🩸 Submission – Unreal Engine 5 Horror Experience

This project is a fully immersive, psychological horror experience built entirely inside Unreal Engine 5—without the use of any external assets, tools, scripts, or software. Every aspect of the game—lighting, sound, AI, mechanics, UI, animations, and visual effects—was created using only what UE5 provides out of the box.

The game drops the player into a forgotten place where something terrible happened. There's no map. No guidance. Only a flashlight, a flickering power grid, and the creeping sensation that something is watching. From the moment the first door creaks open, the atmosphere grips the player with tension and dread.

🕹️ Core Gameplay

The player explores an abandoned structure surrounded by darkness. With no weapons and limited visibility, they must use stealth, clues, and audio to survive the entity hunting them. The gameplay relies heavily on slow, methodical pacing and spatial awareness, enhanced by reactive lighting and binaural sound design—all created natively within Unreal.

Mechanics:

• Dynamic Flashlight System: Fully Blueprinted. Battery drains over time. Light flickers randomly, responding to ambient tension values controlled by proximity to scripted scares.

• Entity AI: The entity tracks the player using sound, line of sight, and environmental triggers (footsteps, door creaks, and electrical surges). Built using Behavior Trees and AI Perception in Blueprint.

• Sanity Mechanic: The longer the player stays in darkness, the more distorted the visuals become—implemented using post-process volumes that dynamically react to light exposure and scripted tension zones.

• Randomized Haunting Events: Ambient hauntings (whispers, footsteps, shadow figures) are triggered using UE5’s level sequences and Blueprint timelines.

• Locked Door Puzzle System: A complete modular system using Blueprint interfaces. Players must find keys, fuse boxes, or symbols to unlock new sections.

• Sound Traps: Some environments contain objects that can be knocked over, alerting the entity. These are physics actors with sound triggers tied to enemy AI behavior.

🧱 Level & Environment Design

All environments were sculpted directly inside Unreal using the landscape and mesh tools. No imports. Walls, furniture, and floors are made with starter meshes and heavily modified using in-engine tools like decals, material layering, and lighting.

• Nanite Meshes: Optimized lighting and dense scenes using Nanite for ultra-detailed walls and props.

• Lumen Lighting: Dynamic lighting changes as the player moves, shadows reacting in real time, essential to the fear factor.

• Foliage & Debris: Environmental storytelling through scattered objects, broken furniture, and flickering signs—all created using static mesh combinations and UE’s foliage tools.

🔊 Sound & Atmosphere

All sounds were sourced from Unreal’s built-in starter content and modified with in-engine effects.

• Sound Design: Layered Blueprint-driven sound cues trigger based on proximity, time, and tension level.

• Spatial Audio: The player hears things they can’t see—distant footsteps, dragging chains, whispered voices—using UE5’s built-in spatial sound system.

• Music System: Ambient soundtrack builds dynamically using audio triggers tied to player actions and game state.

• Silence as a Tool: In many moments, silence is the scariest sound. Controlled by Blueprint logic, audio is sometimes suppressed to heighten suspense before a major event.

🧠 AI & Behavior

The entity isn't just a monster. It's a presence. The AI has multiple states: patrol, stalk, chase, and retreat.

• Patrol Mode: Roams halls based on randomized spline paths. Uses perception stimuli to respond to sounds and motion.

• Stalk Mode: Will quietly follow the player if nearby but out of sight, occasionally triggering off-camera events (lights flickering, doors closing).

• Chase Mode: Full sprint toward the player with scream effects and a cinematic camera shake.

• Retreat Mode: Disappears briefly after certain scripted scenes to increase player false security.

All AI logic was created in Blueprints using behavior trees, blackboard systems, and dynamic navmesh.

📺 UI & Interaction

• Minimal UI: Flashlight battery, sanity bar, and item prompts are the only elements shown—made in UMG with animated effects.

• Inventory System: Player can collect keys, notes, and fuse parts. Inventory is managed through a custom widget-based UI with drag/drop logic.

• Readables & Lore: Players find documents scattered throughout the world with hand-typed notes giving context to the horror. These are implemented using Blueprint text display systems.

• Menus: A fully in-engine pause screen, settings menu, and start screen with camera animation—all made in UMG and Blueprint.

🎬 Cinematic Moments

To break up gameplay, several tension peaks are handled with short, in-engine cinematics:

• Hallucination Sequences: Flashbacks to what happened in the building. These are done with cinematic cameras and color grading via post-process volumes.

• Chase Sequences: Scripted sections where the player must flee through collapsing environments.

• Endgame Twist: Player finally unlocks the truth—but not without cost. Uses level streaming and fade transitions to simulate scene changes without loading.

⚙️ Optimization

• Entire game is under 1GB, using only starter content and optimized Blueprints.

• Levels are streamed in chunks to allow seamless transitions and reduce performance load.

• Post-process effects are dynamic and toggleable, so they adapt to performance conditions.

💀 Final Thoughts

This horror game proves that a terrifying, immersive experience can be built using only Unreal Engine 5. From ambient lighting to enemy logic, every element was handcrafted with what UE5 offers by default. The process challenged creativity, problem-solving, and attention to atmosphere over spectacle.

The result is a horror experience that doesn’t just scare with visuals or volume—but with the slow, creeping dread of being truly alone… with something behind you.