Dune Diver

Project Type:

3D Brawler

Date:

2025

Dune Diver is my first 3D project, and was an intense working timeline. As a team we quickly settled on a concept: an elemental creature able to dive and swim underground having to defeat enemies to save their world from a plague. We had long discussions over our setting and exact mechanics, but it's these discussions that allowed us to get to the project we have now. While we did experience some communication issues, notably on workload attribution and personal expectations (both of which were later adressed accordingly), I can proudly say that our debates on the game itself, its content, features or artistic vision, were handled in a very open and mindful manner such as that everyone felt included and heard. This was the biggest strength of our team, and a true learning experience for all in how to deal with the varying outlooks and opinions of different team members. It's what allowed us to often edit our concept to better fit the scope of the project as well as discuss how we would take into account teacher and playtester feedback. Our final game presentation was extremely rewarding for all, we all got to present our work on the project and were proud to show it off to our teachers and fellow classmates.

Enemy brainstorming - notebook sketches and notes

View of a desert hill through a stone archway

Outside of the main design rules and controls of Dune Diver, my specific role as a game designer on this project focused heavily on level design. While I participated a little in programming for the game's main menu, the major part of my work was done on enemy design and combat situations. Working together with fellow level designer Marie SEMERCIYAN, we worked on an arena system and came up with 27 unique combat situations as well as a final boss fight. I focused especially on designing interesting layouts and balancing combat for a cohesive overall experience. We spent a lot of early production time brainstorming enemy types and synergies. Later, as we implemented situations into the Unity engine, we resorted to lots of play testing from Isart students to get feedback on improving our ideas. After the main level design work was done, I was in charge of integrating all arenas in their cohesive order. Towards the end of production, I had the visuals task to I integrate most of the environmental assets, creating the desertic ruins of Dune Diver with compelling vistas and an immersive atmosphere.