Domhnall Henderson

Game Design generalist

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Gameplay design

Scrum Master

Gameplay design

During this 7 week project, I very much functioned as a generalist. At the beginning I predominantly worked with my world map/progression components, but as time marched on, I started to jump around to other features to aid the product holistically.

World map

Inscryption (from Devolver Digital) was a strong influence for this project. Specifically, we felt the use of board game miniatures was a unique and quirky idea. So, we lent into this for the 'world map' section of the game.

This map room went through a couple of iterations in regards to the UX. To begin, playing with physics for the interaction feedback felt like the right way to go, and in hindsight I regret not sticking with this approach more as this would better match the board game feeling. Regardless, halfway through the 7 weeks, we changed directions and transformed the interactive parts to 2D, more akin to Inscryption.

The room was designed to feel as if the player would be inside the caravan. Apart from the art, there are two factors aiding this. The first is the level sequence as the level loads. This is to give the feeling of stepping up to the table to plan your trip. The second is the camera shake after you select the next destination. This is to highlight the parallel between the mini caravan on the table and your own ‘real’ caravan.

What I learned

Feature teams are the way forward.
In previous school projects, we held a fairly rigid separation between the art, design and programming ‘disciplines.’ I felt like this resulted in a lack of a connection to various components in the games, and the overall quality suffered as a result. In contrast, for Salt & Ink I worked closely with an artist and a programmer on features. It felt very smooth for the programmer to create structures and events in C++ which I could then implement via blueprints into the game. Similarly, my rapid prototyping of the map room informed the artist exactly what they needed to do, allowing them to quickly make props and hand them over to me.

Like many folk, I have a really broad interest in games, but typically my top-played games are 4X, strategy, management, FPS, and sports.

About Me

Born and raised in Scotland, I moved to Sweden in 2018. I spent over 6 years studying and working in the biomedical field before starting fresh in game development.Studying the past year at Futuregames has provided opportunities to experience all different facets of game design, but where my teams and I have thrived most is when I am working in sync with gameplay programmers.In my eyes, pulling people together and collaborating to achieve a shared vision is the most rewarding aspect of game design and development.Outside of games, I am constantly hanging out with friends - round a beer at the pub, grabbing fika, or watching movies snuggled up at home.