Itch.io Game Page

Game Design Document

Escaping Project Paragon is a game where you play as Subject #34 and have just broken out of your cell in an evil science facility. Your main objective? Escape. You will have to use what you find around you, be it security keycards or beakers to aid you in this task. If you are observant, you may even discover clues as to the true nature of the facility...  

​

Game Genres

• Stealth

• Escape

• Single Player

​

Platform

• Windows PC (Itch.io)

​

Engine

• Unity

​

Time Spent on Project

• August 9th, 2021 - December 1st, 2021 (16 weeks)

​

My Role(s)

• Lead Designer

• Level Designer

​

Software I Used

• Unity

• Photoshop

• Audacity 

• Discord 

• HacknPlan

• Google Drive

• ScreenToGif

• Diagrams.net

• Mantis 

• Visual Studio

• GitKraken

• Google Docs

• Google Sheets

• Google Forms

• Chiptone

​

Gameplay Summary

You are a test subject that is trying to escape an evil laboratory without being detected. The focus of the game will be on stealth and avoiding being caught. Guards will have a vision cone and will also be able to hear your footsteps meaning that the player will have to sneak in order to avoid being heard. The player will also have to find keycards to open locked security doors to progress through the laboratory. Each section of the laboratory will have a theme, the themes are: Containment room, main foyer, bio-lab, and a surveillance room. 

​

My Overview of the Project

Escaping Project Paragon was a student project that I completed with a team of 5 artists, 3 designers (including myself) and 1 programmer. I am incredibly happy with how this project turned out. This was my final project in my first year of the game design course at AIE and I believe the organisation and communication between the team was one of best parts of working in this project. This was especially important during this project as AIE was closed due to lockdown throughout the entire project. This meant that we communicated entirely online through Discord. To aid this workflow we also used software that would help us collaborate on documents together such as Google Docs which meant less blockages in the flow of work. 

​

My Contributions

• Created/designed the "tutorial" (containment) area of the game.

• Worked on the Game Design Document.

• Acted as lead designer and made sure the other designers were on task and understood what needed to be done. 

• Frequently held meetings with other team members throughout workdays as well as outside of class. 

• Ensured that I was available for any questions that team members may have had. 

• Reviewed the other designers work and helped to give feedback to improve their designs for different areas. 

• Worked with the artists to import the art assets and ensure they were all the correct size etc.

• Helped to source some audio for the game. 

• Logged bugs in Mantis to aid the programmer in squashing them. 

• Wrote all of the hidden notes in the game. 

• Helped set up the pathing of guards. 

• Designed the story of the game to help aid in the visual/environmental storytelling of the game. 

• Created and conducted surveys for testing purposes. 

• Iterated on feedback given by teachers, peers and participants in testing. 

• Merged each of the designer's sections of the game into the main scene and made them fit together. 

• Created User Interface concepts. 

​

I believe that working on this game taught me a lot about how to lead a team and work together with other disciplines to get a final product out and ready. I gained a much better understanding that each discipline has more knowledge in some areas than others and as a designer it is my job to ensure that I listen to all team members that give suggestions and to keep in mind that each discipline had their own expertise with certain things. I believe I did well to communicate with the team, always ensuring that I was present during class time and available to be contacted outside of hours, should I be needed. Throughout the project I made it an effort to join in any voicecalls within the Discord server whenever I was able and there were people in there, so that I could help the other members of the team or just to have a better understanding of what each team member was currently doing. 

​

Throughout the project during class-time, all members of the team would be in a voicecall on Discord and would be able to easily communicate with each-other. This project helped to give me a much better understanding of what it is like to work on a project from start to finish, including all of the things that need to be done at each of the development stages and exactly what I am expected to do as a designer to fulfill the project needs. I also learnt a great deal about what kind of information I needed to ask for when conducting surveys and playtesting.

​