SIRIUS
Bear with Me
ROLE: DESIGN LEAD, ARTIST, TEST ENGINEER
02/21 - 05/21
Academic project completed at Cornell University with Lucas Jams Cusati, Yiheng Dong, Haomiao Liu, Junxi Song, Juliane Phoebe Tsai, Xiaoyao Yao, Zili Zhou
Instructors: Professor Walker White, Professor Traci M. Nathans-Kelly
ABOUT THE GAME
A strategy game of polar bear and penguins on PC.
This is not a story about saving polar bears; it is already too late to save. For the last ice area — the Arctic, climate change is not an imminent threat but a reality that pervades the everyday life of the polar bear. Climate change is no ice, no food, and nowhere to live.
The game aims to help educate people about the negative impact of human pollution on mother nature and increase overall environmental protection awareness.
01 CONCEPT
Concept Statement
You're a polar bear, and this morning it wasn't your alarm clock that woke you up, it was the ocean water. Just moments ago, the glacier you were sleeping on melted and you flopped into the ocean. You've had enough of this and decide to head to Antarctic, to join your penguin friends and enjoy the beautiful singing of the famous penguin choir.
But unfortunately, the members of this a cappella group have been captured by humans, and you need to rescue them one by one on your journey. There is one imprisoned penguin on every continent, so find enough music notes to use as a key and rescue them!
Design Goals
Caution
The player needs to determine the correct angle and strength when throwing the penguins to make a recovery possible for further use in the level.
Curiosity
As the player progress, different continents will be added with different environments and backstory content, thus giving the player a rich, immersive feel.
Accomplishment
After finishing each continent, the player will be awarded a music stem, along with a delicate change to the background music.
02 VISUAL
Visual Identity
The cold winter environment evokes a sense of lightheartedness, cheerfulness, delight, and curiosity. The icy surroundings are melancholy yet hopeful, urging the player to explore and get one step closer to saving their penguin friends.
Character
Walk
Throw
Punch
Jump
Environment
The background is divided into two parts: a solid-color sky and either buildings or natural environments. There is an overall bluish tone with low saturation. Also, all backgrounds are tessellated, which means they can be repeatedly connected without gaps and overlaps.
03 LEVEL
Level Design
Interactions
Collision with Icicles
Note Collection
Fall into Sea
Contact with Slippery Floating Ice
04 ARCHITECTURE
Dependency Diagram
Activity Diagram
05 SOUND
Sound Effect
Each polar bear’s primary action has its own custom sound effect, as well as the penguins. These sound effects are made very soft to keep the relaxing tone of the game.
Music
The game's music is meant to be ambient to create a calm environment for the player.
We will have a main menu theme, a credit theme, and then a level theme, which will be altered in the following ways:
Starts very barebones, with only ambiance, backing strings, and a melody.
Introduces a new instrument every time a continent is completed.
This will continue until all the penguins are collected, at which point the song will be fully complete to represent the growth of the polar bear throughout the journey.