Oasis
Project Overview
Client
Team Project
My Role
Level & Puzzle Designer and Engineer
Timeline
Jan 2024 - May 2024
This was the first 2D game I created, developed with a colleague using GameMaker. Our goal was to design an empathy-driven experience that resonated with players. For this project, I focused on level design that supported the narrative, helping to strengthen the emotional impact through gameplay.
Early Level Design
In the early part of the game, I chose to include a lot of easy obstacles, traps, and puzzles to help the player understand which objects can be interacted with and which objects can kill the player. As the game progresses, the levels will start to get harder with more challenging puzzles to help the player get used to the movement and mechanics of the video game.
Late Level Design
I developed the concept of “trust” as the central theme, designing gameplay that makes players question whether they can trust their own movements. While the coding for transparent objects was simple, the real goal was to use psychological design to create fear and hesitation, limiting how freely players feel they can move.
I also introduced acid rain in the final level, which required the player to not only be aware of the obstacle in front of them, but also of obstacles around them at all times. If the player touched the rain, they would die instantly.
An example of an acid rain, spirits, and moving platforms
An example of a “trust” puzzle in the game, where the player must rely on their instincts to move forward.
Engineer
Lists of what I contribute:
Pause menu
Main menu and parallax effect
Acid rain
Spirits
Tomb
Invisible obstacle and fake obstacle
Anti-spamming system
Text box system
Automatic moving platform
Sound effects and background effect
Respawn system
Pause menu & Main menu parallax effect
Text box system
