GAME DESIGN DOCUMENTATION EXAMPLE

 Astra, Space Wizard: “Corvidon Prison Break”

This game design document describes the details for a third-person 3D shooter/adventure game/demo (portfolio project) that employs a Pac-man-like chase dynamic and features an original story and characters

Characters

Astra

Astra is the main character in this game and a talented, but irreverent young space wizard who is greatly sought after by Imperium elites for both personal missions and defense against the Warlocks that plague the known universe. She has many friends across the Imperium, but she’s often getting in trouble with the Wizard Guild for breaking rank as she’s one of the only wizards who is consistently untrusting of her superiors.

Princess Priscilla

The princess is the darling of the Imperium and priceless to the royal family. She’s elegant and beautiful, but also trained in combat.

Captain Haggarty

Captain Haggarty is a high-ranking military officer in the Imperium army who is often tasked with accompanying the princess in her travels along with a small contingent of soldiers. Though Captain Haggarty’s a skilled fighter, his talents are no match for Warlock magic or the strength of the Warlock’s Demomorphs.

Demomorphs

Domomorphs are demon-like beings manifested by Warlock magic. Anything they can see or hear is instantly perceived by the Warlock who made them. Robot-like in their simplicity they are tasked with guarding particular stations at the prison. Demomorphs are very strong and can kill a normal human with just a few strikes. Since they are programmed, they also move gracefully and calmly as they run.

Lieutenant Reeves

Reeves is a pilot who often accompanies Astra on her missions and serves as eyes in the sky. He communicates with her via the Imperium military comm system and guides her along in her missions.

Various Prisoners

There will be an interesting cast of characters also imprisoned in the walls of Corvidon. The player will have the ability to free these characters as well in order to create a diversion, so they will need to have their own unique looks and expressions.

These prisoners have come from all over the galaxy. One might be a simple space pirate. Another might be a vicious monster. Some are humanoid while maybe others look like monsters or aliens.

Think about all the different races in Star Wars, especially Jabba’s palace.

Story

Princess Priscilla and Captain Haggarty were captured by Warlocks while traveling between worlds as they attempted to recruit soldiers for the Imperium. Now, locked away in a remote prison powered by Warlock magic, their only hope of escape is a Space Wizard with a force blast capable of overpowering a Key Orb sitting at the top of the structure.

The prison floats suspended in the air of a gaseous planet touting a barely livable atmosphere and no solid ground surface. Outside the prison is a constant storm. This was not a sought-after location. It’s where the worst of the worst, according to the Warlocks, are banished never to be seen again.

Glowing lights run along the paths up and down the stairs of the prison to guide visitors down the dark hallways. The light is powered from the orb at the top of the prison and wired through a grid running throughout the structure. A mysterious element found to be conductive with the energy wielded by Space Wizards and Warlocks keeps the prison afloat and the grid alight. But if another Wizard was to use their force blast and hit the Key Orb multiple times they could over power the base magic and effectively take control of the facility, including all cell doors.

Astra’s spry athletic ability and her power in magic, which is beyond her years, make her perfect for the escape mission. She will have to break the Captain and the Princess out of the Warlock’s prison by first making it to the top of the structure and overpowering the Key Orb with her force blast. Then, she’ll have to make it through a maze of Demomorphs to find the Imperium captives locked away at the bottom.

The Demomorphs are the eyes and ears of the Warlock who made them, so when Astra’s rescue envoy drops her off, she will only have a matter of minutes to secure Priscilla and the Captain before the Warlock shows up with his army.

In this demo Astra will be attempting to save Princess Priscilla and Captain Haggarty from a Warlock’s remote prison, but in a larger game/story we’d get to see Astra uncover a greater plot/conspiracy going on between a few secretive members of the Wizard Guild and the evil Warlocks as they attempt to overthrow the Imperium.

Additional Theming

This is a game about overcoming seemingly insurmountable adversities. The dialogue between the good characters should capture the beauty in humanity worth fighting for, but the structures and barriers in place (the Imperium, the Guild and other factions and rules that apply to different groups, the enemies, the literal buildings etc.) should seem so large, dark and overbearing that the oppression to this beauty feels inescapable.

In a version of the game with a larger scale, the story would ideally progress from Astra’s biggest challenges being misunderstood (like teenagers often are) to bigger problems like saving the Imperium from the Warlock’s terrorist attacks to later uncovering the betrayal of the Wizard Guild and saving the Imperium from the oppression that has been going on within right under her nose.

Story Progression

After being dropped off on the launchpad outside the prison, Astra/the player will immediately hear Reeves’ voice as he sets the scene and tension through a voice over with an effect that lets the player know they are hearing him through a comm system.

Reeves will mention the goal, the time restraint and the fact that there are enemies waiting inside the prison, which will increase tension as the player makes their approach. Reeves will also have to mention that the force blast will be more effective on them than hand to hand combat.

