ajax and argo
kill the humans
overview
Ajax and Argo is a first person shooter developed in the Unreal Tournament 3 Engine. It was developed by the student group Mindless Entertainment during a Game Design course at Vancouver Film School. My main role on the project was scripter/coder, but everyone on the team seconded as a designer. I also took the responsiblity of creating the level flow of the enviroments.
You play as Argo, the robotic defender of his artificial people, wielding Ajax, a powerful weapon that houses the entire AI of his people. It is Argos duty to protect Ajax and deliver him to safety from the merciless human race.
The Mark-III Argo has a heavy duty energy shield that can absorb different enemy projectile energies, then transfer them into Ajax to fire back. The energy that Argo transfers to Ajax and converts to fire back is always supercharged, making Ajax and Argo the deadliest robot due Elysium has ever witnessed.
You can download it here.
videos
This is the intro cinematic. It gives some exposition about the universe and characters in Ajax and Argo. Made by the fantastiscal Sam Irwin.
This is a compiled video of gameplay footage featuring the different enemies and abilities.
responsibilities
Some of my responsibilities on Ajax and Argo were the following:
- Helped conceptualize the vision for the game.
- Contributed to designing game features and mechanics.
- Established the content pipeline ASAP.
This allowed the our 3D Artist to iterate quickly and easily implement assets.
- Made rapid prototypes of key features and mechanics.
Quickly making prototypes allowed us to see what worked and didn't work without slowing down production.
- Wrote all the code in UnrealScript.
Learned to code efficiently using UnrealScript.
- Created level flow with BSP in Unreal Editor.
- Tuned and balanced gaming variables.
Fine tuning the fun was an integral part of our finished product.
code
UnrealScript is a OOP language which has a lot of similarities to Java. Having a brief introduction to C# before starting this project gave me a base understanding of OOP to work off of. I quickly picked up UnrealScript by dissecting Epics original code base as well as other moders work. Within days I started making the framework for Ajax and Argo (IE gametype, player, weapons).
Starting with what I knew I could handle was the first step, but also pushing myself to create things that were beyond my current skill level. Which allowed me to produce code content while learning UScript extremely fast.
Some of the first big challenges I faced was fleshing out an efficient pipeline for content and creating first playable. These obstacles were tackled with determination and examination.
After the basic framework was up came the meat of the project. I would eventually create thirty-eight custom classes that included unique weapon, enemy and features.
This video below shows the charged shot and shield functionality. Which was one of the many features and mechanics I wrote in UnrealScript.
Check out some code snipets from the shield and charged shot.
level
I was responsible for creating a fun and engaging level flow with the use of BSP brushes in the Unreal Editor.
Our early playtests revealed that the most fun gameplay occurred with difference in height in the level flow. Large accessible ramps were created in the lieu stairs/elevators for more spacious gameplay. Both the Generator and Reactor areas were designed with these concepts in mind.
Reactor Room
Check out the level breakdown doc for the reactor room here.
Generator Room
Check out the level breakdown doc for the generator room here.