Before moving on to perhaps more technical documentation, it's important to put the prototype into context. Initially, the concept revolved around death diving, a big jump with super-stylish tricks and a false-flat finish in the water.

With initial trials in third-person slingshot mode, the stakes for the figures were set on the time needed to complete them in the air before entering the water. Another part of the game involved aiming to fall into the water.

I had deliberately removed the rotation controls from the player, so as to be able to offer him touch sequences that would trigger the rotations, and guarantee something satisfying in the air, rather than letting him do just anything.

Two important points emerged from these tests. Firstly, the momentum was broken very quickly after a dive, and I couldn't find an elegant way of keeping it after a successful jump. Secondly, 100% of the people who tested this first version asked to control the rotations... that really got me thinking.

On the initiative of my colleague Luc, who programs the game, we set off again to explore rotation controls. After two days of rotating a cube in a scene, and many hours on Rocket League, we decided to fire the roll because it was unmanageable. This was followed by several weeks of testing and working on speeds, controls, poses and a whole series of small adjustments to come up with something I liked. After getting lost in the complexities of platforming, which deviated too quickly into Parkour, we went back to a square of gymnastics floor to refocus on flat ground movements, jumps and rotations in the air.

So we've moved away from diving, but it doesn't matter, because what counts right now is finding an elegant system of movement and rotation in the air, as well as a way to score. These two essential elements can be found in diving, gymnastics, tricking, trampolining and, more generally, the world of acrobatics, so they need to be super-solid if you want to build a game around them.

I've got lots of things to improve and test, but there's already enough here to test the controls a bit.

To be continued;)