Gear Runner is a virtual reality game that our team of five developed in less than 48 hours at the Seattle VR Hackathon 5 in April 2017. The Hackathon was the largest Seattle Virtual Reality Hackathon to date.
Gear Runner was awarded "Best of Show" by the judges (there was no "Community Choice" award during this event).
My partner, Jesse Comb, and I are continuing development of Gear Runner. An alpha release will be playable at the first-ever Seattle Virtual Reality Arcade, Portal VR.
The player is put into a giant-armored-mech, and able to run through a futuristic-desert-cityscape while attempting to dodge and kill enemy drones. The player's current score is presented in the mech's cockpit and is calculated based on distance traveled and total kills.
Gear Runner takes advantage of VirZoom, an exercise bike built specifically for virtual reality, by receiving the player's pedaling speed via Bluetooth and matching it to the velocity of the in-game mech.
The project was built using with Unity 5.6, C#, and SteamVR.
Our team consisted of three software developers (including myself), and two 3D artists.
My contributions to the project were player movement, game design, head-lean strafe mechanics, audio, controller mechanics, drone AI, endless road, and version control management.
Please stay posted for the Gear Runner's Grand Opening at Portal VR, Seattle's first virtual reality arcade!
While you wait, here is a video of us testing the game at Portal VR: