Project C.A.B.L.E was a free-to-play, top down survival game I made back in 2018 when I was studying Computer Science at college. This was my first independent games project and was heavily inspired by one of my favourite mini-games "Dead Ops Arcade" from the Call of Duty series.
A secret facility has created a new revolutionary substance that could change the world. However, their plans are to use it for military purposes and not for the greater good. In the testing chamber, you play as one of these creations and take on an onslaught of enemies with the help of various power ups to earn score, whilst attending to other objectives.
The main goal was to create a fast paced shooter game with continuous gameplay. This involved three main components: a singular level, waves of enemies and modifiers to change the flow of the game.
When I released a demo version on Gamejolt, it received quite a bit of attention. The majority of the feedback was very positive, however I did get some notes regarding replayability and the players HUD.
Players found the HUD to be quite simple, so simple that many people didn't notice the health bar at the top of the screen. This was because it was too thin to be noticed. Additionally, the score was in the way of the players view at the bottom.
I took in this feedback and redesigned it with a health bar in the empty game space, along with a transparent and more pleasing font for the score and other text elements. The change was well received.
I took in this feedback and redesigned it with a health bar in the empty game space, along with a transparent and more pleasing font for the score and other text elements. The change was well received.
Secondly, people found the gameplay to be repetitive after a while, more specifically "there doesn't seem to be an actual objective apart from shooting enemies". My game loop may have been intended to be continuous but with this came boredom.
I responded by creating a new feature, Bombs. These would spawn every so often and the player has to stay in the designated area for a period of time to defuse it. If not, they would explode and take a lot of damage.
This addition was received very well. It made the player feel more pressure to stay alive thanks to this claustrophobic area.
As I continued working, I started to become very bored of the menu design. It was good for a starting point, but it didn't feel exciting enough when you opened the game. I decided to make a more interactive menu, so when you select a button the camera moves around the room to show different elements. In this change, I did keep some of its aesthetics, such as the player being hooked up to a machine.
