https://www.acorbeilgames.com/about daily 1.0 2024-06-19 https://www.acorbeilgames.com/contact daily 0.75 2024-06-19 https://www.acorbeilgames.com/projects daily 0.75 2024-07-04 https://www.acorbeilgames.com/projects/zones-sensibles-fmv monthly 0.5 2022-01-11 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/e0d7b755-7eb7-46aa-9afe-edf58855675b/Screenshot+2022-01-12+154512.png Projects - Zones Sensibles Fred decides to leave his room to prepare for the party. All clickables would glow and shimmer when moused-over. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/06a6cdde-ee37-419b-a3a0-4c044331d50c/Screenshot+2022-01-12+154519.png Projects - Zones Sensibles An example of the dialogue choices for players. Some of them would alter the mood of the characters in the scene. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/5fc3d643-22d6-4aa0-bae3-859853161ec8/Screenshot+2022-01-12+154530.png Projects - Zones Sensibles Conversations could also take place via text messages. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/2268e02b-dddf-4d80-91f8-1d22b6587bf0/Screenshot+2022-01-12+154544.png Projects - Zones Sensibles Players could find characters around the house that needed their help. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/d1185460-bc41-4a68-916d-aae918d3a95b/Screenshot+2022-01-12+154549.png Projects - Zones Sensibles At the end of every scenario, the character the player was controlling would have an introspection about the events that unfolded. If a player felt they had a similar experience, they could, at any time, click on the Resources button which contained links and phone numbers to help centres that could provide emotional support. https://www.acorbeilgames.com/projects/chapters-u9 monthly 0.5 2022-01-11 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/438ac21a-fac3-4574-a678-94ab94a1b4b2/Screenshot+2022-01-12+151435.png Projects - Chapters One of the questions used in the Leap Year Society Assessment Test. We had to write 12 questions that had an uncanny element to it. Seemingly innocuous questions with slightly weird answer possibilities. Every answer would increase or decrease a hidden stat, which would then put you in a specific role, determining which branch of the society you'd end up in. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/3a3223c8-9910-4522-bf68-3f6bdfd26deb/Screenshot+2022-01-12+151426.png Projects - Chapters Players were put in separate departments depending on the answers they've given during the test. This would change some of the missions they would receive during gameplay. I was in charge of coming up with 3 departments and 5 roles, or classes, that each had their own specific strengths. I wanted these classes to feel modern and all have something related to the psyche. One would have great analytical skills, basically an encyclopedia on legs, while another would be able to command a room because they were able to easily read the emotions of others. On Discord, players proudly displayed their roles and would show it off while they were collaborating on puzzle solving. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/4231ebfa-71b7-430a-8d07-1379dbe66ddf/Screenshot+2022-01-12+144441.png Projects - Chapters Players would choose their next mission on the interactive world map once they were put in their respective department. The world map also showed player density, displayed as orange dots, based on their location. We wanted to diversify the placements of each mission as much as possible, mainly to make them feel fresh, but it had the benefit of preventing button overlap too! https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/567303a0-c160-4e18-8fda-057f537b3fcb/Screenshot+2022-01-12+144434.png Projects - Chapters An example of a case file. Players had clues to click on and would then ask Victoria (bottom right) pertinent questions or answers to the riddle in order to advance. We used Google DialogFlow as our vessel for Victoria, controlling the flow of information using JSON files and context codes as well as Google's powerful machine learning AI. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/6b8f13b4-c37e-486d-8bdb-012808756552/Screenshot+2022-01-12+151159.png Projects - Chapters An example of a clue asset. Once a mission was over, players could open their databank and review all the given assets as well as any discoveries they've made. Since missions could not be replayed once completed, I thought this would make a good memento for players to look back on, while also providing a closing statement on each mission. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/a6f4d433-2e7e-4b13-b111-790daf040402/Screenshot+2022-01-12+151609.png Projects - Chapters An example of a puzzle asset given during a mission. This email was genuine and players had to contact Jacob outside of the game to solve this puzzle. Most of the replies were automatically generated using specific keywords, but sometimes we'd sneak in more personalised messages. https://www.acorbeilgames.com/projects/booze-blues monthly 0.5 2024-06-19 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/73543f1c-b4e0-45cf-b7eb-818ba5626dfa/Screenshot+2022-01-12+163204.png Projects - Booze Blues Conquer the savage lands of Canada, where even the holes are sentient. We added a parallax effect to the trees and effectively made the character run in place while the scenery and obstacles moved from right to left towards the player, making it easier to program. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/e3f1c866-65d8-4efb-866c-77299e2ce0ec/Screenshot+2022-01-12+163147.png Projects - Booze Blues Every level had 2 checkpoints in case the logs proved too deadly for our protagonist. Levels would stay the same during their playthrough, but restarting the game would give you a completely different set of tiles. The tile order was determined and set up as soon as you pressed Start. Any obstacles that would go offscreen would be reset to its original position and the tiles were then stored off camera in case the player had to restart due to hitting an obstacle, where they would be placed back to their original positions. