The Mozzarella Maze is a 3D platformer game that I’ve worked on solo using Unreal Engine.
The Gameplay
Olive delivers pizzas using her scooter. Collecting ingredients scattered around town unlocks upgrades for the scooter which will make new parts of town accessible or will help overcome obstacles. Time is always running short though! All assets except for VFX/water are made by me.
UI Design
I designed mockups of UI menus in Figma. This recipe list screen is where players will build their pizzeria’s menu, one dish at a time. Players will upgrade dishes until they can select them as their “Special” and gain a new benefit from the dish.
I then began illustrating collectable ingredients as well as the game’s logo.
I moved toward a card-like menu design for choosing upgrades.
Environment and Level Design
I started with sketching layouts before blocking out a prototype level.
I started with a more rough visual style before iterating with a more whimsical style made with low poly geometry and with less straight lines.
I realized that if the environment rendered too flat, it could be a problem with the game. A time-attack 3D platform game needs players to be able to quickly judge things like distance and speed, which they cannot do without clarity of perspective. I tried to find a balance between simplistic designs and detailed environments.
I illustrated the sky and made a mockup for the UI. Then I began creating modular assets for a cohesive art style.
For level design, I want a good mix of open spaces, tight corners, and verticality. The levels should reward using the different scooter playstyles for racing, platforming, or just exploring.
Character Design
Character design started with writing the backstory of the character, Olive. Then I made a mood board, sketched and explored silhouettes, drew a turnaround, and then modeled in Maya. I quickly made a WIP secondary character model, Chef, to join Olive in her adventure.
After changing the art style of the environment to the more cell shaded style, I wanted to update the character designs too.
More Game Dev Projects
Midnight City Game Art
Midnight City is a low stress 2D platformer set in a cyberpunk city designed by Trinity Phan-Low as a school project. I created all of the environment art seen here and implemented the dialogue mechanic. This scene was put together with Unreal.
Calvin Norwood 