Dev Diary: sci-fi shooter and roguelike AEROCUBE | Unreal Fellowship: Games | SoloDev

Genres: Arcade, FPS, Roguelike, Sci-Fi, Space, Action, Dystopian.

My name is Alexander Mukhitdinov, I’m a solo developer who has worked with game engines like Unity, RPG Maker, and GMS2, but in my opinion Unreal Engine is the best fit for the choices I make in game development. I was incredibly lucky to be selected as one of only 50 participants out of 500 applicants worldwide for the Unreal Fellowship: Games.

Fellowship lead Edward Bennett said on Youtube in Everything about Unreal Fellowship that Unreal Fellowship can be considered as “an intense game jam” and I think it really fits the definition of Unreal Fellowship.

It was the first game jam I’ve ever participated in, and I used all my knowledge to make the best game I could in such a short time. Since I’m a solo developer who sells games on Steam, I’ve gotten used to making my own assets and AEROCUBE wasn’t an exception. Assets that have been used are created by me.

Fellowship gameplay trailer (2 min):

I was working on the game as a fellowship project in May 6th - May 27th (22 days), although I wasted some days because l was making stylized assets which I had to leave behind.

Fellowship Week Date Stage Description
Week 1 May 6 - May 11 Idea stage It’s really important to decide on the genre and style early on. Especially if you’re creating your own assets like I do. At first, I was working on a stylized shooter called Cubie shooter, but I ended up completely changing the concept to a more serious sci-fi game called AEROCUBE. Below is a robot I spent 2–3 days creating, but I had to scrap it once I decided to switch to a realistic style

Fellowship Week Date Stage Description
Week 2 May 12 - May 18 Creating systems 1)Created shooting system; 2)Created realistic lighting; 3)VFX; 4)Created all materials; 5)UI; 6)Added some 3D models.

Fellowship Week Date Stage Description
Week 3 May 19 - May 25 More systems and polisihing 1)Chaos destruction; 2)System of movement; 3)Sounds; 4)Fixes

Fellowship Week Date Stage Description
Week 4 (2 days only) May 26 - May 27 Packaging, fixes then rest In May 27th for first time in my life in one day I made 5 builds in one day to fix bugs as fast as possible for testers. I’ll never forget this the most intense day of fellowship.

Even though the Unreal Fellowship has ended, I’ll continue updating the game. (See the next message for updates.)

Advice for Unreal Engine developers:

  1. If you make game on a slow PC it’s actually great, because your game will turn out to be optimized since you’ll be always careful :wink:
  2. The earlier you decide what game you’re going to make the better
  3. Publish the page on Steam or Epic Games Store as soon as possible and keep working on your game
  4. If you make all assets on your own like me please decide in the beginning what kind of game it will be and be sure its the best option for you
  5. If you live in a hot country like me - be prepared and good luck! I had 33-40°C almost each day, it slowed my work with the game a lot, but if you start something great like a fellowship game you should never stop.

I hope you like what I did. Let me know what you think.

Also don’t forget to wishlist and follow AEROCUBE on Steam:

EDIT:
Systems that were used in this project:
-Lumen;
-UMG (Widget animations, rich textes);
-Chaos destruction;
-Physics + gravitation;
-Materials;
-Niagra (VFX);
-Blueprints;
-AI;
-Post-process.

Cheers,
Alexander

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Hey there @CubeOfSkill,

Hope you’re well and having a great week so far :slight_smile:

Love the sci-fi theme and floaty-jetpack style flying. Such a rad concept you’ve created here. Do you plan on sharing more gameplay trailers? :smiley:

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Week 4:
Made early version of main menu. Yes, it didnt exist before

Thank you so much for you interest!
Yes, I plan to do it every week - AEROCUBE and HitTube. Wish me luck, haha

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