Dodge Ball
Cooperative Game Project
Summary Dodge Ball
Genre
Shooting Game
Arena Game
Platform
PC
Engine
Unreal Engine 4
Time
5 days (2019)
Team Size
3 Designers
My Roles
Gameplay Designer
Level Desginer
UI & UX Designer
Game Overview Intro
Game Concept
Dodge Ball - Neon Edition is a competitive, local-multiplayer, and sports game for 2 players. The goal is to hit the other player a total of three times to win. Use the fast movements and the blockers of the level to your advantage to get around and dodge the other player's attacks
My Thoughts
This is the first small and collaborative course project we had at Futuregames and it was a lot of fun. It was set as an introduction course and we did not get a lot of time to work on it, 5 days, but I am really happy with how this small game prototype came out in the end and how much joy it would bring our classmates as we played it locally for fun in our classroom every so often
Design Pillars Key Features
Neon
In a futuristic neon arena two... dogs?... fight by throwing glowing neon balls at eachother. Everything is neon in the neon edition!
Dodgeball
Inpired from the sports of dodgeball. Try to not get hit by your opponent, but as soon as the ball falls it's your time to make a shot!
Duel
With only two player's in the arena a lot of pre-planning comes into play as you get time to predict where your opponent might shoot from
Game Loop Objectives
Objectives
Both players share the same goal of throwing the balls to hit the other player a total of 3 times to win the game
Progression
Each player starts out with one ball each as well as 3 lives each. Players may steal each other's balls as they roll around the arena. The matches vary in how long time it takes to win as it's all up to how aggressively or passively the players choose to go at one another
Design Details Deep Dive
Gameplay Design
Mechanics & Systems
- Responsive movement controls
- Picking up and throwing the balls
- The glowing ball system
- Player-tracking camera system
- Simple health system
Picking up and throwing the balls
To pick up a ball the player just simply needs to run into it, the more balls you carry the slower you will move. The shot will fire from the direction which the player is currently facing their character towards. The player can hold down the throw button to charge up their shot and make the ball travel further at a higher speed
Responsive movement controls
To really make the game live up the standards of dodgeball the players are able to move at a high speed with a lot of agility to quickly adapt to an incoming situation and dodge the fast-flying balls
The glowing ball system
As the player shoots the ball it will become red to indicate that it is currently able to damage the players. Both players may take damage as the ball is glowing red which means that you need to be careful to not shoot the ball in such an angle that you hit yourself. After a short moment of firing the ball it will turn back to it's blue colors
Level Design
There is currently only one level in Dodge Ball, which is a square neon arena with a few obstacles that the players can choose to use as cover or shoot and bounce their balls against
The scale of the level is something we changed from the initial size of the map as it was too big for two players to fight on
UX & UI
For the first time doing UI in Unreal Engine, I think I got the hang of it quite quickly and started messing around and testing the different functionalities. The health system is quite simple and hooked up by changing the number as a player gets hit