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Overview

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In Ogygia, players play as Odysseus during the 7 years time in which Odysseus was held captive by Calypso on the magical island of Ogygia, which exists "everywhere and nowhere". The game was designed for Brackey's Game Jam 2024.1, however, I couldn't finish the game on time due to personal reasons. I liked the project, though, so I worked on it for a couple more days after the deadline and finished it. The Game Jam's theme was "What's Behind the Door?", and I was playing a lot of Bullet-heaven games the week before the event, so I decided to give it a try and make a Bullet-heaven game based on doors and "exploration". I also wanted to try and make it a 3D game, as most games of the genre are 2.5D. I ended up with a very interesting prototype that taught me a lot about the Bullet-heaven genre.

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Combat

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Ogygia features the Bullet-heaven characteristic combat, where the player just controls the movement, and the player character attacks by themselves. In Ogygia, the player chooses one of 3 different weapons to pick up after every boss they defeat for up to 3 weapons at a time. Every weapon is different and has its strengths and weaknesses. The Wand has the longest range and attack speed, but the lowest damage and can only attack 1 target at a time. The Sword has the shortest range and attack speed but can deal massive area damage. The Orb shoots projectiles that can pierce one enemy and has mediocre attack speed and range. The enemies get stronger over time, and bosses deal a lot of damage and are very tanky, but move slowly. Enemies can also drop a healing pick-up or a permanent Movement Speed pick-up. The overall result in combat was a success. It's fun, has variety and depth to it, and offers meaningful choices for the players through movement and weapon choice.

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Camera, Doors, and Waves

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The biggest challenge on this project was how complicated things got and the insane amount of in-game managers I had to implement. I implemented a Waves Manager, to make sure the enemies were spawning correctly, their health scaling correctly, and that Boss Waves were spawned every 3 waves. I also had to make it so that the Waves control the Doors so that players can safely walk to the different arenas. Then, I had to implement a Door Manager, to close Doors when needed and to make sure the right Doors were being Opened. And last, but not least, I also had to implement a Camera Manager, to control the different Camera Locations and how the Camera would move between the different Arenas. Looking back at it, the different Arenas made the game much more complex without actually adding interesting variety to the gameplay. I thought I would be able to make it so that one Arena had Fire hazards, and another Arena maybe would feature an Icy lake that would be slippery, but I ended up not having the time to do all that, so 1 arena would be enough and save a lot of time. Adaptation and iteration are always pivotal to game designers, so I would say it was a valuable experience overall.

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Project Final Thoughts

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It was really fun to develop Ogygia, and I learned a lot with it, especially regarding scope and how complex projects can get over time. I wished I had time to develop more weapons, enemies, pick-ups, and maybe interesting gameplay twists for each Arena, but I'm satisfied with the current result. It successfully captures an important part of what makes Bullet-heaven games fun and interesting, and is genuinely fun and engaging, which are some of the most important traits a game can have.

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