Install Wizard is a top-down dungeon crawler in which the player uses digital sorcery to fight corrupted software in a 90’s-inspired computer operating system. Developed by a team of undergraduate students at Champlain College in fall 2020/spring 2021, I onboarded onto the team as a dedicated level and gameplay designer and created two of the game’s levels while iterating upon gameplay mechanics with support from additional designers and artists.
Champlain College Production
In working on Install Wizard, I joined a preexisting team that had already prototyped and proven their core gameplay and theming. In contrast to much of my prior work, here I had the luxury of specializing on a narrow slice of the larger game. With most of the high concepts already established, I was able to focus on creating the most refined moment-to-moment gameplay possible.
The Digital World
Install Wizard’s levels presented some interesting challenges; with levels themed around various computer applications, we took much care to best represent abstract, digital ideas in a tangible space. I pulled some inspiration from an early home computing model of representing data in a way that’s familiar to users — much like applications and shortcuts are represented on a virtual desktop, we represent a web browser with a digital city, image editors with an art studio and gallery, and so forth.
While the game’s visuals and level design philosophy could evoke an older era, second-to-second gameplay still needed to feel tight and modern. I honed combat encounters, enemies, and bosses to ensure they felt challenging but played fair, often leaving the player feeling as though they barely scraped through.
Pipelines
Each of the two levels I worked on for Install Wizard started with concepting alongside the larger design team, followed by sketches and design documents detailing the major beats of the level. These documents included asset lists, level walkthroughs, and semi-detailed breakdowns — all created with agility in mind to change and iterate as we tested the levels.
Greyboxing and level logic were the most intensive elements throughout the design process. Install Wizard’s early design incorporated small, linear levels and rapid-fire gameplay, but after the team expanded we switched to larger and more expansive levels that encourage exploration and discovery. This shift in design mentality pushed Install Wizard into the dungeon-crawler space intended by it’s original design.
The Takeaway
My time on Install Wizard served an important role in my progress as a developer — for the first time, I worked as a designer on a project without being one of the driving creative leads behind it. Working on my levels and gameplay loops for Install Wizard was a blast, and seeing them fit into the larger game as it came to fruition was incredibly rewarding.