Videozax

Hello! I'm Zachary (Zax) Nathanson, and I love developing games! I'm currently a sophomore at Champlain College for Game Design. I specialize in System and Mechanic design. My engine of choice is Unity, but I've worked significantly in Unreal Engine as well.

I really enjoy making smaller games, so I've been mostly working in my free time on Game Jams,  but I'm cooking up something bigger right now.

Veni Vidi Vroom - Arena Combat With a Car! - Available to play

Veni Vidi Vroom is an Arena Combat game made for the 2025 Big Mode Game Jam. The game focuses on constantly keeping the player in the action, and making the player feel powerful. I made this with a team of 5, wherein I did design and implementation. 

Features

• Satisfying Movement System: I spent a significant portion of this Jam creating and tuning the movement system. One trick I pulled is that their is actually secret slight auto aim on the car's dash, allowing players to hit their targets more easily, without realizing it's not because of their own doing.
• Upgrades: Between each round the player can use their points they accrued to buy upgrades for their car. This adds some replay ability to the game, and keeps the players feeling powerful.
• Engaging "Moments": Our team decided early on that the game should have one time memorable moments that happens in our game. We ended up adding a intro cutscene, joke boss, and end credits, as well as many other small ones throughout.

Super Gimbal- Puzzle Platformer - Available to play 

Super Gimbal is a puzzle platformer  Snerds and I made for the 2024 GMTK game jam. You play as the titular Gimbal trying to escape the computer program he is stuck in. Instead of controlling the game like a normal platformer, instead Gimble moves on his own and you must guide him by controlling the box he is stuck in. We got 6th place in the jam with this game, and we are extremely proud of it!

Features

• 8 Puzzles: The game features 8 unique puzzles each requiring a different solution from the player.  Each puzzle also has hidden visual secrets to find, adding even more memorability to each puzzle.
• Special Effects: Using unity's particle system, Do-Tween, as well as the Unity shadergraph, we were able to add professional looking and engaging visuals, on top of our pixel art.  This includes a moving background, effects when clicking,  and game juice such as screen shake and squash and stretch.

More The Merrier Demo - Horde Shmup - Available to play 

In More the Merrier you control an ever growing party of adventures trying to save their world from destruction. I made this in the summer of 2024. This version is a demo I sent out to people to gather playtesting feedback. I'm currently not working on this project, but I'm very fond of it and I plan on coming back to it one day.

Features

• 12 Characters: The demo features 12 unique characters that each have different attacks and abilities that make choosing which ones to bring into battle an interesting strategic choice, as well as keeping every new unlock exciting for the player.
• 7 Levels: The game has 7 unique levels, each with their own boss, keeping each on memorable. 
• Save System: The demo features an automatic save system that will remember the player's unlocks when closing the game.
• Pixel Art: The game is fully made with pixel art done myself, further enhanced with in game effects and animations.