Mods
Sometimes I create mods for other games, mostly games I am a fan of personally. I use this to try to expand my skills and learn new aspects of the industry firsthand.
Some examples:
One of my first mods for the game Volcanoids, the Breaching Fist.
Inspired by Fallout's power fist, I wanted to try to bring into the game the idea of a powerful gauntlet, giving the player an alternative they could use to punch into drillships and other tougher targets. This also gave me a chance to try out animating a weapon for the first time.
First and foremost, when creating or contributing to any project, the first step is to make sure that it can fit within established style and mechanics.
While the power fist works within the open-world RPG world of Fallout, some changes need to be made to translate it mechanically into a different game while considering its spot in the preexisting combat sandbox.
To adapt it to the other roster of weapons, I made sure to make it so it required ammunition. Making it so that players would need to think about the extra slots used on this weapon.
This limited its use to the player’s inventory space and balanced it against other tools that could do the same. Overall, the damage output per inventory slot is less than others, though more immediate. In contrast to other tools, though, this one requires a wind-up, maintaining the other melee options and the shotgun as the primary close combat tools for smaller enemies but outpacing them when it's time to deal with larger threats.
After getting comfortable with the SDK, I created the remix pack.
This is a variety pack, offering different versions of preexisting weapons that either served as upgrades or sidegrades. While creating this, I decided to try to learn some basic Blender so I could use it to change some of the models for a more specific vision.
The weapons changed were the revolver, mortar and sniper. Each of these weapons represent a different point in the player’s progression. The revolver is one of the first weapons you can use and is quickly outpaced by others as the game progresses.
The modified version requires the original and higher rarity crafting materials but provides an upgrade that can keep up with the higher tier weapons of that slot.
The arm-mounted mortar is a modification of the original that, while weaker, provides a faster firing rate that can be used to deal with smaller or spread-out targets.
The mortar is a mid-tier weapon, and all the materials required for its sidegrade can be found in that tier. This makes it more of an alternative option than a necessary improvement.
For the final weapon and as a part of the final tier of progression, the sniper was changed in the opposite direction to the mortar, giving it a high-damage alternative made to combat the late-game enemies.
The charge time and small ammo count balance out the damage output of this variant and provide the player a good way to engage heavily armored targets at a distance.
