Game Designer | Thomas Silverthorn | Thomas@silverthorndesigns.com
SHELL SHOCKED
Genre:
Couch Co-op
Role:
Game Designer
Engine:
Unreal Engine 5
Shell Shocked is a couch co-op 2 vs 2 game of football with hermit crabs. Shell Shocked's design pillars were teamwork, competition and fast-paced.
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I was responsible for designing the level layouts & level transitions and managing the game's production.
Team size:
14
Project length:
8 weeks
Released:
PROJECT CONTRIBUTIONS
LEVEL DESIGN
I joined this project planning to work as a technical designer but I ended up working as a level designer instead. The project was missing a dedicated level designer and although it was out of my comfort zone, I happily volunteered myself as I wanted to prove my flexibility and challenge my design skills. While working on the level design for Shell Shocked, I researched, sketched and iterated upon multiple level layouts and designed how to transition between them.
LEVEL LAYOUTS
My main goal as a level designer was to concept potential level layouts to keep the game fresh and replayable. Our reference game Videoball has over a dozen level layouts for players to choose from, each with their own challenges and charm.
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After researching the level layouts in Videoball and other similar games, I sketched level layouts that could be used in Shell Shocked using a mixture of Krita and paper sketches. This was a very iterative process where I received feedback from designers, artists and programmers making sure that the information was well presented and understandable.
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One of the level design limitations I followed was to keep the gameplay intuitive by avoiding complex or confusing level ingredients. The different layouts had to work with the gameplay that already existed without adding anything new. I therefore focussed on introducing walls to the level and analysed how the different configurations affected the gameplay. Sketching how the ball would bounce against the walls helped showcase the affect of the walls on the gameplay.​​​​
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All this work was done in order to explore the possibility space that the level provided. While researching Videoball, we agreed that the level layouts added a necessary element of uniqueness to every game and made players play another round. We wanted to capture this and make it our own in order to make Shell Shocked a game that players enjoy playing multiple times.
LEVEL TRANSITIONS
Having chosen which level layouts to implement, I was tasked with finding ways of switching the level layout during the gameplay. We wanted to include the different layouts directly in the gameplay, bypassing the level selection process and getting players into the game quickly.
Keeping with the beach theme, the most promising transition was to periodically have a wave wash over the screen, pausing the gameplay momentarily, before revealing a new level layout.
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This solution was popular among the team as it gave the game a level of randomness which was missing in the original design. We found that by leaving the gameplay purely to the skill of the players, some players were becoming frustrated with themselves and stopped having fun. By removing some of the player's agency and changing the level layout during the game, players were able to disperse their frustrations and continue to enjoy playing the game.
WORKING COLLABORATIVELY
As the sole designer responsible for the level layouts and transitions, I worked closely with the programmers and artists who were working on the same features. I created a flowchart of the level design pipeline that I could follow and make sure that the collaboration went as smoothly as possible. Throughout the project, I received feedback that my efforts to include the other disciplines in my processes and decision making were well received and helped keep the team cohesive, especially regarding the level design.
PRODUCTION
Having completed the bulk of my level design work, another hole appeared in the project, we needed a new producer. Having stepped up once already, I felt confident to handle the additional workload and fulfil this role. This meant taking the responsibility of our SCRUM rituals and allowing the team to focus on their own work.
SCRUM
Becoming the producer halfway through the project was unexpected, however I felt qualified to manage the team and facilitate their progress on the project given my aptitude for organisation and previous experience in production. My main responsibility was to organise and lead the various SCRUM rituals (stand-ups, sprint planning, build reviews, sprint reviews, sprint retrospectives) that helped give our project structure. We used Jira to plan and track our tasks.
SCOPE
As the producer, I tracked the team's burndown chart and velocity for each sprint and was able to use this data to guide discussions regarding scope. It became apparent that our initial scope was unrealistic with the time remaining and we cut the areas of the game which could be removed.
GENERAL GAME DESIGN
Although my main focus was on the level design and production of the project, I still maintained an active role in the discussions and brain storming regarding the general design aspects of the game (3Cs, powerups, playtesting).