Maestro
2020
Maestro is a short slice-of-life game about life choices, relationships, artistic achievement and listening to dog poetry during the apocalypse.
This game was originally designed for the Game Jobs Parade 2020 game jam with the theme "Carpe Diem/Seize The Day", but we ultimately decided to take our time and release it separately.
Our team of three was made of our 2d artist, our writer and composer, and I took the role of providing the 3D art as well as programming and designing the core game loop and implementation of the dialogue and sequences.
This project allowed me to collaborate with developers who were equally as excited to speak about subjects that mattered to us at the time, that being overwork mentalities and managing work and relaxation. We discussed greatly about what we would like to see in the game and what roles we would take, as we all were happy to design and write, as well as compose the music collaboratively.
The hardest challenge for me in this project was the demand in programming that was required, as even though it was a linear game with simple goals, making sure that all the narrative flags and conditions were being checked and the correct outcomes were triggered proved to be a challenge. I learned a lot about working efficiently and quickly in Unreal Blueprints, as well as negotiating with our writer about the feasibility of aspects of the writing.