Hectic Cleanup: Gameplay showcase.

This gameplay showcase is for the second component of my capstone for my bachelors in game programming and development. The goal of the game is to pick up all of the different messy objects before the time runs out. To make for a more hectic and fun gameplay experience I opted to have a degree of uncontrollability in the game's original mechanics. This was done by having the movement speed adjusted to be slightly too fast for the size of the environment and to have destructible objects that fall down and get in the way of the player. However upon revisiting the project I found these mechanics felt too rudimentary and only increased the difficulty by making the player have to fight against the game's controls rather than through the game's design.

This lead me to revisit and update the controls, level design and mechanics. The original level was sparsely decorated with few objects in it other than the mess objects. It also had a more simplistic mechanic for cleaning items as simply clicking on the item would count the item as cleaned up. So to start I began by changing the level design and included verticality within the design by adding the top floor. I also spent more time on doing set-dressing by adding additional picture frames and windows to the environment. Some additional furniture items provided some more natural obstacles for the player to have to navigate around. In turn this allowed for the player's speed to be adjusted down for a more comfortable experience. I also changed the method for cleaning up items by having the interaction be physics based. this also lets the player move non-mess items around to clear up obstacles that may prevent an item from being picked up. Once an item is grabbed the two trash cans in the environment show a glowing rotating green arrow above them to indicate to the player where the items belong. Originally these arrows did not glow, but I found by adding a glow it made it would make it very clear to any new player that this is where the mess items should go. Lastly, the "mess bombs" are larger chip bags that when approached begin to jump around and emit a red glow before eventually exploding. This launches additional mess objects and throws the player and items around the room. The final results of these changes are shown in the video above.

This project was created using Unreal Engine 4.27 with the gameplay created using the blueprints scripting system. I made a few additional objects to the be used for the project within Blender and used additional assets through the Unreal Marketplace. As a hopeful gameplay designer, I chose this project as it allowed me to focus on creating a gameplay experience that is complimented by the design of its level and mechanics. I believe this project shows how a game's level design can work in tandem with its mechanics to drastically change the overall player experience.