Hogwarts Racing

We wanted to embrace height in the game, so allowing the player to fly reasonably freely was really important to us. There are bounding boxes on the sides of the track so players cannot just fly off the map, and if you get too high the game pushes you back down which pairs with the constant forward boost to actually feed into your speed. The controls stayed simple on purpose (left stick for left/right and forward/back, right stick for up/down) so the player can breeze through the map without fighting the inputs.

The Boost Bar drains quickly because it gives the player a high amount of speed, but it restores really slowly so players have to carefully manage when to spend it and only use it when they really need it. Speed Rings sit around the outside area of the track and push the player in a direction based on the ring's rotation, letting players carry that momentum wherever the ring is angled. Together the two mechanics reward players who know when to spend their boost and where to line themselves up for a ring.

There are 3 laps in the race lasting about one minute to a minute and a half. Each lap time the player makes is recorded and displayed on the top left of the screen, and when the final lap is completed a leaderboard appears with all the players' names and their times. Because the map feels quite open with the flight, I built a VFX spline effect that continuously spawns and points the player in the correct direction, and the structure of the map itself is set up so players cannot enter places they are not meant to go.

There is a max of 4 players on local split screen. Players can only be added by plugging in a controller to the PC and only in the main menu, so there are no issues with players trying to join mid-race. AI is a toggleable feature since some players might just want to chase the best time on their own. As a stretch goal we wanted to explore online multiplayer to make it easier to play with friends who are not in the same room.

Down one of the corridors, chess pieces appear from the floor randomly to slow the player down, and because the meshes randomly change between a pawn and a horse shape the player has to read each one differently. Down another corridor there are knight statues that swing swords at the player, and when a swing connects it spins the player out.

The stained glass windows are one of our hero assets, inspired by Hogwarts Legacy. They act as a transition piece between inside and outside areas with a dynamic window that can be smashed through, which was really entertaining for the player to trigger. Breakable furniture also floats randomly around the map to disorient the player, and smashes to pieces when the player collides with it, slowing them down.

Teleporting doors are placed around the map to let players start in one area and end a bit further along. Some doors are permanently open, while others open for random intervals which makes it a bit of a challenge for the player to time their use of the door. The inspiration came directly from the Harry Potter series with its floo powder and the cabinet that let enemies teleport into the castle.

In the main menu the player can change the mesh of both the broom and the character. Different brooms give different stat boosts, for example more acceleration, more up/down speed or a higher top speed, and the plan was for players to unlock different brooms by winning different races. A name changer sits alongside so players can put a personal touch on their racer, which also helps clear up which player is which when everyone is on split screen.