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Inua

Inua is a first-person 3D single-player action puzzler in which players use ice and fire to manipulate their environment, utilize combative enemies in creative ways, and progress through an ancient temple.

Inua won Best Visual Quality at the Intel University Games Showcase at GDC 2016! See more about the event and the other competitors following this link

Project Length: 6 months
Team Size: 14 developers
Engine: Unreal Engine 4
Weekly Man Hours: 21 per person

Roles and Responsiblities

Producer

  • Managed project through agile development using scrum and product backlog tool
  • Communicated milestone scope using sprint burndowns and task tracking
  • Contracted music composition using third party composer
  • Wrote and co-wrote project documents including product backlog, asset development plan, game design document, asset database, technical design document, and art style guide
  • Facilitated daily team and leads meeting to ensure project scope and unified vision 
  • Mitigated project risk through dependency schedules and risk assessment plans
  • Facilitated weekly playtest to ensure conveyance of puzzle design

Production Documentation

Product Backlog
Game Design Document
Art Style Guide
Playtest Survey Data

Mini Post-Mortem

What Went Right

What Went Wrong

What We Learned
  • The team iterated on puzzle design rapidly to find the fun early in development
  • Artist created final quality assets early in development to set quality bar and realize project scope
  • Weekly playtest kept team in reality and ensured designs functioned as intended
  • The team held on to features that did not fit core themes of the game leading to difficult cuts later in development
  • Over-reliance on certain team members for critical features strained other responsibilities
  • Development processes such as lead approval were not adhered to when the team was under tight deadlines
  • Testing combined with iteration is the best way to improve quality for the consumer
  • Establishing vision early mitigates rework later in development
  • The project always comes first so all features must improve the experience or be cut

Trailer