Untamed Skies is a Sheridan Game Level Design capstone game project that is being developed by Untamed Skies Studios, a group comprised of myself, Borui Huang, Shujian Chen, as well as various Sheridan undergrad hires. We have 7 weeks going pedal to the medal to deliver a polished finished product after spending the last 5 months preparing for this project part time. We plan on making a finished product that is short but sweet - this means we are going to deliver a vertical slice of a game that takes place in an established world filled with adventure and high speed aerial movement performed by a dragon rider and their dragon. 

I myself am the programmer and game designer for the project, and this devlog will be the first of several devlogs talking about the development of our game. 

Our idea for the game is to make a dragon flying game where you play as a rider that dismounts and summons the dragon in dynamics ways, especially airborne, to navigate aerial obstacles and dangerous environments. This idea is relatively unique due to the dismounting and summoning mechanic. Other dragon riding games exist and have existed for a while, but we want to enhance the exciting speed aspect of dragon riding as well as expanding what aerial movement is known for in typical flying games. 

We would like to introduce the idea that intentionally dismounting your flying mount is a fun way to traverse through the air and create awesome moments in which you reconnect with your flying mount. The How to Train Your Dragon series heavily inspired this idea due to the existence of Hiccups wingsuit and symbiotic flying style with his dragon. The series makes excellent movie moments and has gained quite a following of passionate fans, but these aerial movement concepts combined with dragon riding have never been explored in a game before. I think getting to experience the hiccup and toothless dynamic in video game form like never before will be a very fun game to play and project to pursue. 

Unreal engine 5 is our choice due to the lighting system, performance capabilities, flashy visuals, and innovative technology compared to other engines. 

The first thing I worked on as the blueprints programmer was summoning and exiting your dragon mount. Once this was possible, I had to create a flight system that felt like a fighter jet mixed with a dragon, just like toothless. 

The most exciting moment from the firs How to Train your Dragon movie was when Hiccup and Toothless lost control after flying high into the sky, leading to a long, drawn out, and suspenseful skydive that leads to the most amazing and exhillerating burst of speed that occurs when they are finally able to level out. They catch the wind and inspire awe in the audience with the impact of the momentum on the wings, and then perform exciting maneuvers while flipping, turning, and weaving through rocks to create such a satisfying movie moment. This inspired me to create a system that encourages diving straight down to gain speed, and really make the player feel the sense of speed through the field of view change, particle effects, animations, screen shake, and acceleration physics. Sort of like the Spider-Man games, diving straight down is an exciting build up that leads to super satisfying and high speed movement in whichever direction you choose to go. Diving and swinging as Spider-Man is fun, just like diving and flying with your pet dragon would be fun as well. (as we have seen in the HTTYD films). 

Our main focus is to create a satisfying flight system that encapsulates speed, convincing and flashy animations, and a feeling of nimble control over your high speed dragon. Our flight system feeling awesome will make our core loop about disconnecting and reconnecting with our dragon so much better. The speed that you travel with your dragon will translate to the speed you launch and glide when dismounting your dragon mid air, and how satisfying it will feel to get saved out of a dangerous fall by your high speed dragon with it's built in exhilarating flight system that you would immediately take control of upon being picked up. 

The picture below showcases interactable water that splashes and bends as the dragon flies above it at a high speed, just how Toothless glides right above the ocean. The sense of speed that you get while gliding in a straight line just above water is a great representation of how we want flying to feel in our game - although it doesn't come close to summarizing all the flight features we would like to include.