Nathan Eyles Game Design
Project Witch House
Project Witch House is an assignment showcasing my understanding of level design. I wanted to create an immersive experience with as minimal programming as possible. I wanted the level and minimalistic mechanics to speak for themselves. As a result of this, the only programming involved was the player controller and a few simple sound triggers.
​
Envisioned as the first of many levels, Project Witch House puts you, the player, in the role of a wanderer who comes across a small village caught in the midst of panic. The village elder requests your help to reclaim 5 kidnapped children from the clutches of an evil witch. As you approach the witches lair, you'll notice that things are not what they appear from afar. Before too long, you are trapped and must navigate through a series of puzzle rooms to escape.
​
Will you escape alive?
Will you find the missing children?
​
SPOILER ALERT!
Yes and yes.
The gameplay for this project takes place entirely underground. I wanted to display a quite sterile environment, similar to that which you might see in games such as Portal.
​
The puzzle mechanics are very simple. It is based off of the 6 colours of a colour wheel. Not to flat out give you the solution to all of the puzzles, but the colour displayed on the colour wheel in each room gives the player an indication to the correct path to take. Things may become complicated when more than 1 colour is displayed, but that's where basic colour theory comes into play.
​
Each puzzle room progresses in difficulty, but fear not adventurous wanderer... there is no death or game over. Any incorrect choices will lead you back to the beginning of the room. I specifically designed it this way to provide a safe and stress-free experience for the player.
I tremendously enjoyed myself throughout production of this piece. I had full control over the topic and genre, and just went completely hard with everything. My favourite aspects was coming up with the puzzle designs and the little optical illusions and random cool visuals.
​
For the puzzle design, I intentionally kept things simple because I approached it from the point of view of this being the first of many levels. The puzzles were created vastly through trial and error. Each puzzle needed to make sense within the context of the game, but also needed to be a progression from the puzzle beforehand.
​
The optical illusions were just pure joy to create and implement. I take great pride with all of my work, and even though this was the first serious project I created, it is by far my proudest accomplishment. This is most definitely something I will continue with in the near future, and use my recently acquired skills to make it even better.
Team of 1
Solo project.
Time period
2 weeks.
Equipment
Unity 2021
Maya
​