Deckweaver
Descent Into Chaos
As a graduate student enrolled in the UCF FIEA program, I am currently serving as the Project Lead and Technical Designer. I am in charge of developing a first-person shooter roguelike deck builder with a team of 18 individuals. Rather than relying on traditional firearms, players will utilize magical cards to cast spells. In this capacity, I am responsible for overseeing project operations and delivering presentations to stakeholders, as well as spearheading the implementation and design of various elements within the game. It is worth noting that the game is currently in development and set for release in early July, so no gameplay is finalized.
Cards
In order to optimize our card production process, we have implemented a card creation pipeline that simplifies the creation of basic cards for our designers. This pipeline allows designers to effortlessly incorporate custom-made card components into a card blueprint, which can contain numerous card components, thereby enabling unique combinations of these elements.
Our programmers are not tasked with creating cards but rather focus on developing modular functionality that designers can leverage within the card creation pipeline. By doing so, designers are empowered to rapidly create new and diverse card variations without the need for additional programming support.
For instance, a designer could transform a card that typically causes an explosion and sets enemies on fire into a card that freezes enemies within a specific area in seconds. This approach allows our programmers to concentrate on developing more complex or innovative functionalities, such as our black hole card, for instance.
Card Example - Black Hole
Movement Example
Attraction Example
Our black hole card possesses a dual function in that it can be utilized as both a movement and enemy attraction card. Interestingly, we stumbled upon the movement attribute of the card through rigorous testing and experimentation.
Our intention is to infuse each card in the game with its own distinctiveness and potential for emergent behavior, similar to the black hole card.
Decks
Within the game, players possess three separate decks, but they hold on to one card from each deck. Those cards are readily accessible to the player via designated "hand slots" that correspond with a specific deck. Once a hand slot is activated, the corresponding slot enters a cooldown period, and a new card is drawn from that slot’s deck.
The primary purpose of these separate decks is to enable players to customize them with a specific type or style of card, allowing for quicker reaction times through the development of muscle memory. It is entirely at the player's discretion as to where they place their cards.
This system necessitates tactical decision-making by players, who must carefully consider which deck they place their cards in. For instance, if a player discovers two cards that complement each other exceptionally well, they must ensure that they place these cards in different decks to allow for their simultaneous use in-game.
Vendors and Chests
Players have the ability to manipulate their decks by encountering vendors or chests throughout the game environment, both of which require a specified cost to access.
Although we are still in the process of finalizing the specifics, we plan to award players with a currency that can be obtained through enemy kills.
Players can leverage vendors or chests in several different ways to manipulate their decks, including the acquisition of new cards, transformation of existing cards, removal of cards, or swapping of cards between decks.
Adapting
As the leader of a small-sized team, this project has been a significant learning experience for me. Despite the inherent challenges of my role, I was further burdened by the loss of two team members, leaving us with a team of only 18 people. This led to a challenging decision to pivot our project direction two months into development, placing us significantly behind other teams in our program.
However, thanks to the enthusiasm of my team and some effective management adjustments, we were able to overcome these obstacles and experience a surge in productivity. Our renewed sense of focus and commitment to the new direction of the project has enabled us to make considerable strides towards our goals.
As a result of our design change, we have been able to reduce our meeting times by 52%, resulting in significant time savings for each member of the team, totaling 10 hours per person per sprint.
Furthermore, in the first two months of development with our original design, our team logged a total of 966 hours (483 per month). However, in the single month since our design change, we have logged 1086 hours, more than doubling our previous productivity levels on a per month basis (see chart).