SeaFeud

SeaFeud is a 3D underwater arcade racing game. Players race on fish and dynamically change their “vehicle” stats by colliding and swapping with other fish on the course. While in typical racing games, players select their vehicle or customize their vehicle prior to starting the game, SeaFeud switches things up by defaulting everyone to a basic fish at the beginning of the race. Throughout the race, the player can swap to other fish, giving them a statistical edge. While on these fish, their stamina will run down before swapping back, encouraging the player to try different playstyles.

Overview:

Role: AI/gameplay programmer
Team Size: 48 developers, 14 programmers
Genre: 3D arcade racer
Development Timeline: February 2023 – May 2023
Platforms: Windows (Steam)
Engine: Unreal Engine 5.2

Play on steam

Roles and Responsibilities:

Created AI racers that dynamically react to a track’s obstacles, powerups, and junctions, due to preset behaviors
Engineered race logic for the single race mode and grand prix mode to calculate scores, positions, and times
Implemented UI logic and menu flow for the credits and level select screens
Worked closely with level designers and artists when implementing new game features

Retrospective:

What Went Well:

Shipped a game to Steam with only 4 months of development
Cross discipline communication with level designers and artists
No crunch was required
Very few cuts were needed and most development goals were reached

What Went Wrong:

Lack of pre-production caused the first few milestones to fall behind
Initial code and project architecture were poorly executed, which caused later development issues
UI was disregarded until the final milestones causing for a lot of Beta development to be focused on UI rather than bugs

What I Learned:

Blueprint/UE5 knowledge
How to follow a pipeline on a large development team with leads, producers, and stakeholders
How to communicate effectively across disciplines with artists, level designers, and producers