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Game Designer
OVERVIEW
Digit Duel is a bullet hell designed like it is running on an old Nokia 3310, with only 84 x 48 pixels and two colors. A brand new and fragile smartphone fighting off older and much more resilient phone models from across the 20th century.
I worked with another designer on this project and we immediately decided to double down on the retro aesthetic, by designing an input system where you have to type out the action you want to make.
Thing is, typing on a Nokia 3310 was very different than it is today, and that is the core mechanic of the whole game.
A core mechanic where you start off as terrible and quickly become faster and faster that creates a super addicting gameplay loop
This time around the technical challenge that i had to impose myself was to make everything move discretely in the best way possible, both from a design perspective and player experience.
KEY FEATURES
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Side Scrolling Bullet Hell
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Developed like a 3310
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Retro-inspired input system
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Addicting core mechanic
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Hard - 1 HP
IN-DEPTH
Double Designer Project
Sometimes a module required us to team up with another designer, and I got paired with Francesco Pieruccini on this project. He immediately had a brilliant idea: using a sort of old keyboard input style to double down on the aesthetic and retro theme.
After an initial concept phase where we brainstormed together, I proposed to not split the tasks evenly, since I could focus mainly on the technical part while he refined the core elements of the game and wrote the full documentation of the game. He also decided to take on the job of creating the sprites for the game.
As always, I took on the chance to experiment with something I never did before: implement a complex input system and work at a lower, defined screen resolution.
The project ended up being very polished, especially for the input part, feeling incredibly rewarding and addicting.
Features
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A new and retro-inspired input system:​
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Commands to operate the ship need to be written on screen.​
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Numpad used like it is an old 3310 keyboard, having to type with 9 buttons.
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1 to eliminate the last character and # to confirm the command.
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Different feedbacks for wrong and correct typing.
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Main Menu that is also the first part of the tutorial
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To start the game it is required to type "START"
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Smooth introduction to the core mechanic
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Three different Bosses, they all have two different type of attacks:
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A simple shot, shared across al bosses.
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A boss specific attack, related to the phone model.
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Player only has one HP
PROJECT DETAILS
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Designer Duo: Worked mainly on the tech part
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Genre: Side Scrolling Bullet Hell
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Platform: PC
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Development time: 1 1/2 months
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Engine & Tools used: Unity, Aseprite
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Other: During this project i was mentored by industry professionals.
ABOUT ME
Junior Game Designer with a passion for the technical side of things and a deep understanding of Visual Scripting tools.
Graduated in Game Design at TheSign Academy in Florence.
PORTFOLIO
SOCIAL NETWORKS
I am looking for a position where i can use my hybrid set of skills while learning an array of new ones.
2024 - ALBERTO SARGENTI
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