Bullet: Post Mortem

What went right:

With the team spread out on different schedules we used web based technologies such as Pivotal Tracker, Google Wave, MSN, and even Team Fortress 2 to keep in touch, share ideas and get instant feedback.

Rapid pre-vis: Many of our ideas lived and died as scrawly 2d sketches, or as finger drawings on the circle table at 2am. This helped us to either pursue an idea further in Unity, add it to the Icebox for later, or dump the idea totally. Originally we had a more realistic environment that the bullet could explore in, but this proved too time consuming, which then lead us to the 3D 8Bit theme, created in layers in photoshop using our colour palette and created in Unity using our Qblock replica

The menu system was spawned in one of those 2am circle discussions, where we thought it would be cool to have an infinatly dropping menu. It ended up looking OK in the prototype so we ran with it.
Nic and Tyson did an amazing job coding the game, as what seemed like a never ending vomit of problems were eventually solved through many late nights

The final product has really given all of us a great sense of achievement, as the original pitch being "explode stuff & score big points" has still been the primary focus and we're glad it shows in the gameplay.

What went wrong:

Alot. You can find the details at
https://wave.google.com/wave/#restored:search:in%253Ainbox,restored:wave:googlewave.com!w%252BruXF0zufA

What we would do again and where to from now:

It was such an awesome experience that the learning process in making Bullet will help us in creating better games, whether it is to continue to improve the game we have or start with a new idea, and as far as next semester goes, we might be looking at big, better and more bad ass games before the end (and the course) is finished.

I think what we definitely will be doing again is trying to keep our time management consistent, I believe we did great for a team of three and we were able to reach deadlines fairly well. A well-oiled machine is better that a rusty one (O_o)

Progress Report 13/6/2010

Last week of the first semester! It has gone by so quickly, soon enough it'll be November and i'll be scrabbling to find a job (O_o). CGI environment and the Bullet game are the remaining assignment, and both will leave a sense of achievement after this week.
CGI priorities:
-texture houses
-lighting
-last refinements
-render.

Bullet Game priorities:
-create few more assets for temple level
-last bits of refinement.

Less talk, more pics this week.

Menu Funsies

So *sings* "IT'S THE FINAL COUNTDOWN!" to the end of the uni semester, and Bullet is looking tops, for Nic and Tyson, the priority is to do winter game-cleaning, codes are currently being dusted, the addition levels will eventually be polished and put in and all assets will be in the final build.

While that has been going on, my job was to complete the menu assets, HUD design and menu button designs.
The assets made for the menu are part of a fun shooting gallery type menu system, where the player is able to shoot the objects that are located inside the menu box for fun, or get straight into the game's levels or instructions by shooting the buttons. Because this is currently a game that is not going to be shipped, and only shows our abilities in creating a game, a few of the assets made are from other games, this is purely for the novelty of shooting recognizable characters.

Not too long now, check in to see how it goes.

I hate blogs that have no pretties, so here are the menu assets (some are separated through layers):

Week 12, one dozen.

Here is the week's pretties.
I haven't been doing any matte paintings recently due to other uni assignments being a priority, since next week is meant to be the final week on my personal work timeline, and my assignments are due two weeks after, if i find time to get more paintings done, they will be posted in a couple of weeks.
in the meantime, stay tuned to see how the game 'Bullet' progresses. Nic and Tyson's blogs are currently showing our work in progress.

Week 12:
-Character #5 turnaround: male
-C.o.W: 20 robot silhouettes

-Vehicle #8: 'wings'

Bullets become pretty, Nazi's take on graffiti and are more sensitive to bacteria

Why you ask? Because some good has come out of my seasonal flu. That is why. My next character design has been created with a few keywords in mind to build features to him.
Meanwhile Bullet is looking better every day, with assets for the Temple and Aquarium level completed, and placeholder levels done for both. The pixel generator Tyson had made shows a great example of how the assets destruct, and its easy to use while i was creating each one so i could see if they were looking alright and if adjustment was necessary.

Should probably do a couple a screen shots soon. come back at the end of the week ^_^

8bit Vomit (Bullet assets & Horse levels with enemy & hero)

Breaking News...

Theme for the Bullet game revealed! 3D pixels will now be the art style to the levels, containing blocky shattering objects and many 8bit 'splosions. Nic and Tyson have just about finished fixing the game code and we will be on our way to making the game go from ugly duckling to princess duckface before our presentation next wednesday. for a taste of whats to come, check out http://kyucon.com/qblock/ to see what we have similar in mind.

Apart from that, i'll also be helping out Cameron and Kylie from the 'Islands' team, as they've asked for some more intricate level concepts.

And if you are wondering what this week's personal work will be, you've yet again come to the right place:
Week 8
-Character concept #3: 'Creature'
-Vehicle #4: 'Animal influence'
-Matte Painting #4: 'War'
-Challenge of the Week: 20 battlesuit variations (male or female)

.serutxeT, sleveL dna suneM

This morning i whipped up the demo textures for the two breakable items we will be using for our demo level. A vase and a bunny will be used to show the bullet impact effects with shattering pieces of glass as well as gibby goodness. Tyson has been working on the demo level aesthetics, while Nic has been refining the gameplay, and i will be continuing to develop concepts for our planned destructable papercraft menus, future levels for the full game and will be on call to assist Tyson and Nic up until the deadline.


Pretties Time!

No pics....atm.

So far there has been no criticism by Nic or Tyson. This is good. I've now been given the task of just continuing to experiment the designs of menus, mascots etc. Be a little crazy, Be a little stoopid.

Hopefully paintings and designs up by this arvo. Stay tuned, stay frosty.

Replay

An example of a replay after each run. We were thinking of having the replay face the bullet, so that the player can observe what was hit and how many points were gained. Very much like the Burnout crash challenge replays.

sorry bout the gore, i couldn't think of anything to draw at the time besides an urn and a bonsai plant.

Meet the Breakables

a rough idea of what kind of theme we might be going for. This is some of the stuff i thought would be breakable options (besides the the cheeky bullet itself). These are just an examply of stuff found in, say, a kitchen level. Same applies to bathroom, bedroom, garden/outside area etc.

Just a thought...perhaps enemy bullets that fly the opposite direction and detuct point if you hit them?....hmmm, something to ponder about.

DAS ASS (ooh, you touch my tra la la...)

Prototyping! Glad to be making a prototype game of something I'm interested in. Working with Tyson and Nic on this one, already have ideas on themes, menus and game play. Concepting tomorrow onwards. Gonna be a good one.

BRAIN DUMP!
starting sequence: 3, 2, 1, GO! gun animation recoil (just clears clipping camera)
OR 'Bond Vision'....looking through the barrel for start animation.

Toki Doki/Kid Robot theme (bright colours, chibi with comedy)
Clay modelling texture.

Unity package 'Detonator'
picture frames fall off wall (bonus points)
Epic Reply (burnout fly through replay)
every object in room has points attached to it.
square watermelons

come back tomorrow.