A university group project developed in Unreal Engine that combines virtual reality with physical flight simulation hardware. Players pilot a spacecraft using a flight yoke and throttle, mine asteroids for resources, and upgrade their ship while racing against a time limit.

My Contributions

My primary responsibility was the design and implementation of the game's user interface. Rather than relying solely on traditional VR overlays, I created a mixture of world-space cockpit displays and interactive menus that fit naturally within the game's sci-fi setting.

The largest piece of work was the upgrade system, which allows players to spend collected resources on improving ship statistics. This included implementing the interface, displaying upgrade costs and levels, and integrating it with the underlying gameplay systems. As the flight controls were not compatible with Unreal Engine's built-in menu navigation, I also worked on a custom navigation system that allowed the menus to be operated entirely from the physical hardware.

I also developed several supporting interfaces, including:

• Upgrade menu
• Controls reference screen
• Game over screen
• Countdown timer
• Ship status displays for thrust, speed and reverse mode
• Weapon status indicators
• Resource counter integrated into the cockpit

Alongside the UI work, I contributed to gameplay programming and C++ systems where needed, helping connect the interfaces to the ship logic and game state.

Technical Highlights

• Unreal Engine 5
• C++ and Blueprints
• VR development for Meta Quest
• World-space UMG interfaces
• Physical flight yoke and throttle integration
• Custom controller-driven menu navigation

Outcome

The finished project delivers an immersive VR space mining experience where physical controls map directly to the virtual cockpit, creating a natural interaction model for piloting and mining. User testing informed several refinements to the interface layout, improving visibility and usability while maintaining immersion.