Make your way to the Cauldron!

Whisker Witchery is a third-person stealth platformer, in which the player controls a once-human apprentice who was transfigured into a rat by your rival!

After being cursed by your rival, you must navigate their witch cottage all while avoiding detection by the magic creatures within. Avoid fearsome Fire Sprites who will hunt you down, or the rare Waxies, living candles who shoot balls of fire! Leap between the floating books and locate the 3 ingredients that hold the key to returning to normal!

Will you be able to reach the cauldron, or will you fall prey to many dangers?

Whisker Witchery
Narrative Adventure

Video displays Level 2 - Growing vine mechanic has already been introduced in previous level.

Meet Mystic Team Studios!

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Launch Interview

Fan Art inspired by our game & story!
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What did you do?

For this project, I contributed the following:

- Illustrated 2D Mock-ups & Game Design Documentation

Used Illustrator to show off my designs and the room the player would explore. I also created design documentation that had 6 sections including the general overview, Aesthetics, Mechanics, Game Elements, Levels, and Similar Styled Games for our team to keep us on the same goals.

-Designed & Implemented Levels Utilizing Player Mechanics + Narrative

Designed & implemented Level #2 of Whisker Witchery. I also designed and implemented the bottom area in Level #3's herbology table and collaborated with another designer on Level #1. I also created all the in-between traversal areas that were connections between levels.

I had direct involvement in placing both enemy types, hiding places, moving platforms, props, lighting, patrol points, dialogue, SFX, VFX, and more. I also worked with our environment artists to brainstorm ideas that would convey the story of our game as the player traversed. I would place these story-telling props directly in the players' sight to ensure it was conveyed.

Created inner dialogue to enhance the story as well as to inform the player of certain situations, such as "Do I hear fireballs? I must stay out of the light to avoid fire..." in level 3.

Used Design Principles such as framing, calling attention, leading lines, and lighting to bring attention to certain important items and/or storytelling elements.

Create a gym that tested out mechanics and movement at certain degrees and heights.

I worked with our engineers to design puzzles in our game using the mechanics they created. I worked with their throwing mechanic and AI to use potion bottles to distract our players' enemies.

Throughout this process I was communicating with the other designers to ensure our levels were cohesive and assisting them with technical issues.

- Cut Development Time

I created level maps in Unreal 5 to white-boxed 3D design layouts. This was so that I could test out my designs and the intended gameplay. I also duplicated my final game map for the cottage so that the other designers could work in their space using the same room structure simultaneously to avoid "check out errors" in Unreal with the intention of bringing them together. This saved us a lot of development time as we could work at the same time instead of waiting on one another.

- Standardization and Metrics

Created standardized metrics for our flying books & books used as stairs that required the player to jump. These were set after multiple playtests to retain the width of the books that were appropriate for the gameplay experience. I didn't want to halt the movement.

Created a standardization for our potion bottles. We have two types of potion bottles (one for growing vines to traverse vertically, the other to throw and distract enemies with the loud noise). These were originally the same structure bottle. After playtesting results showed confusion, I decided to standardize the bottles by having the growth potion be a triangle shape with liquid and the breakable bottles as a round shape and no liquid. This was so players can easily & quickly understand the separation between the use of the bottles themselves.

- Identified Problems & Generated Solutions Based Off Playtest Results

When our engineers could not finish our climbing mechanic in time for playtests, I decided to replicate the verticality movement in a new way by white-boxing magical book platforms and implementing their movement using Unreal Blueprints. This ensured a similar player experience while fitting our game's overall magical aesthetic. Playtesters loved it so much that it became its own feature in the game. to create easier traversal while making it fun and magical to our environment.

I noticed in playtests players were running straight past our green potion bottles which are crucial for traversal even when they were stationed right in front of the player. I reached out to one of our artists to see if we could give it a glowing effect. To have this effect we placed a spotlight of a lighter color green in the potion bottle. Not only did this catch players' eyes, but it also fits the magical aesthetic we were driving. After making this change, we had few to no issues of this reoccurring.

