Maze Run! is a 3D mobile maze game with accelerometer support made using Unity3D. It is for a mobile game development subject and I thought it would be fun to do an accelerometer supported game.
Maze Run! Gameplay Video
The inspiration for this game comes from the maze cube with metal ball puzzle toy. I always had fun playing it even though at times it can get really frustrating, though that's pretty much the basis of most games, frustrating yet rewarding!
Since it's a reminiscent of my childhood, I figured it would attract players who had played with the physical toy too. So, for the UI/UX I decided to go with bright and vibrant colours with fun cartoonish font as it reminds me of another childhood cartoon, Looney Tunes! Each scene background are colour coded, Red being game menus, Blue for shop scene, Brown for tutorial scene, and Grey for additional information scene.
Main Menu
The Shop button is a different colour to the level selection and tutorial button to make it more clearly known that there is a Shop. It is to attract players to click on the Shop as soon as possible as the Shop offers some buff that could help players that are stuck especially in Level 02.
Selection Menu
The Shop menu background follows the button colour to keep it consistent with the button colour in the previous scene. This blue colour also matches well with the colour yellow, which I wanted to keep using as it pops up titles well and overall keeps it fun.
Moving on to the button UI, when players have insufficient Coins, the buying buttons will be unclickable and by making it translucent instead of full opacity, it becomes more intuitive to players. When the item is bought, it shows the same translucent opacity as players are only limited to (1) purchase until it is used for item (2) and (3).
Shop Menu 01
Shop Menu 02
The Colo(u)r Preview UI shows the current colour of the player's ball, this allows players to see the ball colour without checking it in the levels repeatedly. This Shop item is purely cosmetic.
[Shop Item 01] Colour Preview
Next, the tutorial UI is straight forward with only a title, short description and picture(s) to let players identify the object, as the rules of the game are pretty simple. I made it using the same concept as presentation decks, where there should only be a maximum of 8 words per line and only 4 lines in (1) slide.
Even if the game is easy to learn, the idea was to limit the amount of time players are kept in the tutorial while keeping in check how much information they have to absorb with every passing scene as this game consist of only gameplay.
Although in hindsight I would make the pictures a gif to show the Red and Purple Walls mechanic better and use different colours for the name of the object and the description. The Coins description could also be improved as it is hard to make sense of at first glance.
Tutorial
Then, there are the UIs in my levels, the coins counter, reset & menu buttons and timer UIs are anchored in the same position in both Level 1 and Level 2. This is due to the accelerometer support that would definitely make the UIs that much harder to read with it moving around like the ball. The Coins counter, reset & menu buttons and timer are Spatial UI components while the Start and Finish Flags are Non-Diegetic UI components as it is placed inside the game space.
The Reset button was implemented after I played other hypercasual games that forces me to lose before the retry scene pops up. In Maze Run! it may take a bit of effort with some time wasted to get the ball to the nearest red wall of death. That is why the Reset button remains as important as the Menu button for an instant hassle-free retry.
Level 1 Overview
Level 2 Overview
Player's Viewing Angle
Upon beating the level, players will get (1) to (3) stars depending on how fast they beat it. This encourages speed runners and completionist to replay the game.
Completed Level Screen
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