Game designer
Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy
Project duration: 2.5 years
Developer: Asobo Studio
Steam page:
Launch trailer:
This single player action adventure game takes place as a prequel of the Plague Tale series. I worked as a Game designer mainly on the 3Cs, the combat system, the final boss, the investigation book and collectables.
I also had to document my designs and keep them up-to-date to communicate efficiently with the whole team.
3C
I had to adapt existing traversal and camera systems from a narrative stealth game to an exploration combat game to create a smooth experience fitting to the genre.
This required adding a jump to our character, that I designed and tuned to be realistic while allowing spectacular leaps across spike-filled gaps.
I wanted to make the player feel as free as possible and made sure combining multiple traversal moves could be possible, such as jumping while vaulting, catching a zipline mid-air, crouching while sprinting (makes the character slide for a few meters), etc.
In such an exploration game with high cliffs that can surprise the players at every corner, we had to implement a system to prevent the character to fall to its death too easily. Therefore, we made the game stop the player and make the character play an animation to warn the player about the incoming danger. Of course, if the player wants to proceed, there won't be a second warning...
I also worked on a camera system that would slowly bring the camera behind the character when moving around. This was designed to help players with less experience handling the camera.
COMBAT
I helped create the combat system in a studio that had no previous experience of it. This required a lot of prototyping, hand in hand with the programmers and animators to understand what makes combat juicy.
Eventually, we made it work by adding a lot of refinements such as: slow down on hits, fine tuning the parry timing and making sure that every move could be cancelled with a parry or a dodge until the very last second, to avoid a fatal blow.
I also participated in directing a motion capture session, to make sure the animation translated the gameplay intentions.
INVESTIGATION BOOK
Inspired by games such as Tunic, I designed a book the player has access to, with answers to puzzles that can't be understood without standing before them. This way, I wanted to create this desire to explore without saying a word.
I also worked on making its usage as smooth as possible, making it even possible to look around in first person camera while consulting the book, to be able to see both the puzzle and the clues required to solve it.
FINAL BOSS
I worked on the final Boss fight of the game, that had to be both a cinematic experience but also a way for the player to show how they mastered the abilities learned previously.
Through prototyping, we created new attacks for the game's main enemy and unique attack patterns to test the player's traversal mastery.
This concluded in an epic fight, creating a cathartic experience.
COLLECTABLES
I mainly worked on the blades and the charms system.
Blades are rare and gives the player the ability to try out a different play style by reinforcing one of the character's skills.
Charms are common, and reward the exploration by giving the player small chances to get an advantage in combat (such as a small chance of en enemy arrow missing its target).
For both of these collectables, my focus was to create a real reward for the player without extending our scope.
I also worked with the artists to create the UI of the codex menu.
