One of my favorite personal projects I’ve worked on is my design for a 2D platform fighter similar to Super Smash Bros. Without the extensive coding knowledge or much time as a full-time student, I decided to do all of the designing of the project and its characters ahead of time. So I brought out my sketchbook and I went to work, visualizing the themes, characters, archetypes, movesets, and mechanics of a full roster. This exercise helped strengthen my ability to translate game concepts into practical, documented information, and could someday form the framework for a future project. Click to expand the images and swipe through some of the pages to see a bit of my thought process!
This project helped me realize my preference for sketching out early designs and prototypes with pen and paper, providing an unexpected comfort and freedom in translating ideas into a physical representation.
After I had the ideas down on paper, I began concepting some of the characters digitally in order to get a better idea for how the look and feel of the game would be like. I even took this opportunity to learn Aseprite, a program for making pixel art, and try my hand at animating an idle animation for one of the characters (as seen at the top of this page).
There is still a lot of work to be done with this project, and I would love to revisit it at some point when I am stronger at programming and game design. The platform fighter is a genre that holds a special place in my heart, and I hope to someday continue to explore the various limits and opportunities the genre provides.
