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About:

GUTS is an ultra-violent and unique fighting game where players must dismember their opponents by chopping off arms and legs. Even while missing a limb or two, the brawl continues until one fighter emerges victorious.

Set in the year 2067, GUTS is a deadly reality TV show that entertains the citizens of a dystopian Earth. Players compete in bloody arenas to earn fame and fortune as the world’s next fighting idol. To become the best, players must master special combination moves, adapt to move sets that change depending on how many limbs they still have left, time their severing attacks, and evade their opponent’s deadly blades.

Studio: Flux Game Studio.

Engine: Unity3D.

Platforms: PC.

Launch day: Nov 15, 2017.

Worked on from: Oct, 2016 – Oct, 2018.

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Key Features:

• Unique dismemberment mechanics – fight with what you’ve got.
• Fun gameplay for every player – even if you have no skill at all.
• 9 unique and hilarious characters with rich background stories.
• 8+ hours of single-player gameplay to unlock all 18 endings – 2 per character.
• Online gameplay – casual and ranked.
• Esports-focused approach with tournaments and prizes.
• An original soundtrack that dynamically adapts to the limbs left in a match.
• Several fun party game modes.

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My Role:

• Created most of the visual shaders using the visual node-based plugin ShaderForge.
• Created particle VFX.
• Expanded and documented parts of the character implementation pipeline.
• Developed and implemented the Substance pipeline.
• Supported lighting development.
• Assisted with UI implementation.
• Contributed to game optimization efforts.
• Developed custom tools, including a simple blend shape manager for character facial expressions during fights and a character skin color customization tool with support for attachable objects.

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Some Work Examples:

UI Examples

The user interface was implemented using the NGUI plugin for Unity. One of the project’s main challenges was that many UI elements existed within a 3D space, allowing them to be positioned directly in the game world rather than being restricted to traditional screen-space layouts. To support this workflow, I worked on custom UI shaders and visual effects that integrated with the game’s overall visual style.

For the gameplay HUD, the game featured miniature puppet representations of each fighter. Rather than creating a unique UI implementation for every character, I developed a modular system that dynamically assembled the puppet components through code. This allowed the same UI framework to support both teams while significantly reducing implementation and maintenance costs.

These puppets also served as the game’s health system visualization. As characters lost limbs during combat, the puppet reflected their current state. To keep the system scalable, all character puppets shared a single animation set, which required strict guidelines for limb placement, proportions, and atlas construction when creating new character variants.

Level Environment Example:

I worked closely with the outsourcing team to integrate environment assets and ensure they met both artistic and technical requirements. Bringing these levels into the engine was particularly challenging due to the large number of animated elements, moving parts, and environmental assets. To maintain performance targets, I also contributed to optimization efforts across the environment while preserving the intended visual quality.

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Links:

• Steam: http://store.steampowered.com/app/682810/GUTS/
• GameJolt: https://gamejolt.com/games/GUTS/283377