Dungeon Odyssey: Return of the Orb is a dungeon crawler game developed as a course project for CS6457 Video Game Design of the Online Master of Science for Computer Science (OMSCS) program. A group of five OMSCS students including me (Nicholas Beshouri, Ming Chen, Boyang Huang, Kara Liu, Jacqueline Shrader) finished this game in one semester.
Trailer for Dungeon Odyssey: Return of the Orb
Story & Narrative
An evil necromancer has stolen a powerful orb from the kingdom of Agania in a desperate attempt to further extend his own life. And now the kingdom is suffering without it: the river has dried up and crops are dying. The king urges all his subjects to search the land and return the orb to its place at any cost. A wise old crone, using magic half-remembered from her youth, believes she can track the orb, but no one will listen and she is mocked – so she must set out alone to retrieve the orb and restore balance to her kingdom.
Game Pitch Demo for Dungeon Odyssey: Return of the Orb
Formal Elements (Rules, Characters, Objectives)
The player will take on the role of the crone, and begin the game with only a stolen sword and the ability to swing it. As she enters the necromancer’s lair, where the orb is hidden, she will face three types of AI driven enemies: zombies, simple skeletons, and large armored skeletons. The lair will be split into several rooms by which the player has to enter through portals.
In the last room, our hero will find the necromancer, the final boss who she must defeat. This is where she is presented with a moral dilemma. The necromancer will persuade her to consume the orb (actually a fake orb) so she could have “superpower” to lessen the burden of getting out, however, the kingdom would not have the orb. The character can also choose to bring the orb out without consuming it. In this way, she faces more challenges along the way back, but the kingdom can have the orb to revive everything.
There are three different endings: 1. The player listens to the necromancer, consuming the orb and becoming more powerful but becomes cursed and dooms the kingdom. 2. The player doesn’t consume the orb but it is fake – she takes it back to the kingdom and this also dooms the kingdom. 3. The true happy ending is when the player acquires the real orb and saves the kingdom. In total, there would be 3 game scenes – one introductory and 3 end-game scenes.
Basic Gameplay & Core Mechanics
Moving between the different rooms in the lair can be done by moving through portals that will only open once all enemies in the particular room that the player is in are defeated. In terms of movement, the character should be able to move around in a 3D space and will be able to dash to avoid getting attacked. Jump attacks will be such that the character does more damage.
Each enemy will have different difficulties to avoid or kill and rooms deeper into the lair have more enemies that are highly skilled. For example, the large armored skeletons are found in later rooms only.
There are also crates in the lair filled with magical potions. Smashing the crates with the player’s sword and drinking the potions hidden in them will give her temporary as well as permanent abilities such as faster speed, more weapon damage or more health. Additionally, there will be hidden items in her journey such as better swords, shields or special shoes that allow her to move around faster. Upon reaching certain rooms, a choice of 3 boons will be granted to the player character to enhance their abilities, e.g. lifesteal, slow effect on strike, etc. The character can only select one boon.
Aside from this, there will also be various obstacles that the player will need to avoid such as ninja shuriken. We intend to introduce simple puzzles to open doors or trap monsters for the player to solve to move on in her journey as well.
Once the player has defeated the necromancer and made her choice on whether to consume the orb or not, the enemies will re-spawn, blocking the way out of the necromancer’s lair. If the player has consumed the magical orb, her speed and strength will be great enough to kill any enemy with a single blow. In this scenario, horror elements that affect the game mechanics or introduce unexpected effects, images and glitches will be added throughout the remainder of the game from when the player advances back out the lair. Enemies will continue to respawn until the player has fought her way back out of the dungeon. For the true ending to occur, the player must meet some conditions (e.g. maintaining a full HP and acquiring the real orb).