Before an important playtest, I noticed our levels were not restarting after the player died. This was a big issue because the enemies would be at the last location where they had killed the player. Also, potion bottles that were used to either grow vines or distract enemies were gone if the player had already used them. I brought this concern up with our team, however, our engineers were too busy to fix the issue in time. Playtests are crucial in giving feedback to us level designers, so I decided to make a workaround. To fix the potion bottle issues I placed around 4 of each type (Growth Potion, Alert Potion) into the world. This way if they were to die they had others they could use. I also went in and changed the blueprints to have the alert potion bottles destroy themselves after being used. This ensured that they were not alerting the enemy to a location from their previous playthrough.

During playtests I noticed our players were not able to distract the enemy in level 1, because of this I reached out to the other designer dedicated to this area. They were not sure why it was not working so I did a couple of tests, such as looking at the ones that were working like my own vs the ones not working while also messing with the blueprint that would alert the enemy. It turns out that they never put in a nav mesh for the enemy which is why they were unable to move. However, they also did not have the value for the noise alert high enough for the distance they wanted the item to be thrown. Essentially, we had to raise the sound value so that the enemy could hear it for her intended design.

While polishing up my designs, I noticed that sometimes the Ai for the small fire sprites did not react correctly. I ran some tests and found out that it was because sometimes they were alerted to the potion bottles that were making noises in the distance (this depended on the value thrown). This was a problem because it disrupted their patrol paths. Instead of each of them covering a small area at one time they would cover only one area together. To fix this issue, I edited the smaller fire sprite's blueprint to ensure they could not hear the noise. The potion bottles that made noise were only intended to distract the big fire sprites so editing these out of their blueprint fixed the issue.

- Collaboration

Collaborated with the storyboard team to create a constancy between the story and what we had in Unreal. I also gave feedback on story sequences and created a new background for the ending to make it more cinematic.

Worked with our QA team on the feedback they received during playtests. I was able to iterate from this feedback so that we could improve our game using user feedback.

Communicated with engineers when I found bugs while testing the levels and gameplay. Before reaching out about the issues I would run my own tests to pinpoint the issue. Sometimes this allowed me to solve the issue myself, however at the very least I was able to come to the engineers with a list of things that did not fix the issue or were ineffective.

Collaborated with multiple disciplines such as Art, Audio, Engineering, Narrative, VFX, and more

Development Time:

Sept. 19th - May 4th

Mystic Moon Studios

Unreal Engine 5

Play Now

Design Process

Up to Date Design Doc

~ Design Doc

This design documentation is an overview of all the details regarding our game Rat Heist. This document was created by myself using collaborated ideas and gameplay created by our team.

This document is broken into 6 sections including the following: General Overview, Aesthetics, Mechanics, Game Elements, Levels, and Similar Styled Games

GYM PHASE

~ Gym Layout

When it comes to the gym I wanted to test a variety of ideas and mechanics.

This includes: Knockable Objects, Potion Bottles, Plant Growth, Collectables, and Movement.

*Enemies were not completed for testing in this stage to test out stealth mechanics.

We found that players loved interacting with these knockable objects displayed in red. Throwing around giant objects as the small creature was very appealing. It was also effective to use this mechanic to solve puzzles such as knocking over a giant book to create a pathway.

*This mechanic would be used later on to solve puzzles as well as alert the enemies.

Potions were a highlighted mechanic in our game that players enjoyed. This mechanic allowed the player to traverse once unattainable areas and gave our players a sense of discovery and magical wonder.

Through testing, we found that using a plant to grow/climb was very difficult for our engineers. We decided to pivot this idea and instead have our vines be flat surfaces that could be easily coded and made created a better movement for the player.

When it comes to the chest, we found that finding these chests and making your way back to the cauldron to place the item was a lot of work for the player. As the player is very tiny and their environment big we decided to scratch this idea and shift the story to reflect our new gameplay. Instead of finding these ingredients to turn yourself back to a human, you will make your way to the spellbook that will turn you back to your former self.

Knockable Objects

Collect Potions

Vine/Vine Pots

Chest/Collectables

For this gym, I wanted to test the movement of the player as a big part of the game is their environment and how they interact with it. I found that the player was only able to clear two books at a time. They could also only clear ramps to a certain degree. The camera also would clip in and out of the player and would need to be addressed.

*Moving forward, we decided to increase the height the player can jump to decrease frustration and create better movement. We also decided to add a sprint mechanic to enable the player to cover more ground and allow the player to scurry as a rats movements would be.

