Hymn of the Sands

Chronoception is a 2D surreal, avoidance-based side-scroller twitch game built in GuildEd. Armed with the ability to slow down their enemies or stop time around them for brief intervals, the player must navigate through the eerie Time Vortex while dodging supernatural hazards and collecting scattered pieces of Dr. Beau Ty’s broken pocket watch. The main gameplay mechanic and main character were inspired by the British T.V. show Doctor Who. The game was built over the span of three months starting in October 2012. The game was designed around the mechanic of slowing down time.

Challenges for the game included designing interesting enemies to complement the mechanic, programming the various AI behaviors, and teaching the player how to use the time mechanic. Through overcoming these challenges, we learned how intertwined the core mechanics and the enemies are along with various techniques for how to teach the player the game.

Deathball features intense, multi-player non-traditional capture-the-flag team battles.

“Fat Ninja” is a fast-paced 2D platformer where players take the role of Wei, the son of a legendary ninja who must retrieve his father’s sword, taken by the Men in Black, if he wants to be accepted as a true ninja. However, because of his physical limitations, he must rely on a grappling hook to move around and needs to constantly pick up donuts, lest he dies of hunger.

We did this game in a 2 month period, using an in-house engine called GuildEd. The main challenge of this game was creating a fun core mechanic that we could exploit in several ways, along with finding a concept that the entire team felt passionate about. By using the grappling hook mechanic that allowed people to quickly swing across the stage, making daredevil acrobatics, and a funny storyline that poked fun at the popular conception of ninjas, “Fat Ninja” ended up being a fun game. It also taught us the many facets that making a game entails, lessons that we took to our following team projects. 

Lunacy is a 2D side-scrolling puzzle/adventure game built in GuildEd, a Guildhall proprietary engine. The player controls Rupert Greene, a hippy conspiracy theorist, as he tries to uncover the Truth on the dark side of the moon. Rupert must work his way into the depths of an inverted, pyramidal alien ruin by using a mysterious artifact to manipulate the force of gravity in order to avoid traps and solve puzzles, all while managing his precious oxygen supply. His ultimate goal is to locate fragments of the Australe Slab, a Rosetta Stone-like tablet, the key to unraveling the mysteries of the aliens.  We began this project in October 2012 and completed it in December of that year, for a total project time of about three months. We built the game around an original gameplay mechanic, a gravity ‘bubble’ that the player can create at will and then jump into to float around obstacles. Challenges included programming the core mechanic, building challenging puzzles, and working around engine limitations, especially on art file size and memory management. Overcoming these challenges helped us learn how to optimize our programming, art assets, and level layouts, and taught us to work together more efficiently to meet deadlines on time.

Miasma is a 2D physics-based platfomer.  In Miasma, players take control of the necromancer Varthras. Vathras must traverse the beautiful and deadly Crystal Caverns, armed only with the mighty power of Miasma. Along the way Vathras must contend with deadly drops, keened spikes, and fierce crystal Gryphons from the Kingdom of Good.

In this eccentric CTF style game, set in another time and place, two factions fight for control of the greatest source of power in the universe.

Raging Sushi is a combat-heavy pseudo-3D side-scroller centering around a renegade sushi roll as he embarks on an epic journey to break his curse and fulfill his destiny. Enter the role of Lon-LI, cursed with an insatiable craving to complete his soul, battling fiercely to earn his name and a spot on the menu. Fight as a dark hero, slicing and dicing other sushi rolls, and collect ingredients at the end of each level. Traverse the perilous terrain of a sushi restaurant’s kitchen, sushi bar, and boss stage. Encounter highly stylized enemies such as the California Roll, the Dragon Roll, the Emperor Crab boss, and many more! Unleash the fury of ancient Japanese weaponry like the Plastic Kocktail Katana or the Sesame Seed Shuriken on your quest to victory.

In a post-apocalyptic future, you must fight for resources to ensure your survival.

Revenge of the Dragon King is a side-scrolling bullet-hell shooter inspired by the Chinese novel, Journey to the West. The game tells the story of the Dragon King’s quest to retrieve The Staff of the East Sea, which the mischievous Monkey King has stolen. The player plays as the Dragon King and uses a state-shifting mechanic similar to Ikaruga. The player can shifts between the physical and spiritual realm to avoid and destroy the Monkey King’s minions. This mechanic is key to the player’s success as they must use it for both offensive and defensive roles.

Salvage Runner is a high-speed, retro arcade style top-down space flight game. The player assumes the role of an intergalactic smuggler with a cargo hold full of military grade salvage that has to escape from the ever tenacious Juggernaut-class warship hot on your tail. While the player's freighter has a lot of special modifications, it is totally unarmed and must make use of your superior maneuverability and piloting skills to make it through an asteroid filled ship graveyard, a minefield, and a meteor shower to make it to freedom and a hefty payday. 

The design of Scarlet Moon began as a mystery noir theme set on the moon during the Cold War.  Players take control of Private Investigator Maurice Mooney in order to solve the conspiracy around the murder of Miriam Miller.  Maurice must use his considerable sleuthing abilities in order to distract, avoid, and trap security forces as he seeks for the clues to find Miriam’s killer. Patrolling security guards sprint toward Mooney when they see him, and security cameras shoot him on sight. Environmental hazards, such as collapsing floors, thwart Maurice’s progress. Maurice uses his cunning to find a way to evade the guards and traverse the environment, including hiding from guards, finding new paths to avoid them, and figuring out how to trap them.

"The Wild Within is a distinctive side-scrolling adventure that focuses on exhibiting a beautiful natural environment, creating a visceral player experience with fierce animal transformations, and offering the player rewarding platforming challenges consisting of clever uses of double-jumping, gliding, and combat.

The player character, Tiponi, must use her spirit-calling abilities to reach the center of the forest and destroy the source of the darkness. These abilities include summoning the spirit of a bear to aid her in combat and summoning the spirit of an eagle to extend her jump. Tiponi can summon the spirit of the bear at any time to strike immediately in the direction that she faces to deal damage. She may summon the spirit of the eagle after Tiponi jumps by jumping again before she lands, resulting in a double jump. Holding the jump button after summoning the eagle spirit enables Tiponi to glide. The player must apply the combined use of these abilities skillfully in order to successfully traverse the levels."

In a digital world where data is the essence of all beings, you must capture precious data streams and defend them from being hacked by your enemies.

Untethered is a gravity-shifting, two-dimensional side-scrolling platform game that forces the player to think, literally, in new directions. Drehen is an engineer sent to the blacked out space station Torque. He is tasked to investigate the power outage and repair the station.  Armed only with his gravity inverter, he must look at problems in a unique way and shift gravity to solve the puzzles and escape with his life.  The enemy is the station itself—malfunctioning security lasers have become deadly hazards to be avoided.  Hull breaches lead to the stygian void of outer space lie all over the station, with assured demise to anyone unlucky enough to fall into them.