cloud! Highrise Guardian is a fast-paced Online Area Retro FPS. Gear up with weapons of your choice, Form the fighting flow with a selection of abilities and perks, and dominate your enemies with map resource control. Make your battle style like arts to fulfill your Anime gunslinger fantasies.
Genre & Description
Multiplayer arena FPS. Players will start with a load out with weapons, abilities, and consumables contained at certain points on a map. Arena shooters may employ movement mechanics that allow for skillful gameplay. Maps in arena shooters are structured in a way that facilitates interaction and combat among players, often utilizing elements like portals or jump pads to provide additional options for movement, and it also features a vertical structure.
Key Features
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BUILD A HERO OF YOUR OWN
In Highrise Guardian, You can select freely select 3 Weapons, 2 Active ABilites, and 2 Passive Perks from the area to create your own anime gunslinger
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WEAPONS: Conveniently Assassinate
Select from Rowdy SMGs, Ruthless Long-range Laser Rifles, Rampant Rocket Launchers, and Shotguns that blow holes in your face. Whether you want to be a long-range sharpshooter or a close-quarter Gun-Kata master, you will find your fancy way to dominate your enemies in style.
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ACTIVE ABILITIES: Be the First to Strike
Extra Agilities, Stealty Infiltration, Intel Scouting, and Control Distortion, Select the active abilities to put yourself on the high ground in the fight you initiated.
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PASSIVE PERKS: Born With Talent
Under Pressure, Pinned down? No Stress! The Perks provides you with a passive bonus to help you overcome disadvantaged situations and outplay your enemies.
Weapons & Abilities & Perks
Players have limited slots for weapons and abilities. They can only choose some of them to make their build before joining in the combat. I designed several weapons and abilities, and each of them focuses on different strengths and performances to create unique play styles. You can check how they work in the video trailer above.
Weapons:
Denzel-10: Full Auto high fire rate nail projectile shooting weapon; Projectiles take travel time to land on enemies.
Sheriff 800: Lever action rifle loaded with 12G buck shot, damage scaled by the number of fragments collided with enemies.
TubeScreamer-10: Classic Rocket Launcher with mid level fire rate. Rockets may knock back players and enemies to force position displacement.
Phased Plasma 40W: Bolt action heavy hit energy beam weapon. Slow fire rate.
Wick’s Sidekick: Semi-Auto magic pistol that has infinite ammo. Low damage output.
Abilities:
Wind Rush: Quick dashing to the front for a small distant
Thermal Sight: Detect nearby enemies in any condition
Optic Phase: Shift into full invisible for 5 second
Magnetic Intervention: Reverse enemies' camera control input
Perks:
Stalker: Strafing speed increase to 150% when getting attacked.
Berserk: Damage bonus scaled by losing HP
Favor of Battle: Regenerate 50% of Total HP after elimination
Hesitation is death: 30% damage bonus, lose bonus for 5 seconds when getting attacked.
Level Design
As the designer of the team, I create the first map. The map is for a small number of players to have fast-paced combat. And the layout of the level allows and encourages players to move frequently in combat. Based on this vision, I have some ideas and rules in its design.
Ideas and rules:
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Several areas in the level.
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Clear paths between different areas, and each area has two to three paths to other areas, and no dead ends.
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Travel across the map in under 15 seconds.
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Make a good flow of movement. Fewer snags on the main path of the level.
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Use landmarks or unique terrain to make different areas easy to be distinguished.
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Distribute resources evenly in the whole level, and put some of them in corners to make every position of the level worth going to, and put some of them in chokepoints to trigger combats.
Inspiration:
After some research, I got some inspriations and references from maps of other arena shooters, like "Blood Run" and "Insomnia" of Quake Champion, and "DM-ASDF" of Unreal Tournament.
Molecule Map:
First step was to make a molecule map, which decides how many areas in the map and their navigation and line of sight.
Blockout with Navigation and Resources:
Because the vertical layout is a requirement of the level design, I have incorporated multi-layered vertical layouts in approximately half of the area, and created paths and connections between different areas through jump pads and portals. I have ensured that there are varying line-of-sight connections between choke points in different areas, allowing players to experience the diversity of layout styles and enabling weapons with different ranges to be effective.
Finish with environment art assets:
