Game Documentation and User Guide:

This devlog is meant to serve as documentation for my game “Escape from the Mansion” and provide a comparison between the original concept and the final game, list of all the assets used in the game as well as provide a user guide for future players.  

Final Game Comparison to Original Concept

There are a number of differences from the original concept to the final version of the game so far. The first and foremost obvious differences are the assets and concept art used in the original concept document as they were later changed to more suitable and in some cases more usable in terms of Unity animation. In fact, none of the tilesets or characters animations from the original concept made it in.

The next main difference is the flashlight aspect, where in the original the flashlight was to run off a “charge” and the player would have to recharge the flashlight as they progress. This feature never ended up being implemented, mostly due to time constraints and difficulty in the feature implementation itself as it would require the use of an inventory system potentially within Unity, as such the feature was scrapped to make the game simpler.

Another feature that was scrapped was enemies or at least as the player progressed would get harder/faster as well as earlier level enemies would flee when the player would shine their flashlight. This ended up being scrapped as the game at the stage of the final week simply didn’t have enough levels, as well as the complexity of balancing the pathfinding used along with the flee algorithm simply did not come to fruition with the time I had unfortunately.

While I ended up not having enough time left to implement the code and features required to implement these extra features, I manage to successfully complete the base game and implement all features I needed for the base game to be enjoyable and functional. As such, I would say that the final game ended up being an accurate representation of my original vision.

Testing Feedback

After the testing session on Friday, I received a number of very constructive feedback from the testers. While it was mostly about bugs, all testers agreed that all elements of the game suited the genre and the feel. Testers stated that the controls were simple and easy to understand, and the aim of the game was fairly obvious. The feedback around the art was that it felt well suited and the testers praised the audio choices. One suggestion at the time was to add audio to the enemies to enhance their uniqueness. Most testers simply suggested more levels to be added, while some other changes were also suggested. While observing the testers I noticed that most were enjoying the flashlight feature and the lighting aspect of the game, and provided I had more time I would take those into account to further enhance the game. The testing session as well as the feedback implemented as a result is explained in further depth in my testing Devlog.

A brief summary of the changes made as a result of feedback include:

• Major bug fixes, mainly collision as well as level layout.
• Audio clips added to the enemies
• Minor UI tweaks
 

Assets

For the sprites and any outsourced assets, links will be provided in the references section at the end of documentation.

Sprites/Characters:

• Player spritesheet
  • “Steven” animated character sprite sheet by Kronovi
• Rat spritesheet
  • From the “Rodents” sprite pack by Tuomo Untinen (Reemax) & Jordan Irwin (AntumDeluge)
• Bat spritesheet
  • Bat Sprite Pack by Elthen’s Pixel Art Shop
• Skeleton spritesheet
  • Skeleton sourced from Monster Pack 40 by Admurin
• Key
  • Key sprite by Karsiori
• Title Screen
  • Image generated by ChatGPT 4o

Tilesets:

• Background, objects, floors, etc
  • Mythical Dungeon Tileset by Versatile Dev

Audio:

• Title Music
  • Eerie by music_for_video
• Background Ambience/Music
  • Horror Background Atmosphere #11 by Universefield
• Player footstep audio
  • Footsteps in a hallway by derjuli(Freesound)
• Rat enemy noises
  • Tikus by SondangSirait419
• Bat enemy noises
  • bats by maxthrower(freesound_community)
• Skeleton enemy noises
  • Rattling Bones by spookymodem (Freesound)

Fonts:

• Used by Title, buttons, game UI and any text in the game: 
  • "Monton-Regular” on Google Fonts designed by Vernon Adams

Scripts:

Disclaimer: Many of these scripts were modified with the help of Github CoPilot built-in to Visual Studio, however the core features, script behaviour, game logic was also designed by the original developer(me, Taif Al-Amin), and GenAI was primarily used as a tool for research and debugging code as well as streamlining any simple changes. Unfortunately as most of the usage occurred in the Visual Studio application, I am unable to provide the exact prompts and share the original chats.

