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Bumpers

Project: Bumpers (Destruction Derby design test prototype)

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Engine: Unreal engine 4

Platform: Windows PC

Role: Technical Designer/Scripter

 

Description: The aim of this prototype is to follow a design test. This test requires to prototype the car mechanics for a new Destruction Derby game. This was produced alongside documentation over the course of 12 weeks.

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Responsibilities

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  • Driving Mechanics

  • Setup car & physics

  • UI & game loop

  • AI Drivers

  • Crash Mechanics

  • Have a "Party game feel"

  • Technical design documentation

Role Breakdown

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Scripting: Within this project one of my main roles was a focus on development of the overall prototype. I developed:

  • Fully functioning car which had specific damage locations

  • Car physics, applied for crashing at specific locations (based off the speed of both colliding objects)

  • Implement 1-4 player local multiplayer functionality

  • Appropriate crash mechanics applying to a point of contact damage system

  • Morph targets to help show damage (morph targets produced on the model within 3DSMax)

  • Implement unique abilities for each car class (boost, ram, shield)

  • Arena hazards (ensure walls apply damage to the player and bounce off)

  • AI development for vehicles including movement and simulating a real player. This meant making "crash decision making" logic such as distance to get a good crash, choosing a different target each time, using abilities when appropriate (e.g. using shield ability when about to be hit)

  • UI implementation for core game play aspects

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This was my first time working with and developing vehicles of any sort. This compared with the high usage of physics within the project caused a rather steep learning curve to master. The scripting worked out fairly well on this project with a lot being learnt.​

 

Level Design: Level design was a fairly small aspect of this project. The main elements came from meshing and being give some narrative to the overall prototype. I had a large focus on meshing the arena space out and trying to make it interesting no matter what angle the player was facing. I had a bunch of industrial assets available for this project so I attempted to make a believable world space in the back alleys of an industrial complex where derby drivers come to smash up some vehicles, I wanted to give a similar kind of feeling to that of a illegal street race meetup from the Fast and Furious franchise. 

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Technical Design: For this project I produced technical design documentation (TDD) to help plan out the various systems and mechanics that would be created as well as being a guide for the programming practices and everything else that is required for the project to function as intended. The TDD can be found below in a PDF format.

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