Overachievers is an educational game designed and developed for Lincoln Learning Solutions online curriculum using Unity.

I was lead developer on the project, using Unity 2022, in C# and published on the web and for Android/iOS tablets and phones. I assisted in the game’s design and created effects, shaders and animations.

This project was technically focused on developing a foundational framework for future LLS games, combining all of the experience and code from our previous Unity games. Specifically development focused on engineering a robust question and answer system that would facilitate a wide range of digitized curriculum content, including math notation and in line styling, which has always been a weak spot in HTML5 Canvas as well as Unity text rendering. I also implemented a robust Text to Speech system that leverages free browser/OS based TTS systems, which enabled full accessibility along with multiple input modes for gameplay/navigation.

Artwork and general design led by CJ Kuehn, with Matt Casper, Sean Kennedy and Sean Ricciardi at Lincoln Learning Solutions LLC.

Orbit & Beyond is an educational exploration of our solar system, designed and developed for Lincoln Learning Solutions online curriculum using Unity.

This project was based on public domain information and images sourced from NASA, ESA, Wikipedia and the HYG Star Catalog (all of the stars are based on their actual positions and intensities/colors). I designed and developed a full-scale model of our solar system that can be traversed via a very simplified and stylized orbital dynamics concept. The player’s ship orbits celestial bodies and sling shots between them by reaching escape velocity. In most space games and science fiction ships travel in straight lines through a static and non-relativistic universe. In Orbit and Beyond planets and moons are in motion based on their real-world speed. The ship travels at near-light-speed and we attempted to simulate the theoretical visual effects of space and time dilation.

Technical challenges in this project included:
– wrestling with floating point accuracy at astronomical scales.
– camera tools for artist to create unique angles at each body
– camera transitions and orbital mechanics using linear algebra
– an educator driven database system system for celestial info
– optimizing high fidelity graphics for low end devices and web (namely gen 1 Chromebooks and phones)

The game was programmed solely by myself, using Unity 2021, in C# and published for consumption on the web and android/ios tablets and phones. I assisted in the game’s design and created several effects, and levels (including planets, shaders, animations and transition effects). Principle artwork and general design led by CJ Kuehn, with Matt Casper and Sean Kennedy at Lincoln Learning Solutions.

Developed for Lincoln Learning Solutions, TrashTalk is an educational game about a couple of funky waste-management personnel who take out the trash in the big city while answering educational questions.

Trash Talk was the second Unity game produced at Lincoln Learning Solutions. It was my first opportunity to bring the full interactive digital media team into Unity, and I created tools for them to design levels, and started establishing a general architecture for our Unity games. After extensive research on the subject of Unity game architecture, I decided to use a scriptable object and event based system created by Ryan Hipple at Schell Games. This architecture leverages in-editor dependency injection, which allowed the team of artists to start participating in development.

This project deployed a number of technologies in Unity 2018:
– 2D Physics System, including joints, rigidbodies and collision
– Parallax background scrolling
– Custom tile-based level design tools
– Scriptable Object & Unity Event driven architecture (for modularity, dependency injection and in Editor dev collaboration)

The game was developed entirely by myself, using Unity 2019, in C# and published for consumption on the web and android/ios tablets and phones. I assisted in the game’s design and created several effects. All artwork and general design led by CJ Kuehn, with Matt Casper, William McCoy and Sean Kennedy.

Developed for Lincoln Learning Solutions in the later half of 2019, MotoCritters is an educational game about racing against dirt-bike riding critters while answering multiple choice question for points and power ups.

This project was a proof of concept for an initiative that I lead at LLS to switch our game development stack from HTML5 Canvas/Javascript to Unity so that we could fulyl leverage the artistic abilities of our interactive digital media team, expand compatibility with digital curriculum content and prepare for app publication. Technical challenges included building physics based racers and developing the foundations for a dynamic multiple choice questions and answers systems that would be used in follow up Unity games for Lincoln Empowered Curriculum.

The game was developed entirely by myself, using Unity 2019, in C# and published for consumption on the web and android/ios tablets and phones. I assisted in the game’s design and created several effects. All artwork and general design led by CJ Kuehn, with Matt Casper, William McCoy and Sean Kennedy.