TowerClimb

Run, jump, and climb your way up Black Mountain Tower (Telstra Tower) to rescue your last artwork.

An original title solo developed by Ricky Vuckovic for a 48-hour game jam where the theme was “Canberra”.

Play TowerClimb for free in your browser at: https://rickyvuckovic.itch.io/towerclimb 

Ricky’s story

I made TowerClimb for the CanDev Canberra Games Game Jam, July 2024. The jam gave participants 48 hours of development time, which could be spread across one week, to create a game incorporating Canberra in some way.

I developed the game solo, using a small number of background tile assets either directly or as references while creational additional environment art.

This was the first 2D platformer I had ever made in Unity, aside from a small experiment a month earlier as part of a YouTube tutorial I watched. I was playing a lot of Celeste at the time, so when the game jam was announced I really wanted to make something similar. Instead of a double jump or dash move, I wanted to make a leap and grab mechanic, reaching back into my love of games like Flashback on the Amiga.

Although this is a 2D game, I created the main character in 3D and then animated them in iClone for the player’s actions, exporting animation frames to trace and colour in Aseprite. I also used the 3D character to pose the intro sequence shots.

I composed an adaptive soundtrack for the game which changes as you progress through the level. I also wrote a lightweight adaptive music system directly into Unity to play this through.

The game is set on Black Mountain Tower / Telstra Tower, and I took photos of the area for texture and palette reference material, plus I also recorded foley sounds onsite of birds chirping and my footsteps on various surfaces.