A.B.B. (Capstone Project)
A bird’s-eye view of Level 1 (before art integration). Here, we introduce many of the gameplay mechanics the player will need to practice and ultimately master in later levels. The game consists of a tutorial level, three main gameplay levels, and a final boss battle.
Inspired by Zarvot
As the end of the degree program neared, my team and I (Team Hydra) had a choice to make: We could continue working on the side-scrolling brawler we’d made in an earlier course as our Capstone Project, or we could choose an existing retail game to replicate.
Since we were somewhat unsatisfied with the brawler, we opted to do the latter.
After a couple of days spent deliberating on a reference game, one of our team members brought to our attention a charming indie title called Zarvot. We felt that we could reconstruct a few of its levels within the time allotted, while also implementing the various player abilities and enemy types.
Zarvot Launch Trailer (Nintendo Switch)
In the span of a month, we had more or less rebuilt the first few levels of Zarvot. But that was only the beginning…
A.B.B. is Born
In the weeks to follow, our team was given free reign to make the game our own. We chose to place a little less emphasis on the white-knuckle battles of the original game, and instead shifted more focus to simple puzzle-solving elements and avoidance of environmental hazards. The charged laser shot was removed entirely, but the destructible level geometry was expanded to include new obstacles only vulnerable to our newly-introduced bombs. Before long, our mutated offshoot of Sam Eng’s Zarvot had found an identity of its own.
We called it A.B.B. (Attacking Bouncing Blocks). This was originally just a placeholder until we decided on a real title, but it just sort of stuck.
An early A.B.B. level blockout, narrated by Ben Murchie
Lighting and Textures and Models, Oh My!
As we entered the final month of the degree program, our team (for the first time) worked side-by-side with students from the Game Art program. Using Trello and Discord, we collaborated with the artists to create the various assets we would need to really make the game feel like a finished product. Admittedly, it took some time to get the art and design teams on the same page, as none of the artists had ever seen or played the game before that point, but we ultimately managed to get some quality assets implemented into each level.
Work in progress, featuring a few completed art assets
Crossing the Finish Line
During the last two weeks of development, Team Hydra put the finishing touches on A.B.B.’s gameplay setups and underlying systems. We made refinements to our scoring system, iterated on our final battle with the villainous “Flame Boss”, and cleaned up many of the lingering bugs and errors from our previous builds.
Looking back on it, there are plenty of things I wish had gone better or differently. The enemy AI wasn’t as interesting as I would’ve liked; the assorted playable characters could have had more distinctive abilities to increase the game’s replay value; and there are plenty of areas that I think could’ve benefitted from one more good lighting pass. But in the end, I’m quite proud of what the team was able to accomplish with the skills and resources available to us at the time. Below, you’ll find a more formal (albeit brief) postmortem for the project, along with a fun little trailer we presented to our peers upon its completion.
A.B.B. Postmortem
A.B.B. Trailer
The Future
On behalf of Team Hydra, I reached out to Sam Eng (Zarvot’s creator) to share with him the game’s trailer as well as the story of its origin. He promptly responded with with words of enthusiasm, kindness, and encouragement. As we faced the end of our journey as students and the beginning of our careers as professional developers, that one exchange of emails did a lot to bolster our confidence and morale – both as individuals and as a team. I don’t know if Sam will ever happen upon this website, or this post in particular, but I hope he knows that he has my most sincere and eternal thanks.