Technical Designer, Technical Artist:
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Designed and implemented a system for creating, displaying, and managing reflections in 2D space
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Implemented a UI redesign for the central combat interface
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Performed quality assurance locating, reproducing, and resolving bugs
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Developed shaders for various visual effects
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Implemented level metadata for collision, monster encounters, puzzles, and treasure
A Tetris-inspired RPG adventure from Impact Gameworks.
Reflection System
One major contribution I made to the project was the implementation of a system to display visual reflections in 2D space. This was achieved using a combination of sprite masking and shaders, along with scripts to manage the objects involved. The goals of this project were for it to be:
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Flexible: Allow reflections to be used in a variety of scenarios with a variety of different shaders, even simultaneously
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Easy to Implement: Designers and artists must be able to easily define a reflection mask and implement reflections with a single prefab
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Expandable: Implementing additional reflection types or shader effects must be as simple as possible
Process
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I first worked on getting the basic technology in place. In this case, this involved learning about sprite masks, their limitations, and how to use them.
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Once I had a single reflection working, I examined the use cases for this system and the workflow it would be involved in.
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I identified that the ability to have both multiple reflected objects and multiple reflective surfaces in the same room was key. Additionally, the process to configure a new reflective object/surface should involve as few steps as possible.
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I then developed a set of scripts to allow designers and artists to implement a new reflective object/surface with a single component.
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Finally, I created documentation and example prefabs to allow for easy use and expansion of the system by others further down the line.
Pixel Art Water Shader
Another major task I undertook was the development of a seamlessly-tiling stylized pixel-art water shader.
The effect integrates the reflection system above and consists of a number of layers.
Depth Calculation
Water
Foam
Sparkle Particles
Reflection
