Caramelize!

Overview

Aimed at audiences 13 and above, who like shooters and also enjoy cute and bright graphics, Caramelize is largely inspired by the story of tyranny from Borderlands 2 and the bright visuals of Splatoon.

Caramelize is a first-person shooter game where the player is a resident of the peaceful CandyLand.

However, the peace is disrupted when the Demons invade CandyLand unannounced.

The player has to survive waves of Candy Demons and return the residents of CandyLand to the sweet, innocent creatures they once were, with their trusty gumball machine gun.

Game Design

Caramelize is a first-person shooter, where the player has to travel all around CandyLand to fend off waves of candy demons. The player wins the level if they defeat all of the candy demons in the level without dying.

In the bigger picture, the player has to discover and explore the map, while levelling up and getting stronger.

In each level, the player has to run, aim and attack enemies until the waves are all over.

Level Design

In this first level, the player is introduced to the world. The once bright and colourful CandyLand is now devoid of colour and it is up to the player to save them.

The first level serves as a tutorial level for the player, where they learn the basics of combat and how to deal with enemies.

Level walkthrough:

Candy House

Player wakes up in their room, awoken by the commotion outside their house
Player gets up and walks around the room, going to the window
Player notices that the world outside is devoid of colour
Player meets Elsie, the tooth fairy
Elsie explains what happened to the Player

Sweetwood Acres Clearing

Player walks out of the house
Player is prompted to go to the area with the treasure chest, where they find the gumball machine gun
Player walks through the forest clearing and is ambushed by a Candy Demon
Player goes through the tutorial and shoots the Candy Demon, changing it back into a Candy Resident
Colour is returned to the area surrounding the Player
Player learns they can restore colour to the world from the Candy Resident
Player continues walking
Player comes across a blocked area and is unable to access it
Player continues to walk until the blinking arrow which signals the checkpoint
Player sees long-ranged enemies that have marshmallow longbows
Player learns how to take cover behind the bushes and rocks
Player defeats the enemies and continue onwards
Player walks past a mine trap and it explodes
Player gets injured and is prompted to go to the next area
Player picks up a health pack and restores health

Sweetwood Acres Exit

Player continues fighting off other enemies
Player reaches end of level and exits level

Concept Art

The concept art of the player and the fairy is as shown above.

I wanted to bring across the idea that they are innocent and sweet-looking, so I used vibrant colours and a simple design for their clothes.

The concept art of this level was based off of having colourful pebble paths amidst the gloomy forest that has been invaded by the candy demons. It is to show the contrast between the bright areas like the player's house, which hasn't been affected and how the player is slowly restoring colour to the world by defeating the candy demons.

The picture on the left shows the entrance to the player's house, and is from the perspective of the small hill that the first treasure chest is hidden. I chose to use this perspective as I wanted it to feel like the house was concealed and hidden behind the forest.

The picture on the right shows a rough sketch of the player conversing with Elsie as they walk along the rock candy pebbled path. There is a candy demon lying in ambush, just as shown in the level map.

Pictured above is the concept art for the gumball machine gun, which shoots out gumballs enhanced by sugar dust.

I also made a mockup of what the user interface would look like if the player was using the gumball machine gun.

Conclusion

This was the first time I had to design a video game so it was quite challenging. I just let my imagination run wild and enjoyed the process of ideating this game.

What I really enjoyed was having almost no limits, as I wasn't actually made to develop this game. I could just do what I wanted and implement mechanics and gameplay with no deadline for the actual production of the game.

Overall, I felt quite satisfied with what I came up with and I would like to make this game a reality in the future after I have improved my skills.

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