Download Tradewind
A fast-paced open-world platformer with an emphasis on freedom, flight, and flow.
Engine
– From scratch, C++
Duties
– Mission/Level Design
Time
– 12 months
Team
– 10 members
Tradewind is a 2D open-world platformer that emphasizes on freedom, flight, and flow. In the game, the player accomplishes objectives using a jetpack to get around a city of networked airships.
The game and its team encountered a lot of unfortunate setbacks during development, including engine limitations that resulted in a slower content pipeline, and an over-scoped design that resulted in a product that should have spent a few extra months in development. Despite the year-long struggle, the project was a fantastic learning experience, and I would gladly work with anyone from the project again.
Skills that I practiced included:
- Open-world level and mission design
- Multidisciplinary team cooperation and communication
- Creating a project-specific level design process
- Usability testing and working with custom tools and editors
- Project scoping
Looking back, I would change the following:
- The game would have been more successful as a linear platformer, not open-world
- Request tool features earlier and faster
- Significant UI, UX, usability, and player feedback improvements
- Scripting support would have allowed more freedom and speed
