Slipstream

High Concept

Slipstream is a 3D, third person, movement-based platformer where you play as a desert dweller who protects what still remains of their ancient civilization from the attack of sandworms. You must race against the queen sandworm, surfing through the dunes and collecting enough energy particles to power up the barrier and keep the memory of your people alive.

Project Info

Project: VFS Team Project
Role: Technical Artist, UI Programmer, Gameplay Programmer
Engine: Unity
Programming Languages: C#

Responsibilities

Gameplay implemetation
Movement Implementation
Parry System
UI implementation
Animation implementation
Cutscene design and implementation
VFX and animation design and implementation
Feature prototyping and iterations

Movement Implementation

As a fast paced movement platformer, the movement feeling good to the player was our top priority when starting this project

An extra challenge was that the player was moving on a hoverboard so the movement had to feel airy and floaty

I iterated on different movement functionalities and feels, prototyped different movement systems thorughout the project and showed it to my team and playtesters for feedback until it felt right

After a lot of iteration and changes we have movement in the game that feels smooth and fun to use

Player can move with WASD freely in circles for sharp turning, and when moving forward at a fast velocity players can use the mouse to rotate the player for smooth turning

Parry System

We wanted to add an extra challenge and insentive for the player during gameplay that worked with the fast paced movement

We came up with a parry system where players must parry powerups while moving at high speeds for temporary special abillities. There is a speed boost and a magnet effect to parry.

I designed a system for parrying the powerups and the abilities stack up, sp if you collect more than one magnet powerup it adds extra time to the powerup, and you can have more than one powerup at the same time

UI implementation

I implemented the HUD UI and systems to go along with them for Slipstream

To unlock the first portal to move to the second level, you have to collect 150 energy particles in your path. We have a meter that fills up accordingly

The player has health hearts shown on the HUD that are lost when hitting obstacles and gained when health items are picked up

You are racing against the queen sandworm, so you must move fast. To keep track of how far the sandworm is compared to yourself, we have a timer at the top which increases as the sandworm gets closer to the goal

Cutscene design and implementation

I designed and implemented the end cutscene for when you win and beat the sandworm to the finish line

I created this using Unity Cinemachine and Timeline systems

I implemented the camera movement, moving objects, sandowrm death and updated VFX during the cutscene as well as the end screen UI that tells the player how fast they beat the game

VFX and animation design and implementation

With only one artist in our team and a big scope for a 2 month long project, I assisted our artist where I could to programmatically make art effects

I created a boost line effect VFX when the player gets a speed boost for them to feel fast

For our tricks then the player double presses space, I created these though Unity Animation system. The player rotates 360 degrees in a randomly generated direction in the XYZ axis when they do a trick

For our pistons that serve to squish and damage the player, as well as to launch the player up, I created a system to squish the player mesh for a few seconds when squished for the player to really feel the effect of a large piston landing on them

Photos