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Runner view, Juggernaut view and Profile view
Juggernaut
The team behind Juggernaut

Juggernaut Race

Starting point

EA provided us with an innovative game challenge to concept a new game to the competitive and oversaturated mobile game market.

Research

Each team studied the material provided by EA and discussed with people in our close circles who enjoyed and didn't enjoy mobile games about their reasoning. Our research provided material for fruitful discussion within the group and proved that some people still preferred board or pc games over the mobile experience.

The problem we noticed is that when a game is targeted for a totally new audience, many core mobile gamers are lost. We concluded that one solution is to make a new unique game that targets the casual mobile gamers. But when the idea is unique, it will bring a new audience into mobile gaming by word of mouth, even though the game wouldn’t be targeted directly for them.

Based on this we decided to develop a new innovative game concept that targets the core mobile gamers.

Design process

We started by discussing our game habits and why some people choose not to play mobile games. Each team member listed their game preferences and the discussion naturally went from the winning concept criteria to what makes a game meaningful.

We listed every game genres that we have found from the most bizarre ones to the basic ones. Then we started listing which of them can be found already from markets. After that we became a bit frustrated. We did find that every game concept already exists in markets. It meant that we have to make a new genre.

We started to brainstorm how to combine genres to make a new innovative one. By the end of day one, we had four different ideas that we started discussing and developing on Saturday morning. After some discussion and with the help of mentors we settled on redeveloping kids game called ‘Statues’ (‘Peili’ in Finnish) and the Juggernaut. In many games, like Halo and many G-mod games, there are gametypes where one player is overpowered and all the others join forces to beat him/her. When someone manages to beat the Juggernaut, they switch places with the Juggernaut and the game keeps going. While the original Juggernaut concepts had a lot of flaws we saw potential in it.

Our team started prototyping the idea with origamis made out of post-it notes and lanes made of graph paper. Through prototyping, we iterate the way of play, the interaction and how to communicate information with players. We managed to test three rounds with 6 new players. Base on the feedback, we improve our game concept and shapen the ideas. It proved to be a fun and addictive activity and we realized Juggernaut had a good core- and metagame.

Gameplay

The goal of the game is to be the first runner to cross the finish line, while one of the players, the Juggernaut, will try to kill other players. If a runner dies, the runner and the Juggernaut swaps roles!

Core

In each game, there are five players, called runners, competing for the first place.

Our core game mode is called 100-kilometer dash. In the beginning of the game, one randomly chosen player is turned into a Juggernaut. Juggernaut's object is to disrupt runners' advance to the finish line by dropping obstacles and switching rules (like gravity, runner controls etc.)

When Juggernaut manages to kill a runner, they switch places, runner becomes Juggernaut, and the previous Juggernaut becomes a new runner. Every time runner respawns after being a juggernaut, they will get movement speed bonus to catch others. This will keep the game interesting and balanced and also adds depth to strategy.

While runners see everything from the 3rd person view + minimap, Juggernaut has top-to-down view on the players.

We also have other game mode called "Into the distance", which doesn't have a finish line, but a 3-minute timer and the goal is to get as far as possible before time runs out.

Future development ideas

Juggernaut’s concept idea is tested with a paper board game version. According to our volunteer testers, the concept was addictive and exciting. But we don’t have a mobile prototype yet, only the slow-paced paper version. That’s why we haven’t been able to test fast-paced endless runner -mechanics, only. Next step could be to build a mobile prototype and start having fun with run mechanics.