Solo Space Combat Game
A singleplayer space combat game, designed and built alone from a standing start with no prior Unreal Engine or 3D tooling experience.
What it is
A singleplayer space combat game aiming for the feel of mid-Cold-War aerial combat transposed into space — think Freelancer, Starlancer, and Everspace as reference points, with Armored Core 6's mission-replay structure and Trepang2 / Need for Speed: Most Wanted's diegetic reality-break techniques as design influences for the narrative layer.
Flight model & combat
- Assisted Newtonian physics: flight assist authority degrades at high velocity, making inertial coasting an emergent, skill-rewarding technique rather than a scripted mechanic.
- Delta-v as the core resource the player manages, rather than an abstracted fuel bar.
- Subsystem damage, aspect-limited missiles that require earned firing geometry, and an EW/jamming system with a home-on-jam tradeoff.
- Enemy AI driven by PID controllers, layered into a green/veteran/ace skill hierarchy.
Systems architecture
The campaign layer separates static authored data (missions, ship loadouts) from mutable runtime state (which pilots are alive, which carriers exist, campaign progress), using Unreal's DataAsset/DataTable system for the former and GameInstance state for the latter. This is the same static-vs-mutable split that shows up in most real game and simulation architectures, and it's the piece I spent the most deliberate design time on.
What I learned building it
- Went from zero Unreal/Blender experience to implementing custom C++ Actor and Pawn classes, PID-controlled flight and AI systems, and a data-driven world state — in one summer.
- Applied a competitive-programming background (C++, algorithmic thinking) directly to game systems programming, which turned out to transfer far more than I expected going in.
- Practiced scope discipline: art assets and tooling complexity were deliberately deferred so the flight model and combat loop could be prototyped first.