Mage Escape is a 2-Player Cooperative Puzzler where the Players' goal is to use a variety of Elemental Spellbooks and Magical Abilities to cast their way to the exit portal.
My Contributions: Initial Concept, GDD, Production Documentation, Tutorial Level, Asset Implementation, Gameplay Testing and General QA.
The initial concept and design for Mage Escape was produced by me for our Major Assessment in 2021. I used the concept to pitch to a handful of my peers in the Game Art and Programming courses with the intent of forming a team to bring the idea to life.
Our team, which we named the 'Grimoire Gang' after the Spellbooks featured in the game, was comprised of Myself as the Lead Designer/Producer, a Level Designer, five Artists who took various individual roles, and two Programmers. The project ran for roughly 16 Weeks, with 3 dedicated to Pre-Production and Documentation materials, and the remaining 13 to the actual development of the game. The final product includes a Tutorial that I designed, 8 Levels created by our Level Designer, a fully-voiced and animated introduction cinematic, and tons of art assets created by our talented Art team.
The game revolves around a duo of Wizards who are trying to complete the magical trials left behind by their late Master in order to escape the Tower they've lived in since they were born. Puzzles see the use of 8 different spells (categorized across 4 different elements) with varying effects that influence the Players and their environment. Players gain access to the spells by picking up various elementally-charged Spellbooks.
Our initial goals were to create a co-op puzzling experience that would allow Players to experiment with the tools at their disposal to solve interesting and unique puzzles, while also giving them space to muck around with one another in the level spaces.
I think the project overall was very successful, and we achieved most, if not all of the goals we set out to. I am extremely grateful to have worked with so many talented peers and to have created something that I'm truly proud of.