Student Project
Something has gone terribly wrong at the facility, and it is now up to the player to recover the vital research and escape alive. The game is a first-person horror looter-survival experience that heavily emphasizes sound, where both the player’s actions and the surrounding environment become key to survival. Every movement, noise, and corridor can reveal hidden objectives or attract unwanted attention.
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T
ROLE
Game Designer & QA
DATE
Nov, 2022
I worked as the primary level designer on this project while also helping shape the game’s overall art direction through moodboards, greyboxing, resource management, and narrative development. My process focused heavily on rapid iteration and playtesting to ensure the environments supported both gameplay clarity and atmosphere.
Because sound played such a central role in the experience, level design became closely tied to audio readability. The player used a Geiger counter to detect objectives and enemies within a cone in front of them, which meant the layout had to support careful listening and directional awareness. Through testing and iteration, we found that sharp corners, tight spaces, and parallel corridors created the strongest gameplay tension and made the mechanic easier to read and engage with.
During development, I also learned that large height differences in the environment made enemy movement harder for players to interpret, which negatively affected readability and player response. This led to further adjustments in the layouts to improve clarity and maintain a smoother gameplay experience.
Alongside level design, I also contributed to QA by testing gameplay flow, gathering feedback from playtesters, and continuously refining the experience based on player behavior and iteration.