The NYU Game Center Showcase 2024
˚✦★⋆. ࿐࿔ .˚ *✦ ˚.˚ .✶ -͟͟͞☆
⟢Thesis
⟢Capstone
⟢Studio II
⟢Major Studio
⟢Mosaic
Ivy Underground
⊹ ࣪.⋆~⊹₊⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆✩࿐
For Capstone
Bring down the corporation poisoning your hometown in this grid-based stealth game.
Ivy Underground - Trailer
Interview:
✧In one or two sentences, what is your game about?
A group of three friends work together in order to stop a corporation that’s currently destroying their home town– through sabotage, information leaks, and property damage.
✧What was the inspiration of the game? What made your team decide to make this game specifically?
Ivy Underground is a stealth-strategy game that explores a young generation’s frustration with the lack of action during the climate crisis. It pulls a lot of themes from leftist and environmentalist media as a result. One of the founding members of the project, Nicole, was particularly struck by how black-and-white the portrayal of the climate crisis is in video games. She set out to create something that wasn't so exclusively "doom and gloom" or "kumbaya," and we ended up here.
In terms of gameplay, we looked towards many different kinds of games for references. Invisible Inc. for turn-based stealth, Into the Breach for team tactics on a grid board, and Fights In Tight Spaces for cards as actions.
✧Were there difficult moments when developing the game? What led to those difficult moments? What did you learn from it?
Figuring out how to balance the difficulty was a point of tension. There are these security guards throughout the levels that impede on the player's ability to progress. Players with previous experience in strategy games would sometimes ask, "Well, they're annoying, so can I kill them?" In accordance with the pro-climate change message we wanted to push through this game, we wanted to discourage violence towards people who, really, are just doing their jobs. Property can be replaced; human lives can't. The thing is, by cutting out the ability to remove guards from the board, the game balance relies pretty heavily on how they move, act, chase and all that. If they're too fast or too strong, or if the player feels like they don't have the tools to move around them, it can make the whole game feel unfair. On the other hand, if you downplay their presence too much, the player might feel like they don't have any use for the tools they have, so they ignore the cards entirely. It took a lot of work, but I'm personally pretty content with where we ended up with the balance.
✧Were there darlings that you had to kill? What were they? Why was the decision made to remove them from the project, and what were the reasons that you like the darling so much?
Originally, this game was going to be a deckbuilder. You'd be able to add cards to each character's deck and use them as tools as the game progressed. This feature was ultimately scoped down into each character possessing a static, but unique deck, each with their own deliberate strengths and weaknesses. I think that was a pretty good decision overall; it eases the mental stack of playing three characters at once by giving each a straightforward game plan, but still keeps that fun, random element of drawing from a deck of cards. At the same time, as we develop this game further, I'd really like to see what this game would play like if the player could augment each character's deck. I like the mental image of these characters reconvening after every mission, adding fancier gear to their arsenal as the scope of their operation increases.
✧Talk about your teammates! What was everyone’s role?
Aaron Kuthoor: Narrative designer and writer.
Amiya Lamisha: UI/UX designer.
Lexa Glucksman: Character and effects animator.
Miles Esguerra: Project manager and 2D/3D artist.
Nicole Shrader: AI programmer and gameplay designer.
Noah Young: Gamefeel and system programmer.
Sara Moiseeva: Writer and cutscene animator.
Seth Royston: Sound designer and programming aide.
Thomas Tang: Cardplay and UI programmer.
play this game on itch.io
linktr.ee/ivyunderground