ELECTRIC GROOVE WIZARD
Corporations rule over all. But do not despair, for rebels, known only as "Wizards", have taken to the streets. You are one of said Wizards, the Groove Wizard. Use your magical remote to disrupt the electronics of the city and reduce the light pollution obscuring the starry sky. Make haste, and get groovy!
BEST
PRODUCT
MY ROLE
Team Lead:
Game Design, Blueprint Scripting, SFX, Level Design
TIMELINE
24 Hours - LaSalle Game Jam 2024
TOOLS
Unreal Engine 5, Reaper
DOWNLOAD
IDEATION PHASE
THEME(S)
Dystopia, Climate Change, Polarization
IDEATION
24 hours isn't enough time to deliver a complex game that feels like a polished and complete product. With this and the announced theme in mind, our team began brainstorming ideas.
After discussing for over an hour, the basis for Electric Groove Wizard suddenly came to me. It initially felt like a left field idea relative to others we had been discussing.
The general feeling behind this idea was: let's just have some fun; take the serious theme and give it a lighthearted twist. An important consideration I made was to propose an idea with a simple core game loop and a scope that I was confident our team could manage.
DESIGN
ZAP
The gameplay I envisioned was a first-person shooter style experience, with simple, accessible controls and mechanics, and rapid fire dopamine hits from the moment you press play.
The player is a wizard with a magic remote (à la the film Click) which has the ability to "steal" light (à la Dumbledore's Deluminator in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone).
The player can simply point at a light and click to "steal" the light (effectively turning it off).
MOVE
My next decision was to add some challenge using a cause and effect relationship. Shutting off people's lights makes them a bit angry.
Each time the player shuts off a light there's a 33% chance that an Angry Citizen will spawn and begin chasing them.
Angry Citizens are holding large cellphones, which, if hit with a Zap from the player's trusty remote, will begin ringing incessantly, causing the Angry Citizen to stop chasing the player.
When an Angry Citizen gets close enough to the player, they throw a wild uppercut punch which drains a bit of Groove from the player's Groove Meter.
& GROOVE
The final piece of the puzzle, and the most random one of all, was my idea for the player's "Make em' Dance" ability.
This ultimate move requires a fully charge Groove Meter. When activated, it spawns a spinning disco ball that draws the aggro of nearby Angry Citizens and causes them to start dancing under the disco ball (when nearby, a rhythmic house beat fades in to replace the regular jazz music).
Funnily enough, the overall injection of "grooviness" came from the background "smooth jazz" music which the LaSalle A/V technicians chose to play on the first day of the jam. This also inspired our selection of music: A quoi sert de vivre libre (Remasterisé En 2016) by Franck Pourcel
REFLECTIONS
The LaSalle Game Jam was an awesome experience. Both myself and my teammates were stoked with our final product, and it was the cherry on top being awarded "Best Product" by the panel of industry veterans from Room 8 Group.
Going in, I was aware of the seriously limited development time we would have, and this fueled uncertainty regarding the amount and quality of work I could personally deliver in 24 hours. As well, around our ability to coordinate as a team to effectively produce a cohesive product.
Before we began, I was anxious about the ideation phase and the possibility of never generating the "perfect" idea which would meet all of my essential criteria: a good fit with the theme, feasibility for an on-time delivery, and something that the whole team was enthusiastic about.
All of these worries disappeared as soon as we locked in the idea and our respective initial tasks for Electric Groove Wizard. All of my teammates were buzzing to just jump in and fire up UE, Maya, etc.
For future jams, especially ones with short timelines, my goal is to continue making games with a bit of silly or bizarre concept. I strongly feel that this approach is in the spirit of game jams themselves - a test of skill, creativity, and teamwork to be sure, but also an opportunity to simply have fun and make memories with friends.
