Alien Races
Alien Races is the result of the work produced for the Online Game Design course held by Prof. Dario Maggiorini and Prof. Laura Anna Ripamonti at University of Milan. For this exam, which is part of the Videogame Design path of Computer Science Master Degree, students were supposed to design an online multiplayer videogame and to develop a prototype of it.
Alien Races was designed to be an innovative kart-racing game in which, during a Tournament (consisting of 4 races) players must try to get as many Coins as possible, by finding them along the tracks, stealing them from other players, etc. Before each race, players can also make bets with each other wagering Coins: at the end of the race, bets losers pay to the winner the amount of Coins wagered. At the end of the Tournament, each player is awarded an additional point for every 10 Coins owned. This means that players not only have the classic short-term goal of winning the race, but also the long-term goal to earn as many Coins as possible, because at the end of the Tournament they might do the difference between winning or losing the gold cup!
The team working on Alien Races was called Smile Games and was composed of the following members:
- Federico Aliprandi, game designer
- Giuseppe Ellena, programmer
- Alessandro Novì, programmer
- Nicoletta Gomboli, concept artist and 2D artist
- Silvia de Toni, concept artist
- Nicolò Lucini, 3D artist
- Ilaria Cislaghi, 3D artist
- Lucia Violino, music composer
For this project I had worked mainly on the following tasks:
- Game Design: complete design of the game and writing of the Game Design Document
- Level Design: design of the Sugar Planet track, including full specifications of all track's straight segments and turns (the 3D model of the track was modeled by Nicolò Lucini following these specifications writtend in the GDD), creation of the scene in Unity with placement of gameplay elements (item boxes, accelerators, ramps, etc...) and props (chocolate volcano, ice-cream trees, giant cakes, etc...)
Main tasks I covered:
- Game Design
- Level Design
Game Engine: Unity