Overview

Neon Dread is a co-op roguelike shooter released on Meta Horizon Worlds. Set within a dark, neon-lit cyberpunk tower, players fight through procedurally generated floors, clearing rooms of enemies and progressing higher through the tower.

The project was developed within the constraints of the Horizon Worlds platform, requiring custom approaches to several core systems and extensive investigation into the capabilities and limitations of the engine.

You can check out Neon Dread over on Horizon Worlds! (Note: this game was designed to be played in portrait mode)

My Role

I was the Lead Developer on this project. I led development from the beginning of production through release over approximately five months. Responsible for the game’s technical direction and architecture while contributing across most areas of development. I also mentored the development team, established coding standards and workflows, and performed extensive research on the Horizon Worlds engine.

My Contributions

• Designed and implemented the game’s procedural dungeon generation system.
• Designed and implemented the core enemy AI.
• Developed a robust enemy spawning system with multiple fail-safes to account for unpredictable behaviour and instability within the Horizon Worlds engine.
• Designed and implemented a custom projectile architecture to work within Horizon Worlds strict entity and execution limitations.
• Adapted and redesigned game systems when the original designs were incompatible with Horizon Worlds’ technical constraints.
• Designed and implemented the game’s overhead player UI.
• Established the project’s technical direction, architecture, and coding standards.
• Established development practices and workflows to maintain consistency across the development team.
• Mentored other developers throughout production and shared knowledge of the Horizon Worlds platform and its development constraints.
• Provided ongoing technical support and guidance to developers when implementing new systems or resolving technical issues.
• Investigated and resolved bugs and platform-specific issues throughout development.
• Conducted regular playtesting and QA across the game.
• Researched the Horizon Worlds platform and its capabilities extensively to inform technical decisions and prepare the project for release.
• Implemented feedback provided directly by Meta during development.
• Communicated directly with Horizon Worlds staff when investigating and reporting platform bugs.
• Worked with the platform’s emerging portrait mode functionality, with Neon Dread being among the early games to utilise the feature.
• Made technical and design decisions throughout development to ensure the game remained viable within the platform’s performance and execution constraints.