Hop'n'Brew is an original potion-crafting game set in a whimsical fantasy world, following the adventure of Froggo and Tod, a pair of charming frog-brothers who have taken up the responsibility of running an alchemy shop in the woods, but as they embark on this magical journey, they could use a bit of help, while still learning how to craft perfect potions.
Are you ready to unleash your inner alchemist and brew marvelous potions with them, while having fun along the way? Hop in! 🐸🍵✨
Game mechanics
Technologies and softwares
Visual and audio
Process and contributions
Your ultimate goal is to satisfy the demands of a quirky ensemble of clients who will visit Froggo and Tod's alchemy shop seeking magical help for their specific needs.
The potion-crafting process is both engaging and intuitive. You'll have access to a set of enchanted ingredients. To brew a potion, you'll need to carefully combine the right ingredients in the cauldron, experimenting with your creativity.
As you progress through the game, you'll need to rely on your wit, memory, and potion-making skills to craft the perfect mix that matches needs of each client. Successfully fulfilling a client's request will earn you rewards, and sometimes, the client may gift you with a new ingredient to add to your inventory.
The game core loop revolves around the potion crafting action: when a client will enter the scene, the Unity dialogue system will display the client's request, which sould be carefully read by the player, who will later proceed with mixing 3 different ingredients to find the correct potion. The user can combine the ingredients by using a simple drag-and-drop gesture to put them in the cauldron.
Each time a three-ingredients-combination is achieved, a pop-up will show the result of the crafting:
1. no potion has been found by mixing those ingredients;
2. a potion has been found, but it's not the right one - try not to forget it for later;
3. a potion has been found and it's the right one: now you can serve the client!
In the last case, when the client's request has been satisfied, the user will get a reward: a new ingredient to find new potions!
The game has been developed to be ideally endless: the user has unlimited attempts and the clients will be spawned continuously with their request. At the moment, it features a limited set of clients and potion requests, but it can be potentially expanded with as many addition as you want.
Hop'n'Brew is developed using Unity and C# scripting, optimized for the last iPhone models. The game was distributed for testing using Apple's TestFlight, with the support of Xcode IDE.
The two key elements were the Unity input system to handle user gestures and the Unity collision system which is the main foundation of almost all the game dynamics.
All the settings, characters and other GUI elements are entirely hand-drawn by the illustrators of the team.
The soundtrack of the game was an original composition by our game audio designer.
Hop'n'Brew is the product of an ideation, research, development and testing process led by a team of six: two developers, a game audio designer and UX designer, two game artists/illustrators (including one animator), a game designer and copywriter.
It was born as the final project for the Apple Developer Academy, hence the choice of developing a game for iPhone only.
As the lead developer, my main tasks and responsabilities have been:
- implementing the clients spawning system with random sprites attached;
- implementing the clients' movement and entrance into the scene as NPCs (non-player characters);
- implementing the dialogue system to display the clients' requests;
- implementing the crafting system by handling ingredients combinations and different cases for the result of the crafting;
- coding C# dictionaries to handle the large number of variables for ingredients, potions and requests;
- implementing the GUI: building the main scene, adding various 2D assets, pop-ups, tutorial and ingredients counter;
- adding the title screen and the play button.