• EightWayMovement
  • Inspired and imported from practicals, then modified to fit current game. Used for player movement as well as a medium to play audio when the players moves. Also includes logic for flipping the sprite with the player direction, also includes logic for handling “Key” collection and “Door” opening.
• EnemyMovement
  • Imported from practicals, then heavily modified to fit current game and NavMesh pathfinding, also includes logic for the enemy stopping when colliding with the player’s flashlight, as well as triggering the “Game Over” UI when colliding with the player.
• EnemySpawner
  • Created by me with some assistance in debugging from Github Copilot
  • Used to spawn enemies at points in the scene, if multiple points will choose one at random to spawn the enemy, as well as currently making sure that only a single enemy spawns at a time
• FollowingLights
  • Created by me with some assistance in debugging from Github Copilot
  • Used to instantiate the flashlight movement as well as restricting the movement and flip the light with the player
• GameManager
  • Created by me
  • Used to trigger and as a medium to trigger the Game Over UI (when the player collides with the enemy) and Victory UI (when the player reaches the door on the last level)
• DoorToNextScene
  • Created by me with some assistance in debugging from Github Copilot
  • Used to open the door at the end of levels and lead to next scene or trigger the Victory UI if the door was in the last scene, the door opening logic was based on the EightWayMovement script if the player has collected the “Key”
• KeySpawner
  • Created by me with some assistance in debugging from Github Copilot
  • Used to spawn the key randomly within a certain bounds within the scene, as well as ensuring that only a single key would spawn at a time. Also includes logic for handling “exclusion zones” to ensure the key wouldn’t spawn at unreachable locations
• MainMenu
  • Created by me
  • Used to instantiate the buttons on the title screen, “Play” to play the first scene, “Quit” to close the game.
• SceneSwitcher
  • Imported from the practicals
  • Used to switch from one scene to another, mostly used in the level to level scene switching
• NavMeshComponents
  • Taken from h8man’s Github, as well as inspired by the Youtube Video “Unity 2D Tilemap Pathfinding Tutorial” by Rootbin
  • Used for enemy pathfinding through tilemaps and game world
 

User Guide

Game name: “Escape from the Mansion”  

Game Introduction:

“Escape from the Mansion” is a 2D horror game, where the player must navigate through the abandoned mansion and escape, opening the doors using keys until they reach the end. The players are given a flashlight to keep the enemies that are on each level at bay, if the enemy catches and comes in contact with the player themselves, the game ends. Once the key is collected, the player can then make their way to the door to reach the next level.  

Controls:

Use the “WASD” keys to move the player and mouse/cursor movement to direct the flashlight. To collect the “key” simply walk over the key as it will automatically collect and open the door.

Game Screens:

Title screen containing three buttons, Play which leads to the first level, Settings which simply leads to an empty menu at this point as it is a work in progress, Quit which exits the game.  

The levels layout which contains the player in the mansion, and a simple light source around on the player to light the completely dark area in the level, as well as the enemies which spawn on a random point (marked by barrels for the first level), and a “key” which spawns within a collectable area within the level. The door at the end of the level which leads to the next level, or triggers the Victory screen if last level.   

Game Over screen which is triggered when the player collides with the enemy.

Victory screen which triggers when the player interacts with the last door in the last level.

References:    

Character: Steven animated character spritesheet by Kronovi, 2021:  https://darkpixel-kronovi.itch.io/character-steven-free

Mythical Dungeon Tileset by Versatile Dev, 2023: https://verzatiledev.itch.io/mythic-dungeon

“Rat” Enemy sprite from the Rodents sprite pack by Tuomo Untinen (Reemax) & Jordan Irwin (AntumDeluge): https://opengameart.org/content/rodents-rat-rework

Unity 2D Tilemap Pathfinding Tutorial by Rootbin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtQhX-lmYEA

NavMeshPlus and components by h8man: https://github.com/h8man/NavMeshPlus

Key sprite by Karsiori: https://karsiori.itch.io/pixel-art-key-pack-animated

Font used in the game, “Monton-Regular” on Google Fonts designed by Vernon Adams: https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Monoton?categoryFilters=Feeling:%2FExpressive%2FExcited

Bat Sprite Pack by Elthen’s Pixel Art Shop: https://elthen.itch.io/bat-sprite-pack

Skeleton sourced from Monster Pack 40 by Admurin: https://admurin.itch.io/monster-pack-40

Eerie by music_for_video: https://pixabay.com/music/modern-classical-eerie-21716/

Horror Background Atmosphere #11 by Universefield: https://pixabay.com/music/mystery-horror-background-atmosphere-11-240870/

Footsteps in a hallway: https://pixabay.com/sound-effects/footsteps-in-a-hallway-47842/

Tikus by SondangSirait419: https://pixabay.com/sound-effects/tikus-220067/

bats by freesound_community: https://pixabay.com/sound-effects/bats-33995/

Rattling Bones by freesound_community: https://pixabay.com/sound-effects/rattling-bones-105394/