Temple of the Tentacle

Project Link

Team size: 3
A 2D puzzle-platformer where the player must grapple their way through various levels
First-place winner for the theme "Discovery" in the ICGN 2021 Winter Game Jam

Made this game with two friends, an artist and a designer/programmer, for the Intercollegiate Game Network weeklong Winter Jam in February 2021. Fifteen teams from a variety of schools participated; our game won for the theme “Discovery.” The ICGN Winter Jam judges were Douglas Reilly (Vice President, Lucasfilm Games at The Walt Disney Company), Paul Tessmann (Systems Designer at Tripwire Interactive), Robert Mai (Freelance Film and Video Game Composer), and Jon Melchiade (Senior Game Designer at Vicarious Visions and Blizzard Entertainment).
Programmed physics-based gameplay mechanics of the grappling hook. This includes adding appropriate forces to make it appear that players are shooting the hook, pulling objects toward themselves, pulling themselves toward objects, tethering and/or pulling two objects together, and creating colliders to be the exact size and length of the tethered rope.
Utilized Unity’s Universal Render Pipeline to implement 2D lighting, adding a spooky ambience to the game.
Implemented 2D art assets and sprite sheets to create animations as well as using animation events to make players more accurately “hold” the grappling hook in their hand.

How to best split up work between two programmers working on the same project without accidentally writing over the other’s code or just stepping on each other’s toes in general
How to properly scope a project for a specific time frame and finish it before the deadline
That some games, especially those that are physics based, need to be play-tested and tweaked to make the gameplay feel just right
How to create a web build of a game that can be played in a browser