SWITCHAROO

Team: Unavailable Games // Role: Game & Level Designer // Timeline: 4 Months

Two players control the same character as one runs & the other guns. Players swap roles in order to reload, damage certain enemies, interact with the environment, & complete objectives. My contributions were Game & Level Design.

Project goals

Meaningful cooperative gameplay
Fast-paced, combat chess

Design Challenges

Meaningful CO-OP

Both players must have equal agency AND have incentive to swap roles often

Gameplay Goals

Running and gunning has been done before, how can we be different?

Engaging Combat

Enemies present different challenges AND need to promote co-op mechanics

My Solutions

Hazards

Plenty of traditional hazards:

(buzz saws, lasers etc.)

Player Specific Platforms that break up areas in interesting ways.

Room Objectives

Each room has an objective type:

- Run & Gun

- King of the Hill

- Wave mode

This One's Mine

There are enemy types:

Cannon Fodder

Flying Swarmers

Heavy

Each have variations that only one player can damage

Reload!

The gunner has a magazine size.

To reload the players have to switcharoo!

Modifications

Modifications that are picked up by the running player changes their dash and shooting attributes. Add fire, lighting, ice or explosives!

Game Design

Inspiration

The team wanted to create a game with meaningful cooperative mechanics and fast pace action. One of the members pitched the idea of two players controlling a vehicle together and eventually the idea was turned into Switcharoo.

Meaningful Co-op

One of my major contributions to the co-op design was the reliance of each player for the other. I wanted players to be constantly swapping roles so that no one was locked into a single role.

I looked at the fun of taking on different roles in Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime and pitched the players should swap positions in order to reload, and there be specific enemy types per player.

One player can hurt robot enemies and the other aliens.

Additional to that, I wanted the movement player to be engaging in combat, so I designed the dash to have trail effects that hurt the enemies of that controlling player.

Enemy Design

I designed each enemy to have a specific role that players can instantly recognize and adapt to that which when combined with other enemies in an encounter, create a interesting challenge each time.

Spawners

Create new enemies, must be destroyed to continue most areas.

Flyers

The enemies dive bomb towards players and ignore most obstacles. They can attack from any angle, therefore the best defense is to counter their attack with a dodge. They follow a patrol path that cover a large are of the room they are in.

Rushers

Similar to Flyers, the Rusher's goal is to get in close and attack players though they are grounded and are therefore easier to dodge. Their movement behavior is similar to Goombas, bounce and turn off walls and drop off ledges.

Grunts

The movement of Grunts are similar to the Rushers, only that when approaching a ledge, will turn around and continue the other way. When players enter the sights of Grunts, they stop their movement and linearly shoot a series of medium moving projectiles.

Assault

These enemies attack different than each other. The
Assault Robot linearly shoots three medium moving projects, while the Assault Alien shoots two slow moving projectiles in a spread that are effected by gravity. They both move between patrol points.

Heavy

The Heavies are hard hitting enemies that have unique attacks. The Heavy Robot has slow moving homing and a spread of three medium moving projectiles. It moves slowly on the ground between patrol points. The Heavy Alien does not attack at all, rather it creates a swarm of smaller aliens that it sends toward the players, homing in on their position in waves. It flies in the air between patrol points.

Level Design

Map Overview

After tutorializing the controls and co-op mechanics the players have three rooms to enter each with a unique objective. Each room is designed around specific combat and traversal challenges.

Each room is locked down when beginning the objective prohibiting progress until completed. There is some choice as to which objective can be played second and third.

Each room leads to a common exit to finish the game.