Concept Document

"Victory shall come forth for those who fight together"

The Concept Document serves as a quick glance on Edgy Entertaintment's concept for Unworthy Roses, a game that will serve as Final Project for the Game Design and the Programming for Web, Mobile + Games at VFS. The game is currently in Pre-Production.

High Concept
Unworthy Roses is a Top-Down Perspective, Co-op 3D Hack and Slash PC game, where players take control of Irene and Valeria, two Demon Exterminators that must free the Modern Human World from the Ancient Monsters from the Underworld.

Camera
The game uses a Top-Down Perspective 3D Camera. This way, players are able to see multiple players on-screen and have no problem in getting attacked from behind. This also serves the purpose of the Co-op experience in the game to keep track of a good chunk of what is happening throughout each level.

Due to the online co-op functionality of our game, both players can be near or far away from each other without disrupting or limiting their movement.





Level Design Philosophies
The following are the Level Design Philosophies that will follow across the development of the project. They go hand in hand with our Main Design Pillars:

Co-Operation

As this is a co-op game ,each and every thing in the game is based on how the two players cooperate with each other through the game. The characters and their weapons both complement each other in a way that together, they become a unit. Throughout the game they will face some obstacles as to advance in the game they will be needing each other, not only will the player use the physical abilities of each character but also need to think together to progress levels.

As in combat players will be overwhelmed with the amount of enemies at their feet. They will have to fight back-to -back using each other's complementing abilities to help out one another and combine their power to finish off the hordes of enemies to become victorious.

Combat Feedback

The combat is the main mechanic of the game, which the player will be experiencing 75% throughout the game so players should feel satisfied while hitting an enemy or performing different combos. This feeling is achieved by the different animation and effects to enhance the combat experience.

In every level when the player encounters a horde of enemies they will get the perfect feedback needed to feel and master the combat of the game with one another. Which will give players the thrust to move forward and encounter more and more enemies making them advance through the levels.

Level Sample
The following is a 2D Layout for a section of one of our levels for the game:

Controls
Both Irene and Valeria are controlled the same way to perform the following actions:


 * Move
 * Jump
 * Attack
 * Dodge
 * Change Lock-On Target
 * Interact
 * Activate Demon Bloom Mode

The controller of choice is the Xbox One Controller.

Design Pillars
The following are our Design Pillars that will hold our game's vision throughout its development:

1. Complementary Combat
Valeria and Irene's combat style must complement each other in order to achieve victory against the enemy encounters throughout the game.

For example: enemies are beginning to spawn from the walls surrounding the players. Valeria can attack one enemy at a time while Irene can hit multiple enemies at a time. Valeria, the hard hitter, will be focusing on the stronger enemies or helping Irene clear the weaker enemies by one-shotting them. Irene will be focusing on clearing enemy waves, or helping to defend Valeria while she attacks the stronger enemies.

2. Made for Co-op
Our game must play and feel as though it’s built for Cooperation between two players. There is no progression without each other. Both gameplay and level design heavily rely on this pillar for decision taking. For example, a puzzle is designed in a way that Valeria and Irene are both needed the entire time. Valeria and Irene may both need to stand on a pressure plate at the same time. Another example can be Valeria punching a block to move it while Irene is focusing on protecting Valeria from oncoming waves.

3. Edginess
Both characters and the overall environment of our game are based on Edginess. This implies cocky personalities, ridiculous and fancy clothes along with arrogant dialogue.

For example:


 * Here what the team perceives as a NOT Edgy User Interface:




 * On the other hand, here's a video from our Prototype for our Main Menu. (Captured like this and not improven due to the CoVID-19 pandemic) Original Footage is still @ VFS' Game Design campus.


 * Our UI contains animations that are triggered when hovering over different buttons along with camera movement. (*Characters and animations our not ours and are only meant for visual representations*)

1. Elegant Stick-Fighting
Irene's not a heavy hitter yet a master in her Stick-Fighting style. Her combat is heavily inspired by Martial Arts like the one used by Shaolin monks called Yin Shou Gun.

2. Powerful Punches
Valeria is pure muscle. She hits enemies with her Doberman Gauntlets with no mercy. Her combat will rely on landing heavy punches, no matter the target.

3. Cooperative Puzzles
Throughout the game, players will encounter puzzles that will stop them from traversing through the levels. In order to complete these, they must work together to solve them, as they will not be solvable with only one character.

For example: If a statue needs to moved towards a specific spot for the puzzle to be solved, the players would work in this way: Irene's player must use the stick to change the path for the statue to reach the eventual target, whilst Valeria's user, must use her powerful punches to actually move the statue.

4. Overwhelmed Feeling
Our goal is to have the players feel overwhelmed with the number of enemies at one time. This in turn forces players to play together rather than by themselves, thus reinforces the co-operative play.

