Raise alien creatures on a planet far, far away. Feed your pet, play mini-games, and watch them grow into giants as the days pass by.

A final obstacle between Rider University students and their diplomas was a capstone project spanning 2 semesters. Students were paired into groups of 4-5 of their peers with the goal of producing a video game from conception to publication. As part of one of these groups, the idea that took hold with my team was a pet-raising simulator similar to Tamogochis. Taking into consideration everyone's skills and the collective desire to challenge ourselves, we decided to choose Unreal Engine as our platform to undertake a 3-dimensional project.

My main roles in the project were the project management lead and the lead programmer.

As a Project Manager I...

• Scheduled reasonable and achievable deadlines for each team member to meet and re-evaluated goals after each milestone.
• Set up and managed the repository(Diversion) and ensured project members were able to submit, remove, and edit assets on time to meet deadlines.
• Fostered an environment that promoted communication on progress, feedback, and co-operation.
• Procured any assets we were not able to produce on our own.

As a Programmer I...

• Developed the core gameplay mechanics, such as the day/night system and interactions influencing the stats of the pet.
• Programmed randomization into which pet the player is given and what color the materials are for the pet, so that each one is unique.
• Reflected the passage of time with the increasing size of the pet.
• Ensured that all art assets were implemented into the game.
• Implemented a post-processing volume to improve the visuals of art assets.

Coding Examples:

Pet Randomization

Day/Night Cycle