Homework 7

Use of Animation in the Blender Game Engine

In this assignment, I created a building that had a door with the ability to open when an object comes near to it. I decided to experiment with this feature because in my teams game, our character will be going from building to building to get to particular puzzles and task that she must complete. Those buildings of course are going to require doors that will need to open when she gets near. I created a door in another file (my_door.blend) with animations and an actuator that causes the door to open. I linked this file into the my_building.blend and I tried to make it a proxy but I lost my animation so I returned it back to a simply linked object. I also parented the door to the building. For now my character is a purple cylinder that move back and forth with the directional arrows. 

Link to Blender Objects: click here

ELEMENTS and THEMES

Four each of the four elements of the Tetrad, explain how it is addressed by your game. If one of the four elements is not used, please state this. 

Disclaimer: These elements of our game are still in the very beginning stages and subject to change at any point. This is just my perspective on the four elements so far...

Mechanics: The game will consist levels of task/puzzles that the player must complete in order to advance and reach the goal of filling the pages to the book and finding the other scientist. Therefore, the obstacles will be completing these tasks. The player will be running and exploring the buildings within the city and will require some sort of energy and health through out the game. So she must find health "tokens" along with the task of completing the levels and getting pages at the end.

Story: The main female character is a scientist that is exploring an abandon city for the answers to what her colleague has done to eliminate all of the citizens of this city. She obtains the book of notes/plans the other scientist had written however there are pieces missing and it is up to her to find these pieces and find out why he did what he did. Possibly, stopping him from doing this to any other city.

Technology: From what I understand from the book, the technology element of our game has yet to be determined. However, I assume that it will be played on a computer and we will use the Blender game engine to create this game.

Aesthetics: Our team's strong point is story telling and we are not that artistically inclined, therefore, we haven't spent much time discussing the aesthetics of the game but it will definitely be incorporated into the game.

Do the four (or less) elements work towards a current theme? 

So far, the mechanics and story elements work toward our theme and I expect the other two elements to work towards the theme, as well.

In your own words, describe the meaning of a "theme", and how does it differ from an "experience" (see book for examples in Chapters 2 and 5. 

What is your game's theme? 

A theme is a main idea or message being conveyed by the author, or in this case, team of game designers. This differs from experience in that an experience is the feelings and emotions perceived when playing a game.

I believe our game has a truth-based theme. I would say the theme to our game is something like  "The exploration of disaster that uncovers the truth behind it all".

What are the elements in your game that are meant to reinforce this theme? 

The story and mechanics are the key elements used to reinforce the theme. Through the detail in the storyline and the actual task and puzzles used to explore the reasons to what happened to this city the theme is being conveyed.

What is it about your game that you feel makes it special and powerful?

Since my team's strongest assets I would have to say the story being told through our game makes it special and powerful. Each member of our team has such a vivid imagination that I hope that we will be able to convey a powerful and engaging story to our audience.

Homework 5

Using the Blender Game Engine

During our last group meeting, my team and I discussed various directions that our game could possibly go in. We came to the conclusion that our game needed to have some type of incentives and obstacles since it is a platform game and majority of these types of game have those items. We brainstormed some ideas and I decided to incorporate some into this assignment.

I used the city setting objects I previously created as the backdrop. I added coins to the stoop that the character could potentially jump up and retrieve using the Logic Editor I was able to have them rotate with the Motion Actuator. I also created some pointed objects that fall from the sky that could potentially "kill" the character. These were made with a cone rotated and scaled down. For these objects I used the physics option and the logic editor to apply force in the z-direction to slow down the speed of the objects. Lastly, I altered a cylinder to move about the area with the keyboard arrows to imitate a character moving about the scene.

I hope that we will be able to incorporate these obstacles and incentives or at least cause the group to brainstorm other potential objects!

Homework 5 Link to Download

TEAMWORK Makes the DREAM Work!

After reading Chapters 23&24 in the book The Art of Game Design by Jesse Schell, I answered a few questions pertaining to my team and our game document...

Do you love your project/game. If not, how can that be changed? 

I do not love my game YET. I do not believe that my group has a good grasp on our game's design and storyline. We have some good ideas forming. I think that once we have made some more concrete decisions on the direction and design of our game, I will hopefully grow to love the game.

Does the team as a whole love the project? If not, what can be done?

It is too early to tell. I think we have some great ideas and story-lines forming. It is evident that the whole team has the passion and drive to create a 3D platform game that we all will love.

Are the team members communicating with each other?

Yes, we consistently communicate through our team notebook on Google Drive.

Does the team have a regular meeting schedule? What is that schedule? 

Yes, we have decided to meet face-to-face on Fridays at 2pm. We all agreed that physical meetings would benefit in the production of our game.

Describe the modes of communication between the team members. 

As I stated above, most of our communication is through our game notebook in Google Drive and our weekly meetings. On our notebook we are able to share our ideas at any time during the week and then further discuss these ideas when we meet on Fridays. There is some communication through email, but it is very limited.

Regarding game documents, what must be remembered while designing your game? 

One thing that must be remembered is that no idea is a bad one. The smallest idea shared through the game documents can flourish into a large aspect of the game when built upon by other team members. Also, communication must be constant. A break in communication within the game document can result into a hole in the design of the game.

Homework 3

First Objects in Blender

In Blender, I created a "stoop" and a cross street sign. The setting of our game is a city so I thought that creating objects that would help with the atmosphere would be great! 

The stoop is a set of stairs connected to a building front. Since my groups game type is platform our female main character will be able to walk up the stairs to retrieve some item. 

The street signs could potentially help our character with directions to the people she is looking for. 

These objects were created with planes, cylinders, and cubes. I subdivided and extruded the base of the street sign. Also I extruded the cylinder vertically and then horizontally. 

The "stoop" was made of a plane that was extruded vertically. I added a modifier array, adjusted the coordinates, and created 6 steps with the counter.

I hope these objects will be an asset to my group's platform gaming idea!

Here's the DropBox link to my blender objects: Stoop & Sign