THRENODY is a roguelite action‑adventure featuring procedurally generated levels, Paper Mario like graphics and wand‑based combat controlled with the mouse. Created for the GMTK Game Jam 2025 and ranked top 3% for art and top 7% for audio.
Along with the audio implementation, music and sound design, I prototyped the wand mechanic and then Jose Striedinger polished the feature and improved on the visuals.
Unity and FMOD were used for this project.
Music Manager
A music manager was created to react to game events which would contribute to a variable called Intensity. Over time the intensity lowers while the intensity increases if the player or enemy is damaged.
On the music event in FMOD there is a parameter called Intensity which controls the different layers of music; changing the volume, EQ and reverb.
Wand implementation
The video above shows the wand in game and the FMOD event. A parameter called Speed is what changes the pitch and volume of the 2 layers of looping sound.
This parameter is then updated on the game object where FMOD emitter is being played. This game object follows the mouse cursor which allows for panning.
To calculate the speed variable, first the distance is calculated using the Unity’s Vector3 Distance function which takes in the current and previous vector position of the line.
Dividing the distance by delta time we get the current speed. The event drawSpeed is then invoked with the variable speed for any scripts listening to this event.
