GUNPLAY: Impractical Conflict Resolution
(In the Wild West)

Development Length: 5 Weeks
Role: Programmer, Puzzle Designer
Tasks: Set up core systems, designed 
and implemented puzzles/mini-games, 
implemented network Multi-Player mode

Gunplay was the second game I worked on with a team and one of my most fun development experiences because it gave me a chance to try out a lot of new things and was one of the silliest games I've ever made. The game consists of a series of wild west duels where you have to solve quick mini-games and puzzles before you get to shoot your opponent.

The game was especially fun to work on because of its small scope. The initial idea was fun, and it didn't take long to setup a simple system to manage puzzles and the level win/lose condition. From there, myself and our team's designer/2d artist, Dylan, got to go wild thinking up and implementing puzzles. Early in that process, we found that more goofy puzzles got a strong response, so we focused our time on ramping up the absurdity of the puzzles from the semi-realistic first level to the point of entering Captchas and connecting to unsecured wifi signals to be able to use the gun. This process went remarkably well, and we were basically done with all of our goals by our in-class playtest a week before the final deadline. At the playtest, we noticed something cool: people playing at computers next to each other were setting up make-shift races to beat certain levels. We all thought this was pretty neat, so I started looking into implementing a proper multiplayer system. It took some doing, but I managed to implement LAN based multiplayer in the last week of the project - rewriting most of the game's other systems along the way. It was rough, multiplayer systems always seem to be, but I really enjoyed the chance to try it and it was incredibly rewarding when it finally worked.

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