Spring Steel Spring Ninja

Role: Main Programmer

Platform: PC

Software: Unity

Game Jam: UAT Founder's Game Jam, September 2022

Theme: Spring

Award Won: Best Audio

This was my first Game Jam game. I worked in a group of 8 to create a platformer with stealth elements. I was the only programmer for this project because I was the only one with experience in programming in Unity. As such, I was the one who put the game together and made the entire game functional. One of the biggest Unity features that I learned how to use was how to carry data from one scene to another, and this would become very useful for later Jams. My biggest challenge with this game was animating with 3D models. We used 3D models to animate the characters, and the process was a little bit different from animating 2D sprites. The biggest hurdle to overcome with animating the character was that the character would be rotated during certain animations for some reason, and I had to figure out how to fix it.

Click this link to download and play it.

Spring Steel Spring Ninja is a 2D stealth platformer created in a group of 8. You play as a ninja that jumps through eight levels while avoiding being seen by enemies.

Spring Steel Spring Ninja was created in Unity using C# as the scripting language.

The art uses a mix of 2D and 3D. The characters are 3D models while everything else is 2D sprites.

Click this link to download and play it.

Hypercalcemia

Role: Main Programmer

Platform: PC

Software: Unity

Game Jam: UAT Game Design Workshop Jam, October 2022

Theme: Liquid

Awards Won: Best Design, Best Audio, Most Polished

I was in my comfort zone when developing this game. I worked in a group of 6 to create an endless-scrolling top-down shooter in the vein of classic arcade games. Once again, I was the only programmer for this project, but the project was much more simple to develop this time around. I used my newfound knowledge of transferring data from one scene to another to create a leaderboard, which enhances the arcade aesthetic that we were going for. I didn't face any major challenges during this project.

Click this link to download and play it.

Hypercalcemia is an arcade-style top-down shooter created in a group of 6. You play as a skeleton running through a graveyard while firing blood from your eyes to defeat enemies and destroy gravestones that are in the way.

Hypercalcemia was created in Unity using C# as the scripting language.

The art entirely consists of 2D sprites.

Click this link to download and play it.

Uprooted

Role: Gameplay Programmer

Platform: PC

Software: Unreal, Trello

Game Jam: Global Game Jam, February 2023

Theme: Roots

Award Won: Best Audio

For this Jam game, I experimented with an engine that I wasn't familiar with: Unreal Engine. I worked in a group of 10 to create a 2D puzzle platformer. Four of us were programmers, and my role as one of those programmers was to program the main mechanic of the game, which was growing roots in and through the ground. Since this was an engine that I was unfamiliar with, simply creating this mechanic, as well as anything else that I programmed, was a huge challenge. I learned how to use Unreal the most during this Game Jam, and I continued learning it from there so I can start developing games with it.

Click this link to download and play it.

Uprooted is a puzzle platformer created in a group of 10. You play as a tree that wants to restore nature to places that have largely abandoned it, such as cities and factories.

Uprooted was created in Unreal using Blueprints as the scripting language.

Despite being made in Unreal, the art entirely consists of 2D sprites.

Click this link to download and play it.

Uprooted is a puzzle platformer created in a group of 10. You play as a tree that wants to restore nature to places that have largely abandoned it, such as cities and factories.

Four of us were programmers for this game, so we divided the work based on how much experience we had with using Unreal. One team member was very experienced with the engine while the rest of us just started learning it. So, we divided the work as so: I worked on the core mechanic of the game, which was growing roots through the ground, one person worked on level design and importing art assets, another person worked on the UI, and the experienced programmer worked on everything else.

Since we were all programmers, we helped each other by giving tips on how to program a feature or to exchange tasks whenever someone is finished with their part of the development. We also had trouble with setting up a repository for the game, so we had to pass around a flash drive and manually merge all of our work that way, which also means we frequently told each other what exactly we worked on so each merge would go smoothly.

In the end, we successfully built the entire game before the deadline.

Click this link to download and play it.

World View

Role: Gameplay Programmer

Platform: PC

Software: Unity, HacknPlan

Game Jam: UAT Game Design Workshop Jam, March 2023

Theme: Deception

Awards Won: Best Audio, Most Technical

I teamed up with some especially incredible teammates for this one. I worked in a group of 4 to create a unique arcade-style twin stick shooter. Two of us were programmers. I worked on the gameplay itself and the teammate worked on the menus. Since I was back in my comfort zone with Unity again, I wanted to incorporate some features that I was unfamiliar with, such as camera manipulation outside of simple panning and controller support. The controller support in particular was the biggest challenge for me to overcome for this project because I had to program the player controls around it.