For example: the enemies will begin to horde around the two players from multiple sides. This overwhelming number or enemies will have players fight “back to back” to clear the waves of enemies.

5. Refreshing Combos
When in combat, if players land consecutive blows they will trigger the combo system allowing them to access more powerful attacks that will help them overcome the enemies more efficiently. It makes combat feel constantly fresh rather than just having the same attack over and over again.

Mechanics
The following are the mechanics for players to experience when using the characters of Irene and Valeria.

Staff Hit

 * Known as wave clearing, Irene can use her staff to attack multiple enemies at the same time. Irene’s staff hits fast, allowing her to attack multiple times fairly quickly.



Gauntlet Hit

 * This is the Heavy hitter attack done by Valarie which targets a single enemy at a time dealing with tremendous amounts of damage.



Simple Movement

 * As in most games, the players are able to control either Irene or Valeria using simple inputs: up, down, left and right. They are able to walk in any direction the players decide as long as they are grounded.



Dodging

 * Thanks to the power given to Valeria and Irene by the Demon Lord, players are able to evade incoming attacks to prevent them from getting damaged by the enemies. Same as in basic movement, the dodge can be performed in any direction.



Jumping

 * Valeria and Irene can jump in order to traverse through the underworld as well as in combat to fight in an interesting way.



Climbing

 * Valeria and Irene can climb on cracked walls in order to get to a higher location as they advance through the level.



Interacting

 * Valeria and Irene can interact with many puzzles. Each with their own interaction. Valeria will be using her gauntlets to interact with each piece while Irene will be using her staff to interact with other elements.



A.I. Horde System
The AI Horde system tries to corner the player into making decisions about how to combat as the player with heavy attacks can be tasked with defeating the commander while the player with area of effect attacks focuses on the grunts. Also the players are more likely to work together as the horde can get overwhelming for just one of them to feel powerful when working together than when fighting them alone.

Demon Bloom Mode
When the Bloom bar is filled the Demon bloom mode activates and the player can choose when to use it to its advantage. There are certain features of this ability:


 * Do more damage: When activated players do more damage with the same attack for a certain period of time.
 * Take less damage: While getting a buff on attack players rather take less damage when this is activated.
 * Health Regen: The health of the player gradually regenerates while using this ability.

Edgy User Interface
Players will have a user interface that complements the style of the game. The user interface is designed in such a way that it feels like it is a part of the game rather than included. The user interface will also be easy to understand, and unobtrusive. For example:


 * The menu screen will feature an environment where the two main characters will be posing. Depending on what is selected on the menu, the camera and pose will change. This adds personality to the game’s menu screen.
 * Health/Demon Bloom Bar is designed in a stylistic way that implores our world and character design.
 * Button notifications will be up to standard to the technical requirements checklist however will still feature personality from the game.

User Inferface Overview
Following our Design Pillar of Edginess, Unworthy Roses' UI is also a system in itself to increase the game's Look and Feel from the Title Screen where we showcase our characters, environment and animations along with particle effects.

The game will consist of 5 different screens with some having one small variation for varied User Experience.

UI Flow Chart
The following is the User Interface Flow Chart that covers the logic for the Game's Screen and Heads Up Display:

UI Screen Mockups
The following figures are mockups for our main 5 screens as mentioned above:

AI Behaviours
Grunts: The Units move around under their designated areas and are influenced and buffed by commanders and if one of the mob units spots the players it alerts the rest and they swarm towards the players with an intent to kill. If it loses its commander it searches for a different nearby commander to join or else becomes disoriented.

Commander: The commander rules their designated areas and buffs the grunts under it.

Target Market
Unworthy Roses is aimed to please gamers that enjoy the Hack and Slash action but also challenging puzzles and overall those who like spending time with their friends playing a game together.


 * Demographics:
 * We will appeal to gamers from the age 18-29 years old mostly due to the emphasis on combat and communication for co-op. The game will please both casual and hardcore gamers.
 * Geographics:
 * The game will be made entirely in English and therefore shall be launched for English-speaking only. There will be an initial soft launch in the Canadian market before expanding to bigger ones like the U.S.

Game Rating
Due to its violence throughout the entire game along with not family friendly language, our game would get an ESRB rating of M for Mature.

Competitive Analysis
There are several games in the industry that have proven Co-op is not obsolete and will not be in the upcoming years. However, from the following list only A Way Out really inforces co-op rather than it being just a feature. Learning from the combat in Darksiders Genesis and Diablo 3 plus the puzzle design and overall gameplay from  A Way Out is imperative for our game’s vision.

Roles and Responsibilities
The following table shows what the roles and responsibilities will be throughout the project. From Pre-Production until Pitch-and-Play this will be what everyone's responsible for.