SONAR
Title Screen
Tutorial Complete
Title Screen
SONAR is a 2D action game where everything is shrouded in darkness. The only way to see what's around you is through your sonar, a ring of light that detects enemies and incoming hazards. Armed only of your weapon, will you be able to reach the end?
Title: SONAR
Genre: Action, Survival
Year: 2023
Role: Game Designer, Level Designer
Platform: Windows, Nintendo Switch
Tutorial stage
Stage 1
Final Boss Stage
Tutorial stage
The idea behind most of these levels was to keep them simple but effective. In the tutorial for example, the player can experiment with their abilities before heading on to the first level. The further the player advances, the bigger levels will get, allowing for more enemies to spawn. From the third level onwards traps start appearing, introducing a new entity for the player to look out for. The boss arenas are all quite similar between them but that is intentional as the fights can get quite hectic by themselves. The last arena is bigger than the others as there are three bosses and to give the player more room to dodge and fight at their own pace.
Reset function
Completion UI
Highscore table
Reset function
UI and other quality of life elements are always important in a game, which is why I tried to make SONAR as understandable for the casual player as possible. All UI elements, such as the health bar, weapon display and instructions, underwent a lot of trial and error before I was sure they would be pleasant to the eye and easy to read.
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When a level is completed, visual feedback will appear to inform the player they can proceed to the next stage: text will appear in the bottom right corner to inform the player of their accomplishment and an arrow will appear around the player to show them where to head in order to progress.
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As and added challenge for the player, a timer was added later on in development to track how fast the game would be completed. Based on how much it took and the amount of lives lost during the playthrough, the player would obtain a score which is shown after the final boss fight. By entering their name, this score is saved in a highscore table, which is accessible in the main menu.