Build a Bot

Written By Donnacha Lohan

On Build a Bot I worked as the player systems designer which duties included:

  • General collaborative designs that began the fundamental base gameplay.

  • Creating management systems to easily track designs across the game.

  • Design chips (player upgrades) in a way that allows for combo potential.

  • Design multiple movement systems for the player each with unique movement options that changes the flow of combat.

  • Weapon systems designs and management, for how 2 independent weapons may interact with one another.

The Fundamentals:

As a group, the early design elements and foundational are a pivotal part of the designs that carried the game forward through each design going forwards. The base principals revolved around the dual weapon system, objective focused combat and modular player systems. These formed ideas for the start of the game, starting at their simple logical options and building out towards more complex systems.

Player Central Command:

The player is made up of a number of small components that all connect to a central controller, they enable input and outputs for the player. Each aspect of the player is designed to trigger external parts that then preform the actions returning relevant information. This aspect is where chips are stored and the information from these chips is collected by the relevant systems.

Weapons:

Weapons were designed with a pair in mind at all times, planned for the player to be able to hit shots easier due to attacks having a wide area of damage, or an aiming line for precise weapons. The following were designed fully by me:

  • Standard Rifle

    • Standard automatic machine gun styled weapon to give a simple and consistent weapon option to the player.

  • 24 gauge Shotgun

    • Better at short range, designed to be used for status effects with small damage but multiple hits per shot.

  • Charge Rifle

    • A precision weapon that fires a single burst of damage, scaling in both size and damage with how long the player charges the weapon.

  • Wrecking Ball

    • A heavy hitting weapon designed like a military flail, makes large sweeping attacks based on the amount of time charged.

  • Not-so Minigun

    • A high firerate weapon that takes a moment to wind up before firing.

Ultimates:

While weapons are always available to the player, once each charge the player gets to use one of these powerful moves that can turn the fight in the player’s favour. These can do damage, provide support or give the player a power boost. I designed the following in the game:

  • Self Repair

    • Heals the player based on their maximum health.

  • Overclock

    • Increases the players movement speed and dash recovery time for the duration.

  • Ammo Cache

    • Unlimited ammo and increased firerate for the duration.

  • Homing Missiles

    • Lock on to enemies in front of the player and fire missiles spread out amongst those enemies.

  • Yo-kai Mode

    • A reference to a game by friends of our team, the player increases their perception of the world around them as the world seems to slow around them.

Movement Systems:

Giving the player the ability to switch up their movement systems balancing the utility, the control, speed and health of the bot. This choice leads into the builds, giving the player options to having powerful escape options, a bonus attack mode with a charge or a heavy control over their movement. I designed the following:

  • Spider Crawler

    • A fully controlled movement that gives a simple and quick dash.

  • Tank Treads

    • A heavier and sluggish movement that accelerates slowly, with a burst of speed with an attacking charge for a dash.

  • Hover Quad

    • A fast and floaty movement with a teleport instead of a dash able to hop gaps and go behind terrain.

Status Effects:

Status effects are add-ons to the weapons that give the player extra options to deal with enemies, or cause methods to harm enemies more. These include critically striking on attacks, burning, slowing/ freezing movement, increasing damage taken, and causing knock back.

Chips:

The most import part of every Roguelite is the upgrades, wether small like increasing the players health or firerate, to spawning traps during your dash. The combined nature is designed to allow for multiple triggers to happen at once, or cause eachother to allow for the player to combo as much as possible. The following chip systems are my designs:

  • Status Effect Chips:

    • These chips apply to either the left or right weapon, each applying a status effect onto the enemy.

    • Critical Strike chance up, Critical Damage Up

    • Knockback on hit

    • Projectile piercing

    • Projcetile richocett

  • Stat up Chips:

    • General stat boosts e.g. health, dash speed, reload speed, firerate… ect

  • Stat up on Trigger:

    • Triggering based on player interations (reloading, taking damage, healing, etc) that give the player a temporary boost in an aspect which can stack.

  • Spawning on Trigger:

    • Dropping a mine on a kill, making an explosion when you take damage, and creating a damaging line based on your dash.

  • Weapon Specific Triggers:

    • Triggering off of reloading, taking a shot, getting a kill, etc each triggering effects tied to the weapon itself, increasing its damage, attack speed or guaranteeing a status effect.

Donnacha Lohan