Rushing Tide
Rushing Tide is a 2D free-movement game developed by the Dapper Dolphins under DigiPen's GAM-200 & -250 classes during Fall '21 and Spring '22.
This was a 12-person team, of which I served as a game designer primarily responsible for gameplay mechanics. I created rapid-prototypes of player movement (making 3 different base player controllers and 5 versions of the dash mechanic overall), enemy behaviors, and a good chunk of the design-based documentation.
Rushing Tide Trailer
Overview
Rushing Tide is a weird one, since we rescoped so many times due to the limited usability of a custom engine and to put less strain on our artists. Fortunately, that gave me a lot to do, since I was primarily in charge of prototyping player and enemy behaviors in Unity. I'm fairly happy with the finished result, though I do wish the game just had more content.
The game was also refocused into getting collectables instead of pure speed due to the fatigue the level lengths were putting on our Design Lead, which was very fair.
Movement Scripts
The earliest version of this project had the dolphin going around in a water bubble with momentum akin to Sonic the Hedgehog. Very quickly, that was scrapped in favor of a 2D free-form sidescroller, still with an emphasis on speed, basing it off Ecco the Dolphin (looking back, someone on the team was definitely a Sega fan). We decided on movement and a dash similar to DKC: Tropical Freeze as our new basis, on my suggestion. In the designers' Unity prototype, I also made it so that the dolphin was able to jump out of the water (which was really fun to do), but was never implemented into the project due to it being too difficult to put in engine.
Prototype Squample (Player Character)
Prototype Jellyfish and Swordfish Enemies
Enemies
Aside from the player controller, the main thing I focused my time on for this project was creating engaging enemies. We ended up going with two total due to the scope of the game, those being the Jellyfish, which floats in place and can be defeated with a dash when not electrified, and the swordfish, which charges at the player from the right side of the screen after a warning animation has played. What's funny is that I modeled both of these enemies after Jetpack Joyride of all things, since I felt avoiding enemies rather than outright defeating them would better serve our goal of letting the player go fast.
