MAJYCK
DigiPen - Freshman Second Semester Project
Role: Lead Designer, Producer & Artist
DescriptionMAJYCK is a silly arena platformer where players are placed into the shoes of magical university students thrown into arenas by their cruel professors to fight for their amusement. The students have two spells at their fingertips, their push and their pull, and must take advantage of these to navigate their environment, and defeat their opponents.
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The TeamDaniel Hudson - Programmer & Menu Designer
Kyler Elmer - Programmer & Singeplayer Designer Carsten Ronshaugen - Sound Designer |
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Design
For the core concept of MAJYCK I was inspired by moments of tension in local multiplayer arena games like Towerfall. I was aiming specifically for that feeling when you are competing with someone to see who will stomp on the other's head first, where you grip your controller tightly and focus in on the screen. I wanted to create a local multiplayer game where that intense positioning was the core mechanic of the game.
I did this by removing the ability to directly kill the other players. Instead, you needed to use movement altering abilities to throw your opponent's off balance and keep yourself in the game.
Playtesting was incredible important for this project and was something I did frequently, despite having only one semester for development. Watching players explore my levels, and trying to create new levels around those observations, was very valuable for learning about player pathing.
I did this by removing the ability to directly kill the other players. Instead, you needed to use movement altering abilities to throw your opponent's off balance and keep yourself in the game.
Playtesting was incredible important for this project and was something I did frequently, despite having only one semester for development. Watching players explore my levels, and trying to create new levels around those observations, was very valuable for learning about player pathing.
Art
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Creating all of the art for MAJYCK was difficult on top of my other roles on the team, but I was glad to do it. As the artist I had the chance to create all of the UI and UX elements for the game, which helped me to learn what visual cues are effective at portraying information to the player.
Another valuable lesson I learned from the project was the importance of a pixel ratio. The pixel ratio on MAJYCK ended up being larger than a normal screen, making the pixel art aesthetic not come across during gameplay because it was blurred by the engine. This lesson was incredibly useful when we started production on The Blade in the Bark. |
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