❋ Project Description
Cards of Heart is a narrative-focused cozy digital card game mixed with a fantasy top-down RPG about a young woman’s daily mental health struggles against her inner Shadows.
Amalia is a young woman living in a small fantasy town plagued by Shadows creeping into all facets of her life, but when a wisp called Ljos gives her the ability to generate cards of light that can push them back, she must use this power to heal from the pain of her past.
By creating cards of light to confront Shadows and discover insights in Amalia’s memory, the player will experience the heartache and hope that are part of the difficult process of encountering and overcoming mental health challenges while exploring concepts like self-acceptance, resilience, and the importance of social connections.
❋ Contributions
Before I worked as the Gameplay Engineer, I was the Graphics Engineer for this game, so I also participated in some of the shaders/effects. Here are some aspects I contributed to this game:
- Card implementation: Architected a modular card system by decomposing card behavior into reusable trigger-condition-action modules utilizing polymorphism, supporting diverse mechanics such as damage over time, status effects, and stackable modifiers. Enabled seamless card logic expansion to accommodate evolving mechanics.
- Card combat system: Developed an extensible card combat system akin to Hearthstone while collaborating closely with the design team. Implemented the counter turn mechanics, allowing players to strategically interrupt enemy actions using specialized counter cards.
- Custom Editor: Built a custom card in-editor tool to enhance development efficiency, enabling designers to visually manage and edit card Scriptable Objects with real-time updates during gameplay.
- Shader Graph and Postprocessing: Integrated visual effects using shader graphs and postprocessing techniques, delivering effects such as wind, fog, fade transitions, outline highlights, and distortion.
❋ Game Showcase
Steam Page
Game Trailer