Type-2033
Type 2033 is a prototype I worked on as my capstone project for Circuit Stream’s Game Design Bootcamp. The project was documented, developed, and pitched within the span of one month.
The game is an FPS Metroidvania where the player takes control of an android tasked to escape the facility they’re confined within. Made within Unreal Engine 5.
Role(s): Sole Designer & Developer.
Features Include:
One weapon & ability pick up
Three enemy types with unique behavior & attacks
Twelve seperately crafted rooms to explore with asymetrical design
A minimalistic and unique level layout to visually guide the player’s traversal through the environment
and more!
Available to play on itch.io: https://edd-ohh.itch.io/type-2033
Level Design & Vision Uniformity
In the project, I was working with two main limitations for the level design;
Technical: Limiting the game’s tutorial section to not incorporate a traditional map system.
Design: Translating the intuitive level specialization player’s attain in a 2D context into a 3D space without compromising on identity.
To solve this, I swapped the style of the project to something minimal, so that points and places of interest in a 3D space can be easier to gauge relative to a player’s position through basic texture and shape manipulation.
From there, I used the engine’s level streaming feature to map the outer skeleton of the area’s architecture to always be seen, and have rooms only load when players enter them through doors (teleporters). Elements that are visible across all rooms are soft-indicators for player navigation and progression, serving to intuit as points of interest for player progression.
Gameplay & Encounter Design
For the gameplay, whilst this tutorial map keeps the player fairly limited, the game is designed to scale player power and agility greatly, to keep itself within the quickness and fluidity found in traditional metroidvanias. The enemies are then created and layered to compliment this reality & provide challenging countermeasures.
1) Melee Chaser enemies as a baseline for managing positioning and stress
2) Crawler enemies to hold player in place ( slower speed in contrast)
3) Ranged enemies within hitscan weaponry, meant tokeep player cognizant of their surroundings and prioritize encounters in relatively expected ways.