Project Drift

SYNOPSIS

Project Drift is an endless, arcade-style drifting game in which players pilot a stylised car through an ever-winding, procedurally generated road. The core thrill comes from chaining graceful drifts around randomly placed pillars, racking up a score based on both angle and speed, while collecting tokens to unlock cosmetic rewards. Its minimalist aesthetic, dynamic world-space HUD, and tight risk-reward loop are designed to induce a “flow state” and keep players chasing just one more run.

Specs
- Team Size: 1
- Engine: Unreal Engine 5
- Language: Blueprint & C++
- Dev time: ~ 2.5 months
- Type: Portfolio Project
- Controls: Mouse & Keyboard

How to Play
- WASD: Move
- Spacebar: Handbrake
- Esc: Pause

This project was an ambitious undertaking for me, as it marked my first time building a game using C++ within Unreal Engine. Wanting to push myself beyond comfort zones, I deliberately chose to move beyond Blueprints and confront a rather steep,  learning curve of C++ especially with how this project had to utilise it. It was a challenging journey—filled with debugging, trial and error and design decisions that ultimately had to be made, in omitting some initial design wishes that I simply wasn't proficient or experienced enough with C++ to accomplish. But it was ultimately, an incredibly rewarding one that expanded both my technical and problem-solving skills.

A key part of this project was also exploring the role of using AI as an asset to game development. I experimented with using AI tools to see how and if it could be used to streamline certain workflows for a solo developer,  iterate faster, and seek clarity when encountering complex technical hurdles.

From a design standpoint, I set out to create a game that stood out visually and mechanically—a procedurally generated, style/speed-focused drift game with an expressive, stylised UI and a strong arcade feel. I wanted it to feel dynamic, rewarding, and visually crisp, without leaning on realism. This meant a lot of custom systems—like procedural road generation, token spawning, and dynamic scoring—all of which demanded rigorous testing and iteration to get right.

This project taught me an immense amount: from the intricacies of game state management, to a highly ambitious first step into C++.  It was a comprehensive, occasionally overwhelming experience—but it made my experience in game design more rich as well.


I have included the GDD for this project as a downloadable file as well.