Project Lead, Product Manager, C# Programmer
Project Management
After developing the various mechanics mentioned below, I stepped up to a Project Management role within the team while continuing my development work. This role was an auxiliary position that facilitated team meetings, developed proper project rituals and planned out work for the team.
Once I had spent a few months in that role, I became the Project Lead for Fruit Ninja VR 2. My duties as lead encompassed the work I was doing in my previous role, as well as more workload around team management, project vision holding and roadmap planning.
Tutorial System
I was responsible for creating the system that allowed our designers to implement and iterate on a tutorial for new players. This system was extremely robust, allowing designers to show messages, prompt/remind the player, display custom UI messages and wait for specific player input. The system also allowed for player choice within it, with two initial weapon paths the player could choose from (blade and bow.
Mission System
About halfway through Cheeky Chooks' development, we received feedback from our testers stating that there simply weren't enough goals motivating players to continue playing. I proposed a solution to this problem in the form of a Mission System. This system would give players a ton of little objectives while they progressed through the game. I also used this system to gate content off from the player, extending gameplay while also giving good rewards for actually completing the missions.
Rhythm Mode
Another piece of feedback we received from testers was a lack of explanation for some of the mechanics present in Cheeky Chooks. The RSPCA also wanted us to give players some real-world chicken facts as they played. To solve both issues, I designed an Alert system. This system would hook into some specific events that were placed within the various systems in Cheeky Chooks. There were three types of alerts in the system: Important Alerts that told the player important information, Info Alerts that told the player real-world chicken facts and Warning Alerts that warned the player about anything negative in their farm.
Immersive UI
I was responsible for implementing all of the UI in Cheeky Chooks, from the various resource counters to the multi-paneled Shop menu. Each menu in Cheeky Chooks needed in and out transition animations, so I developed a transition manager to handle it. This manager allowed me to rest easy about transitions between every single menu, as it was designed to handle any UI fed into it.
Smooth Locomotion
As we were nearing the end of Cheeky Chooks' development cycle, I decided that the game was simply too lifeless without some atmospheric sound. I began on a simple 3D sound system before realizing I had forgotten something quite important. You see Cheeky Chooks uses an orthographic camera that is placed quite high above the actual farm. This caused major issues with 3D audio sources being placed on the actual chickens themselves.
Shop System
As we were nearing the end of Cheeky Chooks' development cycle, I decided that the game was simply too lifeless without some atmospheric sound. I began on a simple 3D sound system before realizing I had forgotten something quite important. You see Cheeky Chooks uses an orthographic camera that is placed quite high above the actual farm. This caused major issues with 3D audio sources being placed on the actual chickens themselves.
Gameplay Level Systems
As we were nearing the end of Cheeky Chooks' development cycle, I decided that the game was simply too lifeless without some atmospheric sound. I began on a simple 3D sound system before realizing I had forgotten something quite important. You see Cheeky Chooks uses an orthographic camera that is placed quite high above the actual farm. This caused major issues with 3D audio sources being placed on the actual chickens themselves.
Physics Improvements
After developing the various mechanics mentioned below, I stepped up to a Project Management role within the team while continuing my development work. This role was an auxiliary position that facilitated team meetings, developed proper project rituals and planned out work for the team.