Cruel Fuel is a first-person shooter with action-combat elements in which the player controls both a Pilot (soldier) and a Mecha (giant human-piloted robot).
FORMAT
Engine
Unity 2018
Team Size
Nine
Development Time
Sixteen weeks during a school semester with a few more weeks of solo polish after the semester
ROLES & TASKS
Creative Director
Conveying Core Vision
Coordinating Team Tasks
Lighting & Post Processing
Lead Designer
Game Design Documentation
UI & Menu Design
Core Mechanic Design
Tutorial Design
Supervising All Design
Lead Programmer
Core Mechanic & Player Controller Functionality
UI & Menu Functionality
Game Manager Functionality
Settings Functionality
Animation/Particle/Shader Integration
Post-Processing Special Effect Functionality
Supervising All Code
DESIGN GOALS
Create a short (roughly 12 minute) game that manifests the themes of "Mecha v Kaiju" and "Conservation" with its gameplay, narrative, and aesthetics
Create a distinct play experience for both the Pilot and the Mecha
DESIGN DISCUSSION
The core narrative and gameplay concepts sprang from the gameplay themes of "Mecha v Kaiju" and "Conservation". To do the "Mecha v Kaiju" theme justice the team knew we'd have to ultimately end in an epic Mecha-Kaiju battle but bringing "Conservation" in meant it made sense for there to be some sort of resource brought to that stage to be expended. From that line of thinking we decided on dividing the game into the Pilot and Mecha stages where the player spends most of the Pilot stage scrounging for parts for their Mecha while gathering fuel (and trying not to expend it). Then, in the Mecha stage, the player battles against a titanic enemy while trying to preserve whatever fuel they've earned to achieve the best possible outcome.
Distinguishing both halves of the game so they truly represented their intended experiences meant clearly distinguishing scale, changing player movement feel, changing player skill sets, and changing the player's total threat level in relation to enemies. Combined all these factors leave the Pilot quick and nimble with lots of options yet still with a good deal of vulnerability if enemies aren't managed well. This constrasts against the Mecha which is slow and tough with heavy firepower and and a meticulous method of staying in the fight.
Shaping the player abilities was one of the biggest components of creating those feelings so while the Pilot has a punchy shotgun and tether focused moveset that allows him to get in and out of combat and control engagements, the Mecha instead has clunky but incredibly high impact abilities (like the artillery strike and minigun) that allow it to both manage hordes of normal enemies and (particularly in the case of its dash-refresh and empowered melee) respond to the Kaiju's threat.
Tutorialization in such a short game needed to be seamless and quick so I opted for a reactive system that prompts the player if they appear unsure of how to proceed. This is true for the Pilot movement tutorial and the Mecha combat tutorial. Additional tutorialization and guidance comes both in the form of mission prompts and the menu driven pilot guide which explains more detail about the player and enemy abilities. Death will prompt a contextual hint based on where and how you died to ensure players leave knowing how they can improve. All of the in game tutorials and mission prompts can be toggled on or off from both the start menu and the pause menu.
STORIES
Our project originated from two separate pitches, one resembling our final project conceptually (pilots and mechas) and one resembling it mechanically (action oriented combat that makes use of combos to achieve stronger attacks). The two distinct directs ended up having to be merged into one idea to form unity within the team and it created a more unique project for it.
One of our programmers left the team early in development bringing out team from ten down to nine and meaning that the technical component of the entire project was divided between me and a single other programmer which resulted in a great deal of learning for both of us.