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/a8647f5a-11b0-4f24-aa2b-82bd5ce3b4ad/Screenshot+2022-01-12+163143.png Projects - Booze Blues Much research was done to get that authentic flapper vernacular. (Also, damn, that is one cool sun). https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/a42a7687-58db-4128-ac5a-09e37a7b1435/Screenshot+2022-01-12+163136.png Projects - Booze Blues The streets of 1930s Chicago proved just as perilous as the dense forests of Canada. We wanted to have a variety of enemies, all sentient, such as flying birds, trash cans, roaming beavers, angry Mounties and rival gang members, both of them would shoot at you (the bullets? Sentient). You had the choice to either chuck a bottle, depleting your booze supply, or get up close and personal to clock 'em with your mighty fist. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/b3ec5d94-8293-45ee-aa81-e5d99f804edb/Screenshot+2022-01-12+163129.png Projects - Booze Blues A cautionary tale. https://www.acorbeilgames.com/projects/nt4 monthly 0.5 2022-01-11 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/4d8917fe-7891-41b4-904b-ef54422ca567/Screenshot+2022-01-12+114104.png Projects - NITE Team 4 The Academy - Our tutorial missions featuring real tools used by professional pentesters. All the objectives for these missions were very cut and dry in order to acclimate players with their tools so I made sure the networks were simple and that we had an NPC called "Wingman" to guide the player along the way. Wingman would continue to be a guide throughout every story mission moving forward. I also contributed heavily on Wingman's dialogue and on the voice actor's direction. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/bd237fc0-403c-4d2f-9b4f-c2dbaba97058/Screenshot+2022-01-12+114110.png Projects - NITE Team 4 The Story Missions - inspired by real cybersecurity events. Every Theatre, which is what we called scenarios, had around 4 to 5 missions. We would provide a moral choice at the end of some theatres that would severely impact the start of the next one. Players could also come back to this menu and see what the other players chose, as a community vote. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/49d761ba-0e16-4634-9a27-82082b055324/Screenshot+2022-01-12+114127.png Projects - NITE Team 4 One of the modules used to hack into a network, using phishing tactics. Players would craft their own virus and write a custom subject and fake sender before email blasting their target. My job was to sprinkle this information in different areas of the network and have the player deduce the correct subject line, file type and sender name. For example, it would be easier for someone to open an infected email if it came from their boss with an urgent subject line. So finding the boss's name in the company's active directory, and the name of a project the target is working on, could do wonders in accessing their workstation. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/91c1171c-223a-4b8a-a368-7536be4684bd/Screenshot+2022-01-12+114054.png Projects - NITE Team 4 Uplink51 was part of our DLC mission, featuring a chatbot using Google's DialogFlow. This was the first time I utilised this tool for gameplay purposes, which is typically used on commercial websites. Certain commands would be processed by the chatbot, and would return with a JSON file that would trigger events in the game. None of the commands were specifically coded in the game, allowing us to change keywords from DialogFlow without having to alter any code in Unity. This made bug fixing and on-the-fly changes extremely easy. I was charged with writing the commands, their responses and implementing them on DialogFlow, maintaining a logical communication flow along the way. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/aba744aa-ef61-4eae-8c65-9672c3d3644f/Screenshot+2022-01-12+114039.png Projects - NITE Team 4 An example of an ARG inspired Open World mission. Players had to scour the internet for clues to solve puzzles in order to infiltrate a hacker group. This particular mission was inspired by Ransomware attacks and I wanted it to feel like you were storming a castle. The group you were infiltrating was called the RatPack, so it had a grimy feel to it, while still keeping the general modern aesthetics of hacking networks, using data moshing, pixel stretching and data corruption to heighten the visuals. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/152103b9-6b98-4c4b-96ca-047892b0eea4/Screenshot+2022-01-12+114118.png Projects - NITE Team 4 Bounties - Bite-sized missions that would appear when certain conditions were met. Bounties were not considered canon and would be released in batches of 5. Some of them would be chosen randomly while others were considered "threaded" and contained their own little story. I had a lot of fun creating these mini-missions, especially for the Halloween ones, where I could flex my horror muscle. The challenge with these bounties were to create small, self-contained stories in a short amount of time. Most bounty sets were hand-crafted and implemented in 2 to 3 weeks alongside any assets that needed to be created, such as documents, images or videos. https://www.acorbeilgames.com/projects/red-bull-settle-the-score monthly 0.5 2024-06-20 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/1720107325644-DFXWSEWFDSI1RYCTHVUZ/Screenshot%2B2024-06-20%2B121945.jpg Projects - Red Bull: Settle the Score The main hub where players would go to during off-hours. Here they could view the event's progress and check out last game's leaderboard. The middle section would show who won a game's challenge with a coloured trophy. This stream ran 24/7 during the entirety of the event and I had to make sure the scripting was solid and the back-end easy to understand for the puppet masters running the event. