I am a creatively driven Game Design student fascinated by the intersection of art and science and passionate about bringing my visions to life as games.
I'm in my fourth year of studying Game Design and Production at Abertay University, with a background and DipHE in Neuroscience from UCL.
Here you will find a collection of the games I have made or contributed to, from Game Jams, to University and Personal projects.
If you're interested in potentially collaborating, please don't hesitate to contact me at:
denis.iannoukos@yandex.com
Or LinkedIn
Time Flies Like Butter 2024
Time Flies Like Butter is the game I made for my Honours Project. The aim was to create a new gameplay mechanic of time-travel and produce a commercially viable mobile puzzle-platformer game that fuses it with the concepts of metamorphosis and the butterfly effect.
In doing so I am exploring a new time manipulation mechanic where the player can rewind into unexplored/void time, using the study of causation in metaphysics to enrich puzzle design, and exploring the butterfly effect as a narrative vehicle to provoke thoughts on the nature of time and elicit joy.
The video below contains subtitles with more info:
The table below, presents the main causation category of each level:
GitHub
Project Portfolio Download Game
Floating Soul 2023
Floating Soul is my first ever Virtual Reality game, made using Unity XR Toolkit. It explores the experience of dying and leaving ones body, based on reports of Near Death Experiences (NDEs).
I created this project using third-party 3D assets and Mixamo animations, but wrote the script myself, directed and recorded voice actors and implemented everything.
The game was designed to work as a tool to help people overcome Death Anxiety, but in the process of creating it, the power of virtual reality in story-telling by entering different bodies as a floating soul inspired me to lean into it as an art project.
In this project I learnt how to develop for virtual reality, scripting interactables, movement in VR, timing events, and implementing 3D animations
GitHub documentation
Rollio 2023
Rollio is a 2.5D golf-like platformer where the player controls an armadillo made of melon bread that can roll into a ball and launch like a golf ball, grow to move big obstacles, shrink to fit through small gaps to collect fruit and complete levels.
It's a vertical slice made by myself within a team of 8 students across Design, Art and Programming disciplines as a Professional Project for the client: Brace Yourself Games.
I have contributed as Team Coordinator, designing and developing the concept, core game loop, scripting gameplay mechanics, implementing cel-shading, art assets, animations and co-producing.
GitHub documentation
Chronicles of Ivy: Urumi Warrior 2022
Chronicles of Ivy is a first-person melee PC game prototype that explores a new mechanic of controlling the direction of attacks via gesture recognition of the movement of the mouse.
The player clicks and drags the mouse and the direction of movement then triggers a corresponding sword strike. The attack must be strategically directed to avoid hitting the enemies shields.
The prototype envisions telling the story of Ivy Valentine from Soul Callibur, before her invention of her iconic whip sword, when she first practiced wielding the traditional Indian Urumi whip-sword.
GitHub Design Document
AGIWYDRAUYASTCYMOS 2022
A Game In Which You Die Repeatedly And Use Your Accumulated Skeletons To Construct Your Means of Success.
Abbreviated to AGIWYDRAUYASTCYMOS, it is a 2D puzzle platformer made by myself and 3 programmers in Unity Engine, as part of a game jam with the theme: "A Game in which it is okay to fail".
I contributed by creating all animations and character art, developing the concept, designing and programming the mechanic of crafting a bicycle and helicopter out of skeletons.
The first prototype was made within 48h. Then, myself and one other member of the team have continued to work on it, adding more features and levels.
GitHub
Cartomancer 2022
Cartomancer is a card based roguelike, where you play as one of the four elements: fire, earth, air or water.
The player must collect tarot cards to use as spell casting agents to defeat the enemies and bosses of each element.
In this project I collaborated with artists and other designers as part of a team of 8 to deliver a vertical slice within a fixed time frame.
I helped to design and balance the card game, programmed the world map, character controller and level progression and created all the visual effects, lighting and post-processing.
GitHub documentation
Mite 2021
Mite is a puzzle platformer where the player can rewind time in two different ways, either rewinding just their surroundings, or rewinding themself too
The goal of the game is to collect the keys required to open doors that function as portals to progress through the levels
The game was scripting in Unreal Engine using Blueprints, and playtested on peers and friends.
itch documentation
Traction 2020
Traction is the first game I ever made. It's a unique 2D platformer for mobile, about a toy steam engine that can add train tracks ahead of itself while it moves.
The idea came from this scene in Wallace and Gromit: https://youtu.be/jrmZIgVoQw4
Using Unity Engine and C#, I made a prototype for PC first, then changed the controls to port it for Android.
I then playtested extensively in person and using Unity Analytics and iterated based on the results.
GitHub documentation