WONDER CELLS
STUDENT PROJECT
Genre: Platform Puzzle Adventure
Platform: PC
Technology: Custom Engine, C++, Git, Trello
Development Team
(Team size: 10)
Producer: Yixian Low
Technical Lead: Wei Sng
Graphics Programmer: Wen Lim
Graphics Programmer: Qin Tay
Physics Programmer: Zhe Kok
AI Programmer: Muhammad Saat
Musical Director: Tai Chee
Sound Director: Seam Leonard
Art Lead: Jia Tee
Design Lead: Nur Amin
OVERVIEW
Wonder cells, a cute 3D Puzzle Adventure game of a dendrite cell deployed on a perilous journey to deliver oxygen from the lungs to the heart. During the journey, Challenging puzzles and obstacles bar his way. But with the aid of other cells of the body, nothing is impossible. Little did he know, an evil virus lurks in the shadow. Will he be able to safely deliver the oxygen and accomplish his mission?
Inspiration
Drawn from a Japanese anime series, Cells At Work (Hataraku Saibou). Along with that, the recent COVID pandemic has inspired us towards producing an Edutainment game that brings awareness of the dangers of the virus through challenging puzzles in the form of entertainment.
Production Challenge
As a student project, we were limited to time constraints and uncertainty of the workload that we will face across the trimester. Members of the team were managing 3 to 6 modules, in addition to the development of the game project. Whilst managing the project's development of the Custom Engine, ensuring project schedule is met, and sprints are conducted weekly. Simultaneously completing assignments and submissions, and preparing for quizzes and exams. The pandemic has made communication more challenging than ever.
With each member undertaking different modules and adhering to different schedules, establish a consistent time for us to discuss the issues pertaining to the project was a challenge we had to overcome. In addition, the varying modules of each member led to external workload and stress resulting in interference in the development.
To overcome the challenges, we utilized Discord as our main platform of communication and Trello for task allocations. Open communication was of utmost importance and vital. By setting up a timeline and assigning up to 2 weeks' worth of tasks each week during our online meeting, we are able to remain in close contact and stay up to date with the latest progress and reports. That facilitated a smoother production pipeline and allowing us to prioritize what to deliver which matters most to the player.
Engine Technology
To develop a Custom engine from scratch in C++ was no small feat. Our engine, Hiphen Engine, was lead by Wei Sng, who proposed the architectural design of the engine that prioritizes the ease of usage for our designers, allowing them to freely develop their ideas with minimal restriction. The complexity of the engine we had to deliver has to be capable of providing stability and consistency to ensure a smooth gameplay experience was one of our many concerns.
Our team mitigated the risk of visual aspects as the team is shy of artists, by using voxel. Through countless iterations of ideation system stress tests, game idea refinement, we mitigated potential impacts of the engine's limitation through modularizing our systems and a do-over by using voxel art assets. The result was as expected and a major improvement in both the engine and the entirety of the game's visuals.
Audio and SFX
As the Sound designer of the project, my priority is to bring about delivering sounds that resonate with the environment, enhancing believability. Creating a sound in the body that is perceived from a cellular entity is a fantasy to behold. The loudest and strongest beat is the heart and the gushing of the fluids in our body. To imagine the body as an organic factory, I imbued relatable humanoid sound effects and audio to simulate the effects from what is perceived in real life.
As our game is dedicated to younger audience, we composed the music towards a light-hearted and jolly adventure soundtracks that does not induce any form of stress, encouraging them to play at the pace they are most comfortable at. The pace of the background music includes a bass hit that resembles and synchronizes with a person's heartbeat to build a stronger sense of place too.
With the blend of realism and familiarity in a fantasy setting, we incorporate familiar diegetic sound to populate the environment, making it feel alive.
Personal Thoughts
My development and involvement through technicalities of the engine's system, level design and game concept, and sound design, I found myself developing and managing different parts of the project gratifying as it allows me to perform and showcase my skillsets across different aspects of the game development. In each development phase of the game, I was heavily involved in the production of many aspects and it was an eye-opening and enriching experience. With each exciting and mind-boggling challenges, I am grateful for the amazing teammates whom are always there to support and guide me, develop new technical skills and exposed to foreign design ideas.
With each new project comes with unique challenges, It is important to adept with the challenges on hand and handles with consideration of how it will impact other systems and implications on the overall game flow. With good project planning lies beneficial aspects in adaptations as well.
To grow is to be shapeless, formless, like the cells in our body.