When Astra first sees a Demomorph, Reeves will again come over the comm system educating the player on what a Demomorph is and remind the player to find the Key Orb.

When the player makes it to the top Reeves will prompt the player to look for the Key Orb and fire the force blast, hinting that it could take a few shots to overpower the Warlock’s enchantment.

Once the Key Orb has been overpowered by the player’s force blast the whole terrain should change colors from red to blue, which will reward the player and communicate a change in the enchantment. Reeves will congratulate the player and remind them to now find the Princess and the Captain. He will also hint that the player may need to be creative to overcome the large number of Demomorphs.

The hint shouldn’t be obvious, but should also nudge the player toward the idea of unlocking the prison cells for other prisoners as well who will then become a diversion to the Demomorphs or even join the fight against them as the player makes their way to the bottom of the prison.

As time counts down, Reeves will warn that the Warlocks are on their way and encourage the player to hurry. When the player reaches the ground floor, Reeves will also tell the player what to look for so they know they’ve found the right people to rescue. Once the player and the Captain and the Princess all make it to the launchpad to be rescued a win sequence will be triggered and Reeves will congratulate Astra on another successful mission.

Gameplay Goals

Overall –

Rescue Princess Priscilla and Captain Haggarty from the Warlock’s prison

Gameplay –

1. Evade and fight off Demomorphs with punching/kicking and force blast

2. Find Key Orb

3. Shoot/force blast Key Orb until it’s overpowered and changes color

4. Open now unlocked prison cell doors so prisoners join the fight

5. Find the Captain and Princess and unlock their cell

6. Make it to the launch pad with escapees unscathed

User Skills

- Run and Jump / Evade Demomorphs

- Force blast (shoot a magic fire ball)

- Punch/Kick in close combat

- Open cell doors

Game Mechanics

Running and Jumping –

The player will use typical controls (“W”, “A”, “S” and “D” and space bar or DPad and “A” button) for running and jumping, but these actions should feel smooth and easy. When Astra is jumping from high up it should feel like she’s gliding and hits the ground lightly like a ninja in “Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon”

Astra is fast and as athletic as our best gymnasts. Think Spiderman mixed with the most limber Jedi knight. The best Space Wizards and Warlocks are able to utilize their magic in their movements and feats of strength. They are essentially super human and the player should feel like that moving around in the world.

Running and Jumping is especially important because evading enemies in this Pac-Man style chase of constant movement and battling against the clock will be just as important as the fighting mechanics. Choosing to navigate the dark, tight space of the labyrinth-like prison or to go outside where there’s more light and open spaces will be key.

Inside the prison, it will be close quarters and tight confined spaces, which is more suited for picking off Demomorphs one by one with hand to hand combat and will be a must for opening cell doors. Demomorphs will soon close in though with greater numbers and the player will be forced to go back outside the prison into open spaces. They’ll be further away from their main goal, but it would be in hopes that with more space they can utilize their Force Blast to take out a greater number of enemies at once.

Hand to Hand combat –

The player will be able to punch or kick in close quarters by clicking the left mouse button or by using the “B” button on a console controller.

Being that the Demomorphs are big and strong, Astra should not be able to take on more than one or two at a time and since they are attacking in a hoard it will often be more successful for the player to run, create some distance and fire their long-range weapon, the force blast.

In close quarters though, when struck or a punch is landed it should be felt by the player. There should be a felt cost to every gritty impact. This furthers the themes oppression and vulnerability. It also creates contrast between the smooth and easy running and jumping and the violence and struggle of the combat.

In the demo version of this game combat will be simple, but if time wasn’t holding the project back scale would then dictate a more complex fighting system with left- and right-hand punching, left- and right-hand kicking, head butts and possibly even special moves to be unlocked as the player completes missions.

Force Blast –

The player will be able to shoot a large fire ball by clicking the right mouse button. The Force Blast should not work in close quarters. As Astra begins to muster a Force Blast when an enemy or object is too close the player should see a magic particle effect on Astra’s hands, but it doesn’t come to fruition and, frustrated, Astra shows us with her body language that she wasn’t able to fire the blast.

Also, it should take about 2 to 3 seconds before the player can fire this again and through sound and animation it should be communicated that each blast takes a lot of energy from Astra.

The main goal here isn’t to force the player to manage Astra’s energy level. The player should however have to choose wisely when to fire the Force Blast as the onslaught of the Demomorph hoard is chasing them. A miss could force the player to have to move further away from their objective in order to open up enough space for another shot of the force blast.

Once again, this will encourage the constant running and heighten the tension the player feels as they race against the clock.

Open Cell Doors –

The player will use the “E” key on the keyboard to open cell doors once the Key Orb has been overpowered and the color throughout the prison has changed from red to blue.

