Introduction🔗

Motorball: The Bounty is a game prototype I created in association with Garry McGee. The goal we had for this project was to create a rough vertical slice capturing what a cyberpunk-esque RPG set in the Battle Angel Alita universe could be like. This prototype focuses on a bounty hunter mission where the player is hunting down terrorists plotting an attack on the stadium of the popular sport Motorball.

This project was created in the Unity Engine over the course of about a week. On this project, I worked as the primary systems designer, gameplay scripter (C#), and level designer for one of the two areas present. My area focuses more on the investigation & other non-combat gameplay, where Garry’s level focuses on the FPS combat aspects of gameplay.

Summary🔗

Challenge🔗

For this project, we were asked to make a prototype of a game that takes place in the world of Battle Angel: Alita, specifically about the sport Motorball that is featured in the 3rd and 4th volumes of the manga. Our given target audience was primarily fans of the series, but also young adults who were not familiar with the franchise. This created an interesting obstacle of needing to have content that appeals to fans and newcomers, without excluding the other demographic.

Solution🔗

It was immediately clear to us that motorball was far too complex and nuanced to make a proper prototype in our given timeframe. We ended up landing on the idea to make our prototype take place at and around a motorball stadium. Additionally, we decided that in order to avoid any conflicts, it would be best to detach this game from the main storyline.

These solutions conveniently helped address the target audience as well. By shifting the focus away from motorball itself, it makes this game more appealing to newcomers, as motorball is a pretty niche aspect of an already niche series. At the same time, by treating this as a spinoff, it reduces the risk of angering fans of the series by not adhering to the canon 100%.

Result🔗

Motorball: The Bounty, as it became, represents a vertical slice of a First Person RPG with First Person Shooter elements. In this game, you take on the role of a cybernetically enhanced Hunter-Warrior living in the cyber-punk dystopian world of Battle Angel. For this mission, the player is pursuing a bounty on a criminal associated with a terrorist group that has staged bombing attacks on the motorball stadium.

Highlights🔗

Train🔗

The game begins with the player entering the area around the motorball stadium on a train. The reasoning behind this was to give the player a nice, gradual introduction to their environment, rather than simply plotting them down in the thick of the action right from the start. Additionally, this provides the player with a nice vista view of the level before and after they get off the train, which serves as a nice visual introduction to the level.

Life🔗

One of the things we wanted to accomplish with this prototype is to make the world feel active and alive. We executed this by having numerous NPCs around the area engaged in different activities. We have people waiting in line at food stands and other vendors, a group of men watching some “sexy” dancers, a large group around two individuals fighting, as well as many individual people throughout the level. For the most part, but especially with the isolated people, I wanted to make sure that there’s some sort of story to them. This is what I feel makes the area feel alive, a bunch of models in T-Pose would not have the same effect!

Scanner🔗

The player finds they are unable to buy a ticket, due to Alita bringing so much popularity to the sport. This was an example of how I would plan to subtly reference the Alita source material, without clashing with it. This obstacle also provides an avenue to introduce some of the AI/Cybernetic abilities the player has. In this vertical slice, the focus is the scanner which is used to identify various types of targets within the level. This ability has many useful applications that could be expanded on, further down the theoretical road.