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Jack Leavey
Technical Designer
HOST
PLAY THE GAME
SUMMARY
HOST is an action / horror title developed in Unreal Engine 5. Waking in a Victorian Mansion, the player must defend themselves from grotesque monsters and uncover the secrets held within. An arsenal is at your disposal, but your greatest strength comes from your ability to absorb enemies and adapt your body with their powers. Are you ready to be the perfect HOST?
I served as the Creative Director for HOST, managing the Art, Design, and Programming departments and leading the vision of the game. This including designing the combat, game flow, level progression, narrative: documenting and implementing these systems while providing overhead.
PROJECT DETAILS
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3 Levels
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7 Unique Enemies
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4 Weapons
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Inventory and Shop System
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Dynamic Loot system
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Dynamic Enemy Spawn System
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Save System
TEAM AND TIME
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Team Size: 14
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Time: 7 Months
GOALS
My Goals for HOST were focused on providing a comprehensive and complete 1 hour experience for the player. The game pulls inspirations from the Immersive Sim genre, action / horror titles like Resident Evil, and Bioshock.
As the Creative Director my time was spent primarily on writing the narrative, designing the combat system, collaborating with the team for content generation, and serving as the bridge between the three departments.
For my frontline contributions I assisted the programming team in designing and implementing the various gameplay systems, worked with our level designers on critical pathing, enemy and item placement, and tone / lighting for each level. Care was taken to give each of the three levels a unique gameplay feel alongside the different art for each section. I also constructed, managed, and updated technical documentation for the design and programming departments.
Bonus: I also did a large majority of the voice acting for this project, which was a inconsequential but entertaining role!
Levels
HOST features three full levels and a smaller boss level at the climax of the game. Each level was designed to give slightly different experience and gameplay loop - keeping the player on their toes throughout the experience. The Manor serves to introduce the player to the gameplay loop and mechanics. The Catacombs force the player to adapt quickly and problem solve against an unstoppable foe. And finally, the Lab tests the player's ability to deal with large scale combat encounters and ensures they are comfortable ability swapping and managing their resources. All of these lessons culminate in the final boss fight - more on that below!
Level 1: The Manor
Level 2: The Catacombs
Level 3: The Lab
Enemy Design
HOST Features 7 unique enemies - each with their own behaviors, strengths, and weaknesses. Click on the slide to learn more about each foe!
On top of conventional health, each enemy has multiple hurtboxes and a poise system. Enemies lose poise when taking damage, and hitting critical hurtboxes applies more damage to both poise and health. When poise it broken, the enemy is briefly staggered. Enemies staggered who are also at low HP can be consumed to restore Marrow or Health!
Combat Design
When laying out the gameplay loop for HOST, I wanted to provide a system that allowed for players to pick their way of play. With 5 weapons and 7 abilities, each player has the opportunity to find their method of eliminating threats and progressing.
The Cytogenic abilities are physical mutations to the player's left arm - allowing them to utilize the strengths of each enemy they encounter. Players can recover Marrow (the resource spent to use these abilities) by consuming weakened enemies - directly absorbing them into the player's body. Consuming can also restore health if the player's Marrow is full. This creates a risk / reward system with every encounter - when should the player commit to a consume? Can they afford to use higher cost abilities right now?
The weapons found in host are the usual suspects for a first person shooter - each with their strengths and weaknesses. I felt it was important to provide player's with some reliable familiarity in the combat system as well - the game is beatable with minimal use of Cytogenic abilities. By frontloading a few of the weapons in the first level and then slowly introducing the abilities, players learn to rely on their arsenal and experiment with their abilities at they go.
Final Boss
HOST concludes with a boss fight against a giant amalgamation of flesh and tissue. This creature displays features of all other enemies seen in the game, and requires the use of all the player's abilities and weapons in order to defeat. With a nearly a dozen unique attacks and different patterns it can choose from, this fight pressures players to damage the weak spots and destroy critical infrastructure in order to prevail.
Playthrough
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