Perhaps the “Shift” keys or “Enter” key could also be allocated for this ability, but only “E” should be listed in instructions as it is the most practical to reach while the player is moving.

When a character is freed from their cell there should be a visceral reaction either to finally get at these Demomorphs who have tortured these prisoners or an expression of euphoric joy as the prisoner gets a taste of freedom.

The cell door should be big and feel heavy and oppressive. It should sound and feel more like a large stone being moved away from a tomb’s entrance than a simple latch door.

Progression and Challenge

When the player first approaches the prison and senses the first Demomorph they will likely back up toward a safer open space. If they try to fight with hand to hand combat or miss with a force blast the backing up is still the likely conclusion.

Eventually they will either pick off enemies one by one and make headway toward the top of the prison or make a run for it, which is also an acceptable strategy.

By the time the player makes it to the top of the prison, they will likely have some idea of the layout of the whole structure as the light paths on the ground as well as the symmetry of the design will be predictable, but also allow for enemies to come from multiple angles, which due to their programming will be unpredictable. This dynamic should allow the player to be able to strategize quickly and simply for their descent to the bottom of the prison.

Whether the player chooses to jump off of the top of the prison or wind their way down the ramps inside they will likely be faced with so many Demomorphs that they could quickly be overwhelmed. They will then be forced outside to once again pick off enemies one by one or they will be inspired to open prison doors and let prisoners that aren’t Captain Haggarty and Princess Priscilla out of their cells.

If prisoners are bigger than the player’s character, “cool” looking in some way, and possibly shouting at the player with unique voices as the player runs by it will increase the player’s chance of making this fun choice. Also, having a large light above the occupied cells will increase the chance of this decision.

When prisoners are released, Demomorphs will opt to chase and fight those characters over the player, thus creating a diversion and time for the player to escape or create space to kill more enemies with their force blast. Prisoners will also help the player in the fight by attacking Demomorphs themselves with hand to hand combat.

Two separate prisoners could act as trump cards on opposite sides of the structure as they will be able to kill Demomorphs in one hit. Once the player observes this ability in these particular freed prisoners, this could become a wrinkle the player plans to take advantage of in future runs.

When the player finally makes it to the cell containing Captain Haggarty and Princess Priscilla and opens the door, these characters should follow the player without hesitation and not bother with fighting Demomorphs. They shouldn’t wander off or get caught up. Time will likely be low and the player will want to break for the finish line/the launch pad.

The Princess and the Captain will fight back if Demomorphs begin to swipe at them. A shout of being in pain and struggle will be necessary as the player will likely be running fast toward the goal. The player will then be forced to come back to them and fight off the Demomorphs with hand to hand combat or the Princess and Captain could die at the hand of the Demomorphs.

If the Princess or Captain are in proximity of a force blast explosion, they could also die triggering a “Failed Mission” sequence. This means the player will need to have removed enough Demomorphs or moved quickly enough to keep the Princess and the Captain from the possibility of running into too many Demomorphs.

If the player makes it to the launch pad with the Princess and the Captain in under three minutes, they will have completed the mission and should be congratulated accordingly.

Losing

The conditions for losing are as follows:

1. The player falls off the edge of the prison structure

2. The player dies by taking on 10 hits/swipes from Demomorphs

3. Either the Princess or Captain die by taking on 5 hits from Demomorphs

4. The player hits Princess or Captain with a force blast

5. Time counts down to 0 from 3 minutes

Art Style

Being that this is a portfolio piece with a one-man team, I will have to work within my limitations. I will be downloading character models from Adobe Mixamo and creating a prison using blueprints and materials from free kits on the Unreal Marketplace. That said I should be able to accomplish the aesthetics I would like to see.

The theme (listed at the beginning of this document) of the beauty in humanity being at odds with oppression lends itself toward an aesthetic of different contrasts.

For instance, the prison could be dark, musty and stale, but the characters could be colorful and vibrant in their personalities. For the Demomorphs, however, I will use one of the darker models with a blank face to further symbolize the staleness and oppression, the evil opposing good, the death opposing life. I was certainly thinking of the Xenomorph from the original alien a bit and their lack of facial expression.

The characters should look like they would fit in either the Star Wars universe or Guardians of the Galaxy part of the Marvel universe generally. Many of the characters in these universes can either be sinister like a Lord Vader or fun, silly and even cute like BB-8. I think the more variety in the characters (human, alien, monster) will add to the enjoyment of freeing these different personalities from their cells. These are prisoners from all over the galaxy.

The prison itself should be reminiscent of the architecture in the 2022 version of Dune. The structure could look ancient, but the light paths winding through the prison and the Key Orb could make it also look futuristic. The prison should be large and feel epic as soon as the player sees it. It should be foreboding. A large iconic animal sculpture should help accomplish this.

