The Root of All Evil
The Root of All Evil
Root of All Evil is an old-school survival horror game made for Game Jam 2023, the goal of the project was to emulate old-school survival horror games like Alone in the Dark and Resident Evil. The theme of the event was "Roots" so I decided to emulate the roots of 3D games and the survival horror genre as the graphics were also meant to resemble the old games.
Game Design
Combat
I designed the combat to be a little clunky, an effort to emulate an older control scheme often referred to as "tank controls" where the player character can only move forward or backward and must rotate in place to move in a new direction. The way to shoot is to enter a “gun mode” in order to create a sort of anxiety while fighting and and to create the dynamics of a retro survival horror, the player can not move while in Gun Mode only rotate in place. This creates a sense of anxiety in the player which was the aethestics I was going for, the outstretched arms help the player aim better.
Puzzles
The goal of the game is to collect three themed keys to unlock a door to a boss fight. Each key relates to the theme of the event. The placement of the keys and items, in general, are shown to the player with focused camera angles and lighting. The player is introduced to the locked door in the beginning of the game.
Mask Key
This key represents humans' African origins.
Farmers Key
This Key represents humans' mastery of agriculture that allowed civilization to form.
Flame Key
This key represents humans' mastery of fire that set themselves apart from the rest of the animals.
Level Design
The main level is circular, the player proceeds through the level in a counter clockwise circle and ends back up to the locked door by the time they find all the keys
Camera Angles
There are 28 different camera angles in the circular map layout. The placement of camera angles serves two main purposes, first to provide an interesting visual shot, and second to highlight anything important in the shot. the thought process behind each shot was to treat them like photographs, care was taken to make each camera as interesting as possible based on their location and still aid in navigation.
Camera 2
This is an establishing shot, showing the entrance to the main facility and the light highlights the central tree where the boss is located around.
Camera 4
This shot highlights the locked door leading to the boss fight.
Camera 8
This shot highlights the gun on the table with a light source over it to highlight it, as well as the ammo box in the shot.
Camera 12
This is the first camera in the green house that shows most of the room.
Camera 16
This shot is after exiting the greenhouse and shows the forest path, the camera was slightly tilted to get a sort of eerie feel, the low lighting helps add to the atmosphere, and a highlighted area of interest is where one of the keys is located.
Camera 24
This shot is after unlocking the door, it's a long shot, looking at the central tree, which is highlighted by several spotlights. the boss will come out from behind the tree as the player approaches, this shot lingers until the player gets to the tree before they get to the next camera. this was done in order to build anticipation.
Documentation
Process
When the theme was revealed, me and my team immediately sat down and brain stormed the game concept and drew the level on a whiteboard and came up with some enemy concepts. The first thing I got to work doing was getting the fixed camera angles set up, followed by shooting and inventory systems. Finishing with simple enemy AI. With the basics done, I then crafted the level, the last thing that was added was the art assets.