Worm Punk

VR Online Arena Movement Shooter

Worm Punk is an online multiplayer VR aerial arena movement shooter. You are a worm with no methods of movement other than your shotguns, your hook shot, and your chainsaw. Hop into an arena with up to 5 other online players and try to worm your way to the top of the leaderboard!

Team Size: 9

Engine: Unity C#

My Role: Gameplay Programmer, Designer

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The Hook Shot was concepted and prototyped as a core movement mechanic in the first week of development. This allowed us to start testing what map sizes and range for mechanics felt best right from the start. I feel the Hook Shot is one of the most fun mechanics I've been able to create, and is a big part of what makes Worm Punk so fun! Possibly it's best feature is being able to pull on the hooked line with your VR controller and feel a corresponding boost in the game. I found this really helps to immerse the player in the experience, and keeps them coming back for more.

My Contributions

Hook Shot Movement

The Chainsaw, originally intended as a combat mechanic, received the most iteration. Like the hook shot, I made prototypes in the first few days to test the concept of its applications. It didn't test so well for combat, but proved to be a compelling movement addition. With the input from other team members, as well as play-testers, the chainsaw evolved into a polished movement mechanic with some additional combat and utility options.

Chainsaw Movement

Chainsaw Movement + Gun Boosts

Chainsaw Deflect Kill

I concepted the wormhole as a fast way to get from one end of the map to the other. Looking back at the original design I saw its potential to help tweak the balance of the game mid match. When I concepted a random chance to encounter power ups in worm holes, I realized we can help struggling players by giving them a much higher chance to receive a power up. This as well as giving a view of the outside of the wormhole made the mechanic much more fun to engage with. Some of the resulting wormhole related battles were favorite moments of mine.

Worm Hole Giving Heat Vison Power up

Worm Hole (Final Version)

Power Ups were concepted later on into development. Designed to give players a worth while objective other than hunting other players. Multi-shot, our first power up lets you shoot big barrages out of your guns, because it was so fun we saw these power ups had potential. Wanting to have a power up alter your play style, we added Heat Vision, Which lets you see and shoot players through walls! Even just getting invulnerability for a few seconds made tracking down the power ups feel worth while. In addition the struggle to claim these power ups created many engaging gameplay situations.

Multi-shot Power Up

Heat Vision Power Up

Jump pads and boost hoops were mechanics I concepted to help traverse the map more easily, or give players an escape opportunity. I think they were a good way to encourage new players to get airborne and experience the other movement options. Experienced players could use these same mechanics to juke and evade other players with.

Jump Pad + Boost Hoop Escapes

While developing the radar mechanic I got to work directly with our UI programmer. Many players requested some system to help locate other players in the arena. Initially hoping long colored trails would help this issue, the radar proved to be the best way to find players obstructed by terrain. The radar has markers color matched to players that will shift on the bar relative to where players are. The markers will get larger the closer players are to you.

Radar Bottom Center Screen

Because of our successful planning and quick development, I had some extra time to add some visual polish. Teaching myself along the way, I had a fun time designing some particle explosions for destroyed power ups and player deaths.

Multi-shot Power Up Explosion

Heat Vision Power Up Explosion

Trailer