Beat the Beat Up!
May 2020-May 2021
Technical Designer
Beat the Beat Up is a Bollywood-themed rhythm/fighting game that allows players to take on the role of an action hero in a Bollywood movie, fighting enemies to the beat of music.
The game was awarded Best VR Game at the Mumbai International Film Fest and received an honorable mention at Digifest Temecula 2022.
My responsibilities consisted of outlining core mechanics at the beginning of the project, and creating game design documents that outlined key features such as the combat system, the integration of rhythm into the gameplay, and environmental events that could occur.
Design
With the VR and rhythm elements of the game very much dependent on their technical implementation by the engineers, one of my responsibilities was maintaining multiple design documents, including "beatmaps," a technical implementation of the level with timestamps marked to beats in the song and windows for players to hit enemies for bonus points.
The beatmap system was a collaboration between me and the engineering team to solve the problem of needing to rapidly iterate on gameplay between playtests, which was difficult to do with the Unity timeline system we had been using so far. To create the beatmap, I ran through the song in Adobe Audition and set markers for each "beat" we wanted to have the player perform moves on. After exporting a csv containing all the marker timestamps, I added details to each beat describing where the player had to strike the enemy, the type of enemy, and the direction on the map from which they would approach the player.
The engineering team and I created a script that could take in each beat from the csv and map it to a corresponding enemy within the level. From there, I used my own experiences playing the game and feedback from playtesters to tweak the timing, hit type, and positioning of the various beats to make the player experience feel more fun and engaging.
My Work Also Included:
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Design Documentation
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Technical Documentation
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Level Design
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Experience Outlining
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Playtesting and Iteration
Work Examples
Technical Platform Document
An example of a design document, outlining possible events that could occur in the environment as the player is fighting enemies.
An example of a design document, outlining possible events that could occur in the environment as the player is fighting enemies.
Game Event Brainstorming
A sample of the level design spreadsheet with timestamps for player actions.
A sample of the level design spreadsheet with timestamps for player actions.
Level Design Spreadsheet
A portion of the design document that outlines the different types of enemies the player could encounter and how they would have to be dealt with.
A portion of the design document that outlines the different types of enemies the player could encounter and how they would have to be dealt with.