Testing Movement (video)

Mock-Ups

I had the idea to have each designer create a visual design doc with all their ideas for a bookcase level. That way we could present these ideas to each other and have ideas derived from each designer for the level. See my ideas in the "Game Design Ideas".

My ideas focused on using books as a way to create puzzles for the player and have one enemy encounter that incited its own type of puzzle.

The "Bookcase Level Design" is a visual design doc that I created using all three designer ideas to form one level. That way in Unreal each designer could test out their own ideas and it flowed in a way that allowed for player experimentation. This lets us hone in on what players really enjoyed for this mock-up and what we needed to change moving forward, and communicate these ideas with the rest of the team.

Game Design Ideas

Bookcase Level Design

Whiteboxing

Moving Forward

For this stage, I white-boxed the entire bookcase level. I focused on keeping it very simple so that we could test ideas. I also put items in the other design tiers so that when they were ready, they had what they were wanting in each cubical. As well as being able to show our team what our ideas in each cubical would be.

~ Using Color

During this period, we were still trying to fix bugs in our vine growth mechanic. Due to this, I used color to show what would occur once we had this mechanic up and working.

Brown was used for vines that needed a potion to grow. Green for them either being pregrown or what the vine would grow to upon potion use. Red was used for interactable objects such as books and holes that would be placed in our bookcase.

This was a very effective method of conveying my ideas to the team when the mechanics were not yet complete. My goal was to allow anyone from our team to go into the level and it be easy to understand.

After creating a simple white-boxing outline, we moved forward in designing cubicles. Each designer had their own set of cubicles to design and iterate.

Early on, I noticed some challenges in my designs for my cubicles. Specifically in the enemy encounter. Previously I had the player using two cubicles to complete an enemy puzzle. The player needed to use the top cubical to drop an item, distracting an enemy below and opening a path.

I found this difficult to convey to the players as they were under two different tiers. To combat this issue, I decided to keep the puzzle in the same cubical to avoid any confusion regarding the actions the player must take. This kept all the puzzle elements regarding the enemy in the players' sight of vision and increased the likelihood of them completing the puzzle. This in turn changed the movement flow of the bookcase to the image on the left.

Whiteboxing Bookcase

Flying Book Gameplay Feature

Replace Assets/Testing

~ Testing & Iterating

This phase came with a lot of testing and iteration. I had three cubicles I was working on, the book puzzle cubical, the close-range enemy puzzle cubical, and then the long-distance enemy encounter.

~ Cubical #1 (Book Puzzle)

The book puzzle cubical required multiple iterations to ensure the best results. The player originally struggled to jump books while holding the one that would allow them to acquire the potion bottle. Instead, I designed this puzzle to use the book first. The player would not be able to jump one of the big books and reach the potion without grabbing the book and using it as an additional stepping stone. This got rid of the jumping with book collisions and allowed the player to complete the puzzle easier. I also wanted this book to stand out among the rest making it more intuitive. This goal was met by reaching out to one of the artists and collaborating to have this specific book titled "How to use things to your advantage".

~ Cubical #2 (Close Range Enemy Encounter)

For the enemy encounter cubical, I had to test the movement and placement of the books so that the player could easily traverse the floating books. I create these books to have two location points that they would move between. I playtested and iterated this sequence many times to get the best point locations & movement speed for the player to traverse. I also had to test the enemy patrol points and the throwing of the mushrooms that would alert the enemy. I had to ensure the player would die if they went straight to the potion, but had enough time to pass if they were to throw a mushroom in the opposite direction of the potion alerting the enemy to that location.

~ Cubical #3 (Long Distance Enemy Encounter)

When it came to the long-distance enemy, testing was limited as our engineers were still working out some bugs with our growing hat ability. This section was designed to highlight the hats' ability to grow to avoid enemy detection and damage. I did however iterate book speed & movement in this cubical to better reflect my design goals. These books would move slowly back and forth in an open area requiring the player to use them to move across the room. However, this area required the use of the growing hat due to the player being in the wide open with enemies.

~ Moving Forward

Once our engineers completed the enemy ai and hat mechanics I would later test my designs further and iterate to better use their finished product.

End of 2022 Build

~ What did this last iteration leave us with?