Click this link to download and play it.

World View is an arcade-style twin-stick shooter created in a group of 4. You play as a ship shooting various things, such as rocks and fish, as the camera zooms out and you learn that the environment you are in isn't what it seems at first.

World View was created in Unity using C# as the scripting language.

The art entirely consists of 2D sprites.

Click this link to download and play it.

Light: Lite

Role: Gameplay Programmer, Level Designer

Platform: PC

Software: Unreal

Game Jam: UAT Game Jam, July 2023

Theme: Light

Award Won: Best Technical Achievement

For this Jam game, I experimented with Unreal Engine to create a unique gameplay system for the game. I worked in a group of 5 to create a 3D first-person puzzle game. Three of us were programmers, and my role as one of those programmers was to program the main mechanic of the game, which was preventing the player from moving outside of light, making them only able to navigate within it. This was a challenge to program because I used concepts that I wasn't familiar with, such as raycasting, to factor in obstacles and walls. Now that I learned how raycasting works, I will use it even more in future projects when necessary. Click this link to download and play it.

Light: Lite is a 3D first-person puzzle game created in a group of 5. The stand-out feature of this game is a system that prevents the player from moving outside of light. Puzzles are designed around this mechanic.

Light: Lite was created in Unreal using Blueprints as the scripting language.

The art entirely consists of 3D models.

Click this link to download and play it.

Light: Lite is a 3D first-person puzzle game created for a Game Jam.

To prevent the player from moving outside of light, a Blueprint actor was created for a spotlight source. This Blueprint actor uses raycasting to measure the player's location in relation to the spotlight. This also allows obstructions to block the ray and limit the size of the light and the amount of space the player can walk.

This code was written to be modular as well so it can be used in items. There are certain items in the game that emit light and can be carried around. These dynamically changes where the player can walk, and this creates more possibilities for puzzles.

Click this link to download and play it.

Honors for Valor

Role: Co-Designer

Platform: Tabletop Card Game

Software: Photoshop, Trello

Game Jam: UAT Veterans Day Game Jam, November 2023

Theme: Veterans Day

This Game Jam was unique in that it was 24 hours long instead of 48 and we worked on a card game instead of a video game. Because of this, I was able to focus on game design since programming wasn't involved. I worked in a group of 9, and all of us knew each other since we worked on the same production studio project. The card game that we ended up developing was a deck-building card game, where we gather cards and build up our decks in order to gather medals and win. I contributed to a number of aspects about our game, such as overall card balance, game flow, and potential implications based on the game mechanics. The last point was especially important since the game was meant to respect veterans in the army and we didn't want to have any game mechanics that would seemingly "disrespect" them.

You can view our presentation on the project here.

Crescent Beast's Balancing Act

Role: Gameplay Programmer, UI Designer

Platform: PC

Software: Unreal

Game Jam: Global Game Jam, January 2024

Theme: Make Me Laugh

Award Won: Best Use of Theme

This Game Jam was really well organized. I worked in a group of 5 as one of the two programmers and we used Unreal to make the game. We used GitHub as our repository for this project, even though GitHub is not well-suited for Unreal. Thanks to prior knowledge and experience, we split up our work so none of us worked on the same files at the same time. This minimized the amount of merge conflicts and it kept the project running smoothly.

Click this link to download and play it.

Crescent Beast's Balancing Act is a 3D endless runner created in a group of 5. The player must avoid obstacles heading their way and avoid falling off the unicycle. Crescent Beast is livestreaming the event and the chat reacts to how the player is doing.

Crescent Beast's Balancing Act was created in Unreal using Blueprints as the scripting language.

The art entirely consists of 3D models.

Click this link to download and play it.

Cultist Farm

Role: Gameplay Programmer, UI Designer

Platform: PC

Software: Unity, Trello

Game Jam: UAT IGDA Academic Chapter Jam, June 2024

Theme: Eldritch

This was probably the most unique Game Jam for me. I worked in a group of 6 as one of the three programmers and we used Unity to make the project. For every Game Jam before this one, I organized my work with the other programmers by saying what parts of the project we work on. However, for this one, we discussed the code's architecture before actually programming it. We organized the class hierarchy and utilized advanced coding features such as interfaces for encapsulation. We unfortunately spent too much time on the planning phase to develop some of it, but we didn't run into any issues with what we worked on thanks to that planning.

Click this link to download and play it.