Game Concept

Overview

This section of the DevLog details the title of the game being designed by the student, the concept statement, genre or category of game, concept creation process/area and influences, and the audience.

The title of the game I'm developing is called Dungeonator.

In Dungeonator the player needs to work their way through the dungeons multiple rooms, battling enemies in their path, to find useful items and collect certain keys that allow the player to gain access to different rooms that will lead them towards the final room to vanquish the Dungeon Master.

The genre or category of game that Dungeonator would fall under is a 2D Isometric Platform game that gives a 3D effect to the game, also known as 3/4 perspective, and allows the player to move their character in eight directions around the scene and shows facets of the environment that would not be visible in 2D games using a side view or top-down perspective. The play mode for Dungeonator uses the keyboard and is single player game.

The process taken to develop the concept for Dungeonator was to gather ideas from other games and books to help steer myself towards something that I thought was doable with the amount of skills and knowledge obtained from doing the practicals/exercises, and something that was interesting but could also challenge myself in someway or another to produce a game that people could enjoy. This game would be considered as a mashup design using elements from different games or other material to produce the desired outcome that the developer has intended for. The main ideas used to create the concept for this game came from the classic 2D platformer called The Legend of Zelda, and elements from Dungeons and Dragons campaign books.

The image below depicts what the first Legend of Zelda game looked like during game play on the NES, showing different elements that could be incorporated into Dungeonator in some way including: player health, item slots for weapons, etc, enemies with different actions/abilities, doors/paths to different areas and tilemaps relating to dungeons to name a few. The style of game play used, to me, is quite interesting and has been one of the main influences used for coming up with my game and the isometric display from the practicals in KIT109.

 The target audience associated with Dungeonator are both men and women aimed at the ages of teens and above, that enjoy 2D platform games/isometric platformers, games that have elements or resolve around dungeons and fighting against different enemies and boss battles. The game will cater for casual and hardcore players with multiple different enemies that range in difficulty and obstacles put in place to challenge players through the dungeon floors or choose to take it a little bit easier through the rooms. The controls used to play the game will most likely only require the player to use one hand to control their character, making it more inclusive to players with disabilities. The game may also appeal to those that may be beginner gamers that are after something fun but not extremely difficult to play, someone that loves playing many types of 2D games, enjoys dungeon like games from role playing experiences in D&D or someone looking to become a game developer, artist, etc and wants to look at what students and other developers have been able to accomplish over their degree/job/own time, using programs like Unity, Game Maker, etc. An additional feature that will be implemented into the game is the playing being able to choose between a male or female character to play as.

Game Treatment & Concept Art

You are an adventurer that has stumbled into what seems to be a dungeon, with no way back out you must traverse through the dungeon floors finding items and weapons along the way to help you combat lurking enemies and pass through doors, to defeat the 'Dungeon Master' and escape. You must become 'The Dungeonator'.

Key Features:

• Multiple rooms for the player to interact with
• Multiple enemies to come across
• Simple keyboard controls for players
• Male/Female character choice
• Player characters can move in 8-directions
• Use swords and other items to combat enemies
• Story line dialogue
• Aesthetic assets used for the dungeon

The concept art chosen for Dungeonator is not fully complete as I've not fully decided on all the art to be used throughout the game but have included the basic ideas that may be used for the project to give an idea about the assets used for the background, objects in the scene and other items.

The tilemaps below give an idea about the tiles that could be used thus far for this game, including possible enemies, weapons, obstacles and key and door sprites for passing from one room/floor to another. These sprite sheets were obtained and downloaded from itch.io with links to their location when the image is clicked.

The following image is a random scene using some of the assets of the dungeon tiles and the male sprite from my player movement upload to hopefully show some basic art of the game.