01 Contract Overview
Dinoblade is a prehistoric action RPG developed by Team Spino LLC. I joined the project as a Technical Designer contractor during production, working within an existing Unreal Engine codebase and gameplay architecture.
My responsibilities were to update parts of the existing save and load functionality and to implement controller support across the game's menus.
Duration
FOCUS
MY ROLE
GAME ENGINE
12 weeks
Gameplay & Systems
Technical Designer
02 My Contributions
Save & Load
Updating an Existing Production System
When I joined the project, most of the save and load system was already in place. My task was to expand the existing system so that unlocked skills and abilities would also be saved when the player moved between levels.
I extended the save system to collect the skills the player had unlocked and store them as part of the player's progression data. I then added the loading side which restores those skills when entering another level.
Controller Support
Skill Persistence Implementation
The Save Skills Function
Gamepad Navigation & Input Handling
Adapting Existing UI for Gamepad Navigation
Several of the game's menus were originally designed around mouse input and couldn't be fully navigated with a controller. My task was to add controller support to the existing UI without affecting mouse and keyboard controls.
I updated most of the game's menus to support controller navigation and widget focus. This allows the player to move between buttons and other interactive elements, make selections and use things such as drop-down menus with a controller.
I also added a system that detects when the player switches between controller and mouse and keyboard. This also handles controllers being connected or disconnected and automatically pauses the game if that happens.
Input Device Detection handling
Development Footage - font assets are missing from this archived build. The footage demonstrates controller navigation and UI focus functionality.
03 Production Experience
Working Within an Existing Production
Unlike my personal and school projects, Dinoblade required me to work within an already established codebase and adapt to systems and architectural decisions that were already in production.
This meant first understanding how existing systems interacted before making any type of changes, keeping my implementation compatible with surrounding functionality, and avoiding unnecessary changes outside the scope of the task at hand.
This contract gave me practical experience contributing to an active Unreal Engine production where maintainability, communication, debugging, and working with existing constraints were as important as implementing the features themselves.
