The shoebox of photographs rattles with every hesitant step. The words of your late grandfather echo:
“In the blink of an eye, so much changed. I should have been there more.”
You hold up one of the photos, standing where it was taken, watching the elements align.
Seeing it as though you were taking it. But when you lower the photo, it’s all still there, like it was, 40 years ago.
In this 3D Exploration Puzzler, you alter the environment to explore an old apartment building and what’s been left behind with the use of photographs.
Specifically, when you line up a photo in the right location and perspective,
the contents of that photo are restored from the past to the present.
My Roles
LEVEL DESIGN
ART DIRECTION
RESEARCH: Editing Assets to Fit Aged Aesthetics
As a level designer, I have been bringing together the art, narrative, sound and other created assets for the game and turning them into one cohesive experience through my level design.
As art director, I deal directly with the external project artist(s) to help them understand the project vision while they are creating assets.
Also, I spend time helping those same artist(s) with any project pipeline related questions that they may have.
My experience as a level designer also contributed to my research which can be found further on in this debrief.
Level Design Principles
With a game like Through The Lens, narrative has an extremely heavy focus.
Therefore, what is created by the narrative team is what I handle first and foremost
in my level designs. Most items within the world will have a story-driven reason for being there.
Level design for a game that has historical emphasis also requires a large deal of research on what
the world would be like culturally and architecturally during the intended time period of the game.
I pride myself on my ability to perform meaningful research into how and why things looked the way they did
in different areas (specifically 1970s New Mexico for this game).
RESEARCH: Editing Assets to Fit Aged Aesthetics
ABSTRACT: Through The Lens is a game with specific needs when it comes to any art assets.
The visual design of the assets is dependent upon the look and feel of being abandoned and left to decay for decades.
Therefore, any assets used that were not already specifically made to look like they were decaying had to be edited
in a 3D modeling or image editing software. This paper aims to analyze the techniques used for the aging process along
with deciding which technique was the most effective. After testing several techniques for aging assets, it was found
that use of a decal system was the most extensible method, but the other methods presented were useful in their own ways.
As a space rescue professional, you are sent to the last known site of a ship's distress signal. Upon arrival, you come across several floating astronauts that are no longer attached to their ship. Will you be able to rescue them in time?
The idea behind this game was originally an unused idea for my Global Game Jam 2020 team, so I decided to run with it on my own time. The game jam theme was Lost and Found.
My Roles
AUDIO
OVERALL DESIGN
OVERALL PROGRAMMING
I was the solo designer for this game, so all of the work seen in it is from me.
I felt very accomplished while completing this project.
Trying Something New
While I may have a background in programming, I am not usually the one doing the gameplay programming on my teams.
I more often than not deal with the visual design aspects of games. Therefore, it was a new experience being the sole programmer on this project.
I really like learning new things, so I still enjoyed trying out gameplay programming even if it's not in my specific wheelhouse.
Adaptive Audio
After finishing the basic prototype for this game, I started doing some audio design work for it.
Luckily, this work coincided with an audio course that I was in at the time. By using Reaper and FMOD, I was able to create and use my own sci-fi themed sounds in the game.
Designing a sound environment for a space-themed game was a rewarding learning experience, and I am happy that I have a bit of sound designing under my belt.
Asset Creation
I did all of the asset creation for this project, and I'm proud of the work I did.
I'm passionate about creating visuals for games, and getting a chance to practice that part of my craft was very welcomed.
Being able to create something that people will be able to see while playing is what keeps me motivated while working.
Someone left the gate to your sea lion enclosure unlocked!
Can you get the zoo visitors to give you treats, or will the zookeepers catch you first?
My Roles
ART DIRECTION
UI/UX
My primary role for this prototype project was art director.
I kept the vision for the idea in focus for all of the people who were doing any visuals for the project.
I also did 3D modeling work for the moving characters. My secondary task was for the UI of the prototype, but time was sadly not on my side for this short project.
Modeling Animals/Humans
After modeling a sea lion and some human beings, I now have an even greater appreciation
for the 3D artists who model organic life professionally. Making furniture or inanimate objects is one thing, but creating
organic models that match their real life counterparts (such as animals or humans) is a skill that I could only hope to possess one day.
Side note: the team for this prototype project collectively decided to name the sea lion "Dumpy" on account of his good looks and charming smile.
Time Crunch
Working on this project made me realize just how important it is to prioritize
items before work even starts. But that's really what a prototype is, isn't it? While working on this prototype, I learned that not everything can be perfect.
The most important topics must be decided on and accomplished first.
Chromophobia is meant to be a Game For Change that demonstrates to the players how those who deal with color blindness view the world around them.
As a puzzle game, players use the different color views to see different objects and escape monsters.
My Roles
LEVEL DESIGN
ART DIRECTION
UI/UX
Working on Chromophobia was my first real foray into working with a serious game development team. It put a great deal of things into perspective,
and it helped me figure out what area of game design I wanted to focus on (i.e. Level Design and anything involving visuals/art).
UI/UX Items
While working on the UI for Chromophobia, I wanted to make sure that it matched the art direction we were trying to take our game in.
Everything needed to play on the color-changing experience that we were designing. Some games can get away with having basic UI,
but other games with specific art styles must have detailed UI as well. The UI will seem out of place otherwise.
Inspired by Frogger, this game aims to have the player maneuver across a top-down forest. The only catch: rain clouds are in your path, and you hate the rain!
My Roles
ART DIRECTION
I was not very experienced with the Unreal Engine at the time of this project. Therefore, my main focus was on art direction for this rainy game.
I kept the visual ideas in track while trying to learn Unreal behind the scenes. While the project only had a 2 week time limit, I do feel like I learned
a fair amount about the engine itself.
New Engine
Getting the hang of using an engine in 2 weeks while still having a full course load of work is not for the faint of heart.
I had picked up Unity fairly quickly when I first began learning that engine, so I assumed that Unreal would be the same way. Oh, how wrong I was!
Unreal and Unity might seek to accomplish the same things, but Unreal feels like it has a lot more oomph behind it right off the bat.
Links
Important links to be added!
Unreal Engine 5 Experiments
This panel is under construction :)
My Roles
PROGRAMMING (BLUEPRINTS)
ART (BLENDER MODELING, NIAGARA VFX)
ETCETERA...
Something something what I did and how (chaos vehicles, Quixel Bridge, fracturing, terrain editing, etcetera
Chaos Vehicles UE5
TODO. Crazy stuff.
Niagara VFX
Niagara is now the base VFX for UE5. The Cascade Particle System is being turned into legacy content. Figured I'd try it out.
Unreal Terrain Editor
TODO discuss. Nice tool at its core, can get some fine details in there without having to fight for them.
Hello all! My name is Abby Markish, and I am currently a project manager at Liquid Development (Keywords Studios).
Previous professional work includes: QA Tester at Deck Nine Games, IT Support at PS Bank
For my Game Design and Development Master's degree at Rochester Institute of Technology, I was the level designer on the Hungry Turtle Studios capstone team.
Most of my time in my Master's degree was spent on bringing together the ideas presented by each section of
the design/dev team (narrative, art, mechanics programming, etcetera). Nothing delights me
more than being able to create a cohesive experience in the games I am helping to make.
I have personal design experience in narrative-driven games, puzzle games, platformers, and FPS games.
Overall, I really enjoy helping to create games that players can get lost in.
Feel free to contact me if you feel I would be a good fit working for your studio!