I later came up with the idea of applying the same concrete texture to for the build to a wolf and then a crow to enhance the look and vibe of the prison. I did the same for the skulls on the side walls.

One more inspiration for the architecture and the constant storm is the building in the final scenes of the original Ghostbusters movie and the architecture inside the mine in the new 2022 Ghostbusters movie. In both movies the Ghostbusters are going head to head with Gozer, an ancient God. I imagine the Warlocks to have a long history and similar evil nature. Also, the storms that begin to form when Gozer enters the world could be similar to the storms surrounding the prison.

Music

Rolling with the inspiration of older IP’s like Star Wars and Dune and even the musical nostalgia baked into the Guardians of the Galaxy reference I think it’s a sensible jump to take notes from one of the best sci-fi soundtracks of all time in Bladerunner.

I want to capture the synth sounds that harken back to the 80’s and some of those well-known sci-fi atmospheres. The wonder and overwhelming nature of these old synth sounds also enhance the epic feel of the architecture etc. as well as tie to the theme of oppression in a way.

To accomplish this, I will be borrowing a Moog Voyager to get the authentic synth tones and also using a plugin from Spectronics called Omnisphere, which will allows me to add glitch sounds and many other atmospheric elements if needed.

I will need a main title theme (1) that will loop, a quiet, sparse song (2) that will play when the player starts the mission and hasn’t seen an enemy yet, and lastly a song (3) that ramps up the tension as the player is being chased. This last song will continue until the timer counts down, the player dies or the player completes the mission.

As I began experimenting with writing for this project, I realized it would make the whole thing feel more cohesive if I introduced a musical theme in the main title that existed in some form both in the quiet, sparse song before the enemies come into the picture and the chase song. I was then inspired by the cowboy-esque flute sound in the TV show Mandolorian. I accomplished a similar thing by going back and forth pretty quickly between two notes on the analog synth. It doesn’t sound cowboy anymore and doesn’t evoke the thought of anything Mandolorian now, but it does work to make the songs cohesive as a musical theme. That quick back and forth note change is now the Astra theme.

Sounds

The Setting

When the player is outside the prison, they should hear the sounds of the wind and the storms on this hellscape of a planet. When they are inside, they should hear the burning of the torches and the generated electrical sounding power from the Key Orb and the light paths. Footsteps should be hard on the Dune-esque stone platforms as characters stomp around in their space boots. The Demomorphs, however should have lighter footsteps as they are programmed and calm as they attempt to kill.

Astra

Astra should sound confident and strong. Look for a voice, dialogue, expressions and reactions that will help a player feel an attachment to this character and see themselves in her a bit. For instance, if she’s over confident she will seem like a jerk, but if she’s too weak then it won’t make sense with the fact that she wields these super powerful abilities to shoot fire balls from here hands etc.

Reeves (Voice Over Guide)

I’ll be creating the guide voice myself. My goal is to keep each cue short and to the point, but include all the necessary information. I will have to time out certain portions of the game based on how long it takes to complete these sound cues. The voice would ideally sound friendly, but urgent and have an accent much like many of the Star Wars and Star Trek characters, which helps create the feel that the universe is large and contains many different people groups.

Demomorphs

The demomorphs should shriek a lot. When they first see Astra or another character escapes from their cell, when they’re hit by a force blast or a punch/kick and definitely when they are striking the player or another character. The prison should be full of terrifying shrieks – a demon pit so to speak. Different than other characters, the Demomorphs swipes should sounds like claws scraping or gashing the other characters when they make contact.

Other Characters

My plan going in will be to match character voices with alien and monster sounds found for free online. I will also use a free kit with male and female warrior/soldier voice sounds and fill in where needed with original content. These should be fun and get the player’s attention. They should also be unique/iconic to each different character.

Technical Description

-Consoles (Playstation, XBOX, Switch)

-PC and Mac

I realized while completing this project that if you build in Unreal on a Mac then you can’t build for PC and vice versa. I could’ve downloaded Unreal Editor on a friend’s computer and built the game again easily, but opted to make a video with the Mac version for the purposes of a portfolio.

Target Player/Viewer

Being that this is a portfolio project, the goal is to impress a future employer. I’ll be making choices that hopefully get the attention of the user and show that I have sensibilities about what a player will think is fun and memorable. It’s also important that features, mechanics etc. are clear in gameplay and through video.

Other Ideas

As I’ve worked on this and became more passionate about the game and themes, it’s become apparent this could be a much bigger game with a broader scope. Having more playable characters with different abilities and various missions would open it up quite a bit.

A force blast could bounce or have a homing ability. Wizards and Warlocks could pull or push objects magically. They could have a speed burst or fly etc. They could shake the ground, creating earthquakes.