Umbrellads
Platform: PC
Engine: Unity
Team Size: 6
Role: Level Designer
Period: October 2019 - March 2020
Team Members: Guilhem d'Humières, Samuel Basset, Lucas Ferrantelli, Nicolas Ceriani, Léo Marambat-Patinote, Martin Jacob, Killian Gales
What I Did: Level Design, Level Building, Game Design, Playtest & QA Testing
Umbrellads is an adventure game that combines 3D platforming and combat. It's Inspired by very classic 3D platformers like Mario Odyssey as well as a classic beat'em all because we wanted to try and make a game " by the book " before trying to be more innovative for the graduation project.
You play as Lewis the guardian of a peaceful realm of floating islands that you must protect with your faithful Umbrella from the Baron Boulon and his army of robots.
My Role
My role on this game was as the main Level Designer, it was the first project where I could completely focus on the level design and the game design because we had dedicated programmers on this project.
It was really interesting because I could validate my skills and knowledge.
The Level Design Process
The process for the level design on this project was a bit particular because since we had very little time to make it (only half of the year) and a pretty large scope, we had to produce everything really quickly. Another challenge was that we had no Game Artists.
Since the world is made of floating islands, the developers made a custom tool that allowed us to do the world-building and the blockout at the same time, I didn't have much time to iterate on a paper level design so I very quickly moved to in engine iteration.
The world structure
We divided our experience into 4 worlds and a boss, each one would introduce a new méchanic, and then it would all come together in the boss fight.
The maps are made of a swarm of small floating islands revolving around a central hub.
In each world, the habitants have a problem caused by the Baron Boulon, so you have first to complete minor loops to collect Suns that will put the world back in order allowing you to unlock the new mechanic and progress to the next world.
When you have finished a loop you come back down gliding with your umbrella.
Here are some more visuals of the game.
A build is available on request.
