Carson Moon | Linn Falls

Linn Falls is a relaxing puzzle game that is designed to get more complicated as you go through the levels. With mechanics like tapping (to break rocks and flip levers) and dragging (to move boulders and rotate the camera), there is no shortage of unique interactions to explore.

There are two worlds with ten levels each, an endless mode, and a nighttime mode!

This was the first project that I produced, and I could not be more proud of the end result!

Some of the core aspects that we decided on going into production was the orthographic camera, cozy atmosphere, relatively easy puzzles, and low fidelity graphics. I set these pillars up to align everyones vision throughout the project.

At the very core of Linn Falls is water. The entire premise of the game is to find a way to get the water flowing downward off the screen. That being so, the water system took up the most of my time during the development period. The inital water system went though numerous small changes to allow it to update as performant and dynamic as possible. I ended up with a system that uses queues that water blocks can add themselves to for an update next cycle. Three queues are used, one for just receiving an update, one for getting polluted, and one for destroying. Once I had laid the groundwork with these queues, the water was able to dynamically update through a level.

Water is split up into "Source" blocks and "Water" blocks. Source blocks act as the origin point of a levels water flow. Usually placed above the screen to give the illusion of the water flowing from the previous level, Source blocks hold the queues and are used to check if pollution has corrupted too much of a level. This video showcases the water system in action alongside the pipe mechanic.

I loved developing the water system because it was something I had never done before. About a year and a half later, I went back and improved a lot of the systems with the goal of eventually improving the visuals of Linn Falls. This water is not a part of the mobile game, however it showcases efforts to create something that updates "smoother" than the tick updates of the previous water system. This new water system also uses object-pooling for better return on investment with each water block and a HashSet to determine which locations are occupied which speeds up searches considerably.

Spawning a new water block


// Spawns a new groundwater block at location. Adds the block to the spawn queue.
private void SpawnGroundwaterBlock(Vector3 offset){
	// Get location and spawn block.
	Vector3 spawnLocation = transform.position + offset;

	GameObject temp = Instantiate(groundwaterBlock, spawnLocation, SpawnDirection(spawnLocation));
	Water tempWater = temp.GetComponent<Water>();

	// Name the block.
	temp.transform.name = "Groundwater  " + Source.instance.GetNameNumber();

	// Child the block.
	temp.transform.parent = Source.instance.transform;

	// Pollution status
	if(isPolluted)
		Source.instance.AddToQueue(tempWater, 2);

	// Assign value to new block.
	tempWater.SetValue();

	// Add the block to the spawn queue.
	Source.instance.AddToQueue(tempWater, 0);
}

Spawn queue Update


// Spawning
private void SpawnQueue(){
	// Go through spawn queue and call spawn function for Water.
	int qCount = spawnQueue.Count;
	//print(qCount); 

	while(qCount > 0){
		spawnQueue.Dequeue().SpawnCheck();

		qCount--;
	}

	spawnCooldown = spawnBuffer;
}