Merritt Lum
Multimedia Digital Artist
Artstation (3D works):
https://www.artstation.com/merrittlum121
Contact:
mgl13@sfu.ca
Software Used:
Processing, Blender, Audacity
Overview
OBELISK is a 2D, "classic"-style fighting game, built for the final project of a SFU's Introduction to Digital Games class in Processing, a Java-based coding environment. Though admittedly simple, what primarily makes this project notable is being built from the ground up in a basic, non game-based coding environment with little to no prior frameworks for the essential, but complicated mechanical elements which make up "classic" fighting games, such as motion commands, hitboxes, hitstun, basic AI, and frame data among others; all of these required me to come up with original programming and implementation structures.
​
Process
Coding OBELISK had a number of noteworthy challenges, of which I would like to highlight two in particular whose solutions ended up coming not from trying to simply imagine an arbitrary implementation, but instead from working off of ideas common to fighting games. Motion input attacks - attacks requiring certain movement sequences before attacking to execute - were one of the fighting game mechanics whose frameworks I had to personally figure out a way to implement. My eventual solution, drawing on 'numpad notation,' was based on tracking movements as a sequence of numbers, and cross-referencing this sequence with ones in the attacks.
On a more design-focused side, the most interesting game design challenge was creating a health pickup - a project requirement, but very rarely seen in fighting games. In turn, what I chose to do was build my solution off of a type of mechanic which is instead commonplace in fighting games: comeback mechanics, something that activates for a disadvantaged player to help them recoup losses, but can lead to their actions becoming more predictable. When falling below certain health thresholds, an item will fly out of your character which, if you pick it up, will restore some of your health; however, your opponent may predict that you will attempt to pick it up, and thus something of a mindgame is created between the two players.
Project Type:
Independent Game
Date:
March-April 2022
P1 getting hit & a health pickup flying out.
P1 using the beam attack, exclusively an input move.
Sample of the Blender pose libraries for the fighter character.
Furthermore, though optional, I also made original audio and graphics for the game, using Blender to create and render characters and backgrounds; sounds were made by experimenting with various foley techniques and effects, whereas characters, character poses and environments were created in Blender.
On that note, this project allowed me to gain more familiarity with rigging and posing processes for 3D models; since many attacks require at least 2-3 frames to display a motion at all, I began to familiarize myself with pose libraries as a means to save time, keep poses consistent and allow for modification, allowing me to go back and modify or work off of old character poses whenever needed.
Reflection
I feel that this project ultimately suffered from having too wide of a scope; in being so ambitious and trying to recreate the "essentials" of classic fighting games, I feel I ultimately lost out on creating more truly original & exploratory mechanics, such as those of the health pickup, and chose a somewhat questionably applicable place to apply my efforts, with it arguably being better to simply copy over publicly available frameworks where existing. Furthermore, the amount of assets required made it so that I couldn't spend much time on any individual one, leaving many of a quality below what I would have liked.
​
That said, I still feel that creating OBELISK served as a unique and worthwhile process, especially in terms of programming; in not simply copying over other solutions for these mechanics, I was able to experience deconstructing, interpreting, and reconstructing mechanics as needed to suit my own project, an overall unique problem solving experience. Similarly, adapting my experience in 3D and audio carried with them places to figure out and learn more about those workflows.
​
Overall, making OBELISK was a demanding challenge, but certainly interesting to make; the complex nature of it allowed for a more grounded understanding of coding structures and combining disciplines, and the level of effort put in led to both a respectable result as an independent, short-timeframe game project and a high project grade.
Early build of the game, lacking environments, input moves, and other features.
