I am working on a game called Shaolin Freerunning that is inspired by Mirror’s Edge. The aim of the game is to allow players to have unprecedented freedom of control over a character in various urban environments ranging from skyscraper cities to construction sites. The game’s main appeal is the thrill of scaling huge life-size structures such as cranes and high-rises and leaping off the edge of them while admiring the view from being above hundreds of feet above the ground. If ‘base-jumping’ is not enough then players may opt to go on high-speed free-flowing freeruns over the rooftops of a city, jumping between buildings and vaulting over objects.
Unlike other games in this genre Shaolin Freerunning aims to retain some degree of realism, meaning that although incredible drops from thousands of feet are easily survivable, you cannot simply fly around and teleport to the top of each structure. The player must strategically climb each building either by jumping from one building to another or by jumping between various nooks and crannies of each structure. The huge drops at the top of each building are aesthetic rewards for the player skill in climbing the building.
The YouTube video below demonstrates some of the features of the game albeit in a space-like environment. You can see the basic running movement and speed, the wind shake while falling from a height and also the huge scale of the drops that you may encounter. Please note that the assets used (brick blocks) are only placeholders and so is the space environment. Also the city will not consist of floating buildings, this freerunning course just serves for ease of demonstration.
It looks very promising, a few suggestions from a fellow Mirrors Edge fan:
When you are running it seems as though you are bouncing too much. Just my opinion.
When you fall and it starts shaking you should have the edges slowly start turning black. This will give more of an “Oh shit!” reaction, and a sense of speed.
Other than that it looks pretty good. Also, are you going for the Mirrors Edge look or keeping it realistic?
I will try to keep it as realistic as possible but I would like the player to be able to survive huge drops too. I want to give the player the feeling that they can do whatever they like and survive but still in a normal, realistic world.
Ok actually scratch that the realism idea just went out the window.
The game now focuses on insanely ridiculous jumps between huge buildings and cranes. Much more fun.
Mirror’s Edge is one of my favourite games ever, so I’m definitely keeping an eye on this one. Are you going for the minimalistic design look of Mirror’s Edge, or will it be set in a more present, ‘dirtier’ urban environment?
It will be more urban, but not necessarily ‘dirtier’. In fact, the game will instead have a variety of maps spanning the globe. I already have four ideas. The first is a residential area with small construction sites, which I have already started work on. The second is the Burj Khalifa. The third is a map of Mont Blanc that has cranes dotted around from which you can jump across cliff faces and radio masts. The final idea is the simplest but also my favourite: A modern skyscraper city (New York-esque) where you can leap around skyscraper rooftops and explore a variety of modern-day features (underground train lines, construction sites, huge government buildings, historic monuments etc.) Sounds a bit ambitious I know, but I am planning to take this one step at a time and release individual maps as a sort of DLC.
If you aren’t going for realism then you could make it like you are in a mech suit of some sort. That would make the bounciness of the running make sense and actually be very immersive. If, however, you are going with the ‘being free’ idea I could also see that. That would make it seem like you are in a dream of some sort which would be really cool.