We received incredible feedback and critiques from playtesters and instructors for this build. We found that moving forward we needed to keep in mind the following for our levels/world building:

Players loved the flying books and enjoyed the throwing mechanic
Players wanted to sprint and run around open areas more. Being inside the bookcase felt too restricting.
The witch's library was a popular theme. Playtesters loved the environment.
Confusing at time regarding where to go.
Players wanted more storytelling assets, feedback, and VFX

Standardized Book Metrics

~ How did you standardize metrics for the flying books?
I did this by creating multiple books that varied in width and height. From there, I playtested having around 5 books together that would be moving to different locations and iterating until I found the right size for the type of gliding movement I was looking for. After finding the perfect metrics I ensured the rest of the design team utilized these metrics in their designs so that the player could always expect the same width and height of books.

~ Why did you standardize metrics for the flying books?

I wanted to standardize the metrics for the flying books because I didn't want players to focus on the width and height of the books when they are trying to platform across. Instead, I wanted the challenge to come from the speed and location of the books. Without it, players would have to make an educated guess on the size of the books for each jump and that can lead to player frustration, especially if they keep failing due to the unknown height/width.

~ What Changed?

For this new iteration, I completely rebuilt the library level keeping in mind the past feedback we received.

I kept both types of flying books that everyone enjoyed so much and implemented their new movements in engine.
I created the level to be way more open allowing for more players to utilize the sprint mechanic more as well as observe their giant environment.
Built a basic room layout using what assets and blueprints we had until our Ai was functioning.
I placed potion bottles, enemy encounters, and cauldron in relative locations.
I utilized props our artists are making for the witches' cottage as a way of traversal. This way they get to interact with their environment even more.

Next Iteration

~ What does this document show us?

This document shows us the three sections that the game will be divided into (Levels 1 - 3). It visually shows us the traversal routes the player must take as well as the counterclockwise movement around the room to the final player goal (The Cauldron). As my focus is Level 2, I have a lower opacity in Levels 1 & 3.

I created this document to not only visualize where I wanted certain objects and encounters but also to give a broad overview of our world. See the key at the bottom of the document for a better understanding.

Visual Design Doc

Next Iteration

~ What Changed?

For this new iteration, I worked off what I created in my visual document above as well as iterated more based on feedback from playtests and how our AI was functioning.

Playtesting showed players were likely to sprint by potion bottles even with them being placed directly in front of them. This was an issue as those potion bottles were crucial for growing vines and progressing the game. We found that this was due to the lighting in the room being the same as the bottles. To combat this issue, I worked with one of our artists and we came up with the idea of adding a green spotlight in the bottle to make them glow. This made the potions more eye-catching and more likely they would collect them.

Changed candle stick enemy locations. This was so that they were always directly in the player, making it easier to avoid health damage. (Playtests showed that avoiding fireballs coming at you from the side was too challenging.)

I added in more "downtime". One of the critiques of my previous designs was that they were too action-packed and needed more "downtime". I was able to give our players more downtime by adding more traversal in between my action-packed encounters and moving platforms. This built up excitement and created better gameplay flow.

You'll notice my AI designs for the smaller fire sprites is different in the video and the photos. This is because multiple iterations were done to best utilize our Ai. As our Ai was still buggy, each iteration was redesigned to best fit what we had at the time.

~ What Changed?

We received incredible feedback and critiques from playtesters and instructors for this build allowing me to do the following:

Tweaking Patrol Points - You can see the patrol points and the enemy they correspond with in the photo below. (Far right corner) The colored circle represents the enemy while the X's represent their patrol points. You'll notice the red one does not move far this is so that they block that pathway requiring the player to use the throw mechanic on the bottles presented to them so that they distract the enemy to a location away from that opening.

Deleted candle stick enemies from my level. This way each level will add an additional enemy type. As mine is level two it is appropriate to have two types in my level and three in the final level. This spaces out concepts and keeps things interesting as well as ensuring the player can demonstrate their knowledge of each enemy type before gaining a new one.
I created a connection between the end of my level and the start of Level 3.

Finalized design layout for enemy encounters after multiple playtests.

Whiteboxed our owl that will indicate where the "Owl feather" Ingredient is located in this level.

Used books to frame certain objects like potions to guide players' eyes to that location.

