Behind the Scenes of Sunderfolk: UI, Engineering, and Tech Art in Unity

If you’ve played Sunderfolk, you’ve probably noticed how polished and unique it feels. Maybe you’ve even wondered how much thought went into every little detail.

Sunderfolk is a Unity tactical RPG developed by Dreamhaven. It features turn-based battles, cooperative gameplay, and a richly stylized underground world. Our team at Devoted Studios supported the project by working on core gameplay systems, UI, animation, shaders, and performance optimization.

We’re excited to share a full breakdown of the work our team contributed to Sunderfolk!

Project Overview

Tech Art – Shaders, VFX & World Visual Fidelity

Creating the visual tone of Sunderfolk meant balancing art direction with performance. We worked closely with the art team to build shaders and visual tools that would support the game’s painterly style, magical elements, and atmospheric lighting.

Custom Shader Framework

Sunderfolk has a painted, atmospheric look that feels different from most games. To help achieve that, we co-developed a custom stylized shader framework using Unity’s Shader Graph and HLSL.

Here’s what we built:

• Rim lighting and gradient mapping to add visual depth to characters and props
• Stylized water shaders with depth blending, foam, and reflections
• Depth-based fog for layering inside caves
• Edge outlining using SDF to help characters stand out in gameplay
• Glow shaders for crystals with animated emission and subtle distortion
• Tree leaf shaders that respond to wind using world-space vectors

The shader system was designed with performance in mind and exposed key artistic parameters for real-time tweaking by the art team.

Dynamic Lighting Effects

We also built lightweight tools for in-game effects:

• Emissive material masking on spells and crystals
• GPU-friendly bloom and sparkle overlays for magic effects
• Volumetric light shafts used around the Heart Tree crystal, driven by vertex alpha
• Water rendering optimized for GPU performance

These effects helped make the world feel more dynamic and alive, while keeping everything running efficiently.

Engineering – NPCs, AI & Pathfinding

Creating a world that feels alive takes more than just visuals. It also requires smart systems behind the scenes. We supported this by engineering flexible AI systems and tactical gameplay logic that worked well with Unity’s performance goals.

Modular NPC System

Our team built a component-based NPC system in Unity that powered ambient characters and interactive quest givers.
The features included:

• State-driven behavior trees (Idle, Patrol, Interact, Flee)
• Reusable animation blueprints with blend tree overrides
• Event hooks for dialogue and cutscene triggers
• Simple proximity AI using Unity Physics and NavMeshAgents

Grid-Based Pathfinding & Tactical AI

Tactical combat is at the core of Sunderfolk, so we knew these systems had to feel sharp, fair, and responsive. Every move, spell, and enemy action needed to make sense in a world built on strategy and positioning.
We supported the making of a custom battle HUD for clarity during tactical encounters:

• Custom hex-grid navigation integrated with Unity’s ECS
• Line of sight and elevation-based targeting rules
• Skill prediction previews (telegraphs, area highlights)
• Turn-based AI logic with behavior tuning per enemy type

Performance profiling ensured these systems worked seamlessly in local co-op mode with multiple players.

UI/UX – Multiplayer, Devices, and Battle Readability

To help players stay engaged and informed during combat, we supported the creation of clear and readable UI systems. Our work focused on making the tactical interface intuitive, responsive, and optimized for performance.

Companion Device Integration

To support Sunderfolk’s couch co-op experience, we supported and helped with optimization on a companion UI system that allows mobile devices to act as player inputs.
Key elements included:

• Device pairing via local network discovery
• Dynamic class selection and sync (Bard, Berserker, Arcanist, Rogue)
• Spell management and card-based turn input
• Responsive layout for both portrait and landscape modes

Everything was built using Unity’s UI Toolkit. That gave us flexibility with styling and animation while keeping the interface lightweight and responsive.

Tactical Combat UI

We supported the making of a custom battle HUD for clarity during tactical encounters.

• Hex highlight shaders with effect-based cues (danger, spell zones)
• Dynamic card display showing available actions with hover previews
• Fate draw panel with animated reveals for attack modifiers
• Real-time health, mana, and status effect displays

All UI was built using Unity’s UI Toolkit for performance and skinning flexibility.

Animation – Trees, Emotes & Cinematics

Smooth, believable movement helps characters feel more alive. We worked on the animation systems to ensure consistent, expressive motion across gameplay and cutscenes.

Blend Trees, Shared Graphs, and Cutscene Integration

We worked on the animation pipeline using Unity’s Mecanim system. Our goal was to make character movement and expressions look smooth and natural.
Our work included:

• Complex blend trees to support 8-direction movement
• Class-specific idle and spellcast animations
• Facial expression support using blendshape drivers
• Integration with Unity Timeline for cutscenes, scripted events, and idle emotes

We also helped build a shared animation graph for all bipedal characters, saving significant memory and rigging overhead.

Tools and Optimization

Behind every smooth game experience is a lot of behind-the-scenes problem-solving. We built tools to help the team test, fix, and improve the game’s performance across different platforms.

Streamlining the Build and Performance

Behind the visual polish and responsive gameplay, we built tools to help the team test, improve, and ship Sunderfolk smoothly across platforms. Performance and efficiency were key goals.

To support the porting and multi-platform optimization, we:

• Created batching tools for LOD generation and lightmap baking
• Implemented shader keyword stripping to reduce build size
• Completed shader optimization
• Profiled GPU/CPU spikes in high-density environments
• Built internal debugging tools for AI, NavMesh links, and event tracking

These systems helped make development faster and more efficient across all stages of the project. This kind of work fits into shader optimization Unity and supports Unity tactical RPG development best practices.

That’s a Wrap!

Our work on Sunderfolk focused on building systems that supported visuals, gameplay, and performance. From UI and animation to shaders and pathfinding, our goal was to make tools that helped the team move faster without giving up quality.

Want to check it out? Visit → https://www.dreamhaven.com/sunderfolk/announcing-sunderfolk