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/b976c222-fdaf-4db1-8a5f-a853683ed36d/Screenshot+2024-06-20+122703.png Projects - Red Bull: Settle the Score The reception for the event was very positive! People especially loved Cubert, the event's mascot (and organizer). Both streamers received an LED cube that they would show during their challenges. Cubert would then react and quip about the streamer's performance in each challenge. At the end, the winner received a trophy matching the colour of their team, which would show up on the Event Hub. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/2df85d2d-90fb-40ab-aa40-67c49fe64f13/Screenshot+2023-10-10+132313.png Projects - Red Bull: Settle the Score A prototype of an employee card for the meta puzzle I designed. Originally each card would have a math equation to solve in order to get the key code needed to fill out the grid, but there were already a LOT of numbers involved in the puzzle so instead we gave the key code to whoever knew the employee ID and the phone number to recover it. The entries shown in green indicate the correct grid nodes to fill in. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/13cde74e-accb-40b4-a0e6-8329d172d788/Screenshot+2023-09-19+121955.png Projects - Red Bull: Settle the Score The Jumbotron in the middle of the scene was used to show leaderboards, player content (screenshots, fan art, etc) and was also coded to play videos. I used a simple Media Texture array to make sure all 4 sides displayed the same thing and cycled through all media found in the JSON file controlling the hub, checking the media's file extension to switch between a video texture and image texture. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/0d699a77-0999-4e67-9c1d-4e2e47a7e4bb/eID-68349.png Projects - Red Bull: Settle the Score The final version of an employee ID card. It took me a lot of sleuthing to find symbolic connections to numbers and I wanted to avoid duplicates as much as possible throughout all 12 cards. In total there are 300 unique symbols/terms found in these cards. You used the sigils on the sides to put all the cards together like a jigsaw, which would reveal a pass code once all grids were solved. https://www.acorbeilgames.com/projects/rose-cottage monthly 0.5 2024-06-20 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/d3d2b847-4bcf-4038-97e7-62057d308a6b/Screenshot+2024-06-20+132515.png Projects - Rose Cottage Rose Cottage is set in Alice & Smith's The Black Watchmen universe, after the events of NITE Team 4 that caused the organization to fall into disarray. In this game you play as a private investigator/coroner working at Rose Cottage, a shadowy detective agency masquerading as a dairy farm that investigates strange murders, no questions asked. Most, if not all, cases deal with supernatural beings and phenomena that aren't out of place for Black Watchmen players. The general idea was to create a year long advent calendar, counting down until the release of a new PC game which would continue the Black Watchmen story. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/5c6616bb-c636-4d56-8043-488ab2a44ba9/Screenshot+2024-06-20+132306.png Projects - Rose Cottage In the morgue lies a secretary desk containing all the clues to help you solve the case. The gameplay was very similar to Chapters: players analyzed the clues they were given and answered a prompt given by their case worker. We utilized audio and visual clues, but all cases required outside research to solve as they were based on real events or places. And like Chapters, we used Playfab XR to store mission data, which we could then change on the fly depending on player feedback or playtesting. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/10eb33bb-0510-47e7-925f-03c6198d1346/BottlePuzzle.png Projects - Rose Cottage A challenge I designed where the player must solve an "Einstein" logic puzzle to craft an antidote out of these noxious chemicals. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/b37d6182-08be-400a-9474-0a2a510dfde2/CUCPamplet-eathiaek.jpg Projects - Rose Cottage This is a pamphlet from another case involving a dangerous religious cult. Spoilers for the puzzle solution! For this one, I wanted to use a reverse book cipher, so instead of using numbers to find letters in a book to spell out a coded phrase, I wanted players to find a word in a bible passage and count its position, which would give out a phone number in the end. Players would call the number and be given the URL to the cult's website. You can see in the next image the tool I created in Excel to make this cipher easy to use and reuse. Try to solve it before looking at the next image! https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/1720107231106-FU7O5E829VY6D1R0VFJL/Screenshot%252B2024-06-20%252B135616.jpg Projects - Rose Cottage This is a portion of the tool I created to make the reverse book cipher. It contains every bible passage in the Book of Genesis. Here's how it works: first you'd feed the phrase you wanted to scan on the left side, you would then input a number at the top of each column from 1 to 9. The sheet would then spit out the word at that number's position inside the phrase. If the word was used more than once in the phrase, it would show up as Red, to let you know to not use it. You would then craft a sentence, using one word per column, which would become your key phrase. On the left of the phrases in excel, you'd see the bible passage number that would be added to the cipher. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/61d769a5235ef74536a50bc3/e3873b9d-e464-4ff6-8f3d-5341a33a74ba/Screenshot+2024-06-20+132843.png Projects - Rose Cottage The front page for the cult's website I created in WordPress. The site is peppered with religious imagery and platitudes, and it's hiding coded messages in plain sight, for the cult leaders who are in the know. I would put the site's URL here, but that's no fun. Call the number in the pamphlet to get it!