Nightshift Survival
2023 - Ongoing | Unity | PC
Night Survival is a Roguelike horror game from the "Survival genre", deeply inspired by Vampire Survivors, Five Nights at Freddies and Resident Evil in the game the player must survive till 6AM (15 minutes) against waves of terrorizing enemies currently published on Steam by the publisher Bee Legacy.
THE TWIST
is that in our game we focused on the horror aspect, so we integrated resouce managment and a deeply immersive sound design to make the players feel an intense and nerve wrecking experience.
is that in our game we focused on the horror aspect, so we integrated resouce managment and a deeply immersive sound design to make the players feel an intense and nerve wrecking experience.
Game Design
Nightshift Survival is designed as a survival roguelike however with a twist of also being a Survival Horror in disguise an a Mascot Horror game.
It's pretty common in this genre to revolve around player improvisation, but not often about scarce resources and tough choices. The goal was to make the player always compromise, there's always a risk and few safe choices.
It's pretty common in this genre to revolve around player improvisation, but not often about scarce resources and tough choices. The goal was to make the player always compromise, there's always a risk and few safe choices.
One of the decisions that I've made is regarding XP, normally in survival games players always can reach max upgrades in every weapon. But by the nature of Survival Horror scarcity, it is something impossible in Nightshift Survival. so committing to level 5 items is a choice, and balancing every item level is also a viable strategy.
This choice to make a Survival Horror Survivor Roguelite was based on trying to achieve a feeling of "Horror", that different of a scary game we try to achieve with atmosfere and the encounter design. So the Design goal is to create spooky moments, make the player's heart beat faster, and for him to jumpscares, not because something jumped on your screen screaming but because a monster stood in the right place in the right moment and the player wasn't expecting.
Survive Waves of enemies until 6AM
Select a new upgrade by Leveling
LEVEL DESIGN
Our main difference was the enemy IA and variety, and the way that they could find and use pack tactics to trap the player, so the Level Design in Night 1 was made to create open "Safe" zones and dreadful Arcade corridor, but there's a catch:
- As the night starts there are only ducklings, a very easy monster so the player can XP farm without any worries, he will probably stay in the safe open area;
- However 1:30 Toy robots spawn, they have a very annoying projectile that when the player isn't used to he will have some problem dealing with, but very close to the open safe area there's an arcade corridor;
- Now that the player is inside the Arcade corridors, we will probably think that he cheesed the game, but 3 Am starts spawning the Spawlings, they are an enemy with more robust IA, they now only climb through objects but they also coordinate attacks and try to trap the player, this is normally when the player dies the first time in the game;
In Nightshift Level Design and game design work together to create a feeling, each night has a "Theme" that is more like a lesson to teach our player, Night 1 theme is "This is a Horror game before a Survivor Roguelite", and Night 2 is currently in production and its theme is "Hunt and be Hunted".
What do i Learn?
It is Nebula's first game published on Steam and is our proudest game yet. It taught us how to complete an indie game and to release it, and it's currently teaching how to deal with a game that is already out there., what feedback to consider, how to maintain the core experience, to develop a continuation and still being true to what came before, but also being new and while building to something that will come.
