Beat Reaper is a 2D top-down rhythm puzzle game where players must input their movements with the beat. The player plays as a nameless assassin from the underworld, hunting down various people who have all cheated death in some way. The game features 3 complete levels, each containing 2-6 mini-puzzle rooms of increasing difficulty.Â
I made this game alongside a partner over the course of a semester during my time at USC. For this project, I worked primarily on the engineering and level design. I was also able to learn a lot about building a game from the ground up, starting with various demos and eventually working towards a Game Design Document which went into specific details about each mechanic as well as level layouts and possible puzzle solution paths.
For the engineering side of things, I worked on everything from the player movement to the different enemy AI and the camera shift/zoom effects. The player movement follows a grid-based movement system. Players can move 1 or 2 spaces per beat, with the 2-space dash allowing players to skip through any obstacles or walls in their path. As players progress, they encounter various obstacles and enemies with different behaviors. There are basic moving enemies, enemies that attack spaces in front of them after a short delay, and bouncing laser turrets that continuously move towards the player. I also added a camera transition effect as the player moves between puzzles within a single level/scene, similar to the camera movement in Celeste. The camera could also zoom in and out depending on the size of the puzzle, which was another layer of juice we wanted to add to the transition effect.
For level design, I created the layouts for all 3 levels, including obstacles, enemies, and targets. When designing the levels, I wanted players to be able to experiment with taking different paths within a single puzzle. Easier routes would take more time to complete, while difficult paths would test the players' mechanical and rhythmic skills. I also wanted to include secret shortcut paths in each level, similar to how games like Celeste and Hollow Knight offer hidden paths to find strawberries and grubs.