Collaborated with an artist to solve the problem of players running straight by potions that are crucial to gameplay, even when potions are placed directly in front of their path. We came up with the idea of placing a green spotlight that not only gave a glowing effect catching players' eyes but also matched the magical aesthetic we were driving.

Added in levels 1 and 3 that the other designers were working on into the overworld I had been building

Added in more prop assets and VFX - ie cauldron fog, windows, chandelier, rug, etc.

The vines and Ai were very tedious, so I assisted in getting those working for the other levels.

Playtested other levels and wrote down feedback.

Assessed what still needs to be done and what I can help out with.

Next Iteration

- I will continue to get feedback through playtests
- Help out the other designers with their levels
- Focus more on worldbuilding/set dressing
- Start researching lighting
- Work with sound/vfx artist to produce more
player feedback and make it "juicey"!

Next Steps:

~ What Changed?

As a majority of the gameplay only needed to be tweaked/finalized I started work on the environment and spaces that the player would traverse. Adding "magic" by set dressing and adding lighting to the areas.

I started by swapping out all the finished assets our artists have been pushing. I even used old assets in a new and interesting way to make the cottage feel more lived in. An example of this is utilizing old mushroom assets and old vine assets to fill vials and containers in the Alchemy Lab.

Set dressing these environments really important to me. I find it only highlights the designs prebuilt by marking them more interesting with magical props.

I collaborated on lighting with one of our environmental artists. Neither of us has worked on lighting prior so we watch similar Youtube videos to learn. We decided to test lighting ideas on our own and brought them together in the world.

As a designer, I wanted to utilze lighting to invoke emotion or feelings depending on the area. Because of this, you'll see certain areas with warmer and cooler tones. For instance, near the witch portrait you'll get to experience a green tone representing the sour betrayl of your old firend who decided to go dark. While the begining has much warmer tones to reflect the start of the adventure.

I also utilized lighting to highlight specific storytelling elements, props, and pathways. One of these storytelling elements/props included a broken frame of the witches as children.

Next Iteration

Standardizing Potions

~ How did you standardize metrics for the potion bottles?

I did this by reaching out to one of our 3D artists on the team and communicating our need for a different-shaped potion bottle that would be used to distract enemies. As our growth potion was a triangle shape, it made sense to have a circular one for a completely different use. I also ensured that this potion would be empty to further differ from the other one. From there I created a blueprint in UE5 that would activate a shattering noise once the potion collided with the floor. This way we not only have visuals of them being completely different, but we also have different player feedback. Once this was complete, I reached out to the other designers to ensure this was consistent throughout our magical cabin.

~ Why did you standardize metrics for the potion bottles?

I wanted to standardize the potion bottles because our game has a quick pace due to the enemy encounters, moving platforms, and inviting environment. Due to the quick movement, I didn't want the players to slow down just because they were confused about the use of certain potion bottles. I designed it to be very clear so that the player could see these bottles from a far distance and understand their uses. This also ensured they did not have to traverse backward due to leaving a crucial potion bottle behind. This was proven effective from playtests.

~ What Changed?

Wow, you made it to the end, congrats! Now this last stage was a lot of adding magic and polishing! This included the following:

Finalized Patrol Points that allowed the player to better predict when they could sprint & hide to avoid enemies.

Finalized Lighting for the final map.

Filled the environment even more with props our artist created, and tried to use the ones we have like books in a more unique way so they don't all look the same. I did this by flipping some of the books and having different orientations for the books to keep things interesting and feel like a used library.

Added in one more checkpoint to make the game less frustrating if the player is to lose.

Added dialogue to certain areas of the room. This way it makes players want to look at more props in case they have a story or comedic relief. It was also utilized to give context, for instance in level 3 when we are introduced to a new enemy we will have a pop-up inner dialogue when our player gets close stating "Do I hear fireballs? I must stay out of the light to avoid fire...".

Worked on bug fixes to have the gameplay as intended.

Implemented SFX such as the breaking of glass after potion bottles have been thrown. I wanted to add as much player feedback as we could.

Changed the potion bottles for the ones that would be thrown and used to distract enemies. I changed it to a circular empty bottle instead of the triangular one. This is so that there is a clear difference visually and mechanically between the green potion bottles meant for growth and the empty ones meant for distractions.