Geist

Geist is a first-person 3D Stealth Action game with a focus on movement and freerunning. You play as a “geist”, a bounty hunter that utilizes magic powers granted to them by a bacteria, known as ecto, that makes its home inside their bone marrow. The closer a geist is to death, the more magic they are able to unleash. 

In an underground mine, an unknown criminal organization illegally harvests ecto, but their eyes can’t even see the purest forms of the bacteria.  As a geist, you could search these caves and find what the criminals could not, and use its power against them.

https://kevin-ray.itch.io/geist

This vertical slice was developed by Kevin Ray and designed by Kevin Ray & Rilee Horowitz with additional help by the following: Sammy Chuang, Winlyn Liu, Dayoon Lee, Carsen Decker, Colin Hernando, and Nethra Fernando

Geist was the capstone game I developed in class during my senior year of college. I partnered with Rilee Horowitz to design a vertical slice of a larger game so we may focus on refining the design of the game’s core mechanics. We wanted to recreate mechanics from AAA games that we love with fluid movement and stealth systems. Through the development of Geist, I focused on challenging myself with complex systems design and programming in the creation of stealth mechanics and how character powers interact with NPCs. Enemies are reactive. They will stop to talk to one another, investigate suspicious noises, patrol the map, retreat from danger, chase and corner the player, and alert fellow guards of enemy threats and magic. Geist achieves a state of emergent play as every player uses the game systems in their own way to overcome the challenges before them. Moreso, I achieved my own goals of completing programming challenges, properly documenting schedules, asset lists, and pitch sheets, and finally obtaining my bachelor’s degree in Game Design.

Interview at 32:36 | NYU Game Center Showcase 2021

Here I discuss with Charles Pratt and Greg Heffernan some of my inspirations for Geist along with additional gameplay footage showcasing the game.