1. Game Project - Concept Creation and User Experience

> September 22

Today we were set the game engines brief - in my group is James, Abbie, Jade and Owen. The ideas we've come up with are either a horror game set in a warehouse where you must collect items to escape and avoid a monster or a dodgeball stylized game with power-ups. At the moment we aren't settled on one idea but both seem good. I'm leaning towards the dodgeball purely for aesthetics. If we can keep it simple and get down the mechanics early on it will be good.

> September 29

Today the group discussed our game ideas weighing out the pros and cons on a whiteboard. We've decided on the dodgeball game but haven't really finalised any ideas. I'm glad we've chosen the dodgeball game because it was my idea and I think it's the easier option.

> October 6

Our game idea we have decided to scope down to be just 1v1 but is still relatively the same. When brainstorming this game we were very focused on keeping scope low enough that we could finish and polish to a satisfactory degree. Ideas came up about customization of character and map, having power ups, multiplayer and having more drastic differences between the player's side. These ideas were decided too much to consider and thrown out in favour of more ideas about the basic mechanics.

In order to make the game fair we want a fairly clear balanced pitch with no obstacles that can be used as full cover. The player who is winning will gain advantage as the pitch of their enemy shrinks. We decided to have the midpoint move to show who was winning and by how much. A point based system could have also worked but lacks any feeling of imminent danger, excitement or Progress for players.

> October 13

Today in game engines we as a group talked about the first scrum period and have more clear roles amongst ourselves. I am art lead and the asset list is up on Trello. James and Owen will model for me, Abbie and I will texture. For this first scrum period I'm going to focus on creating the concepts for the models to work from and hopefully tackle some texturing too if time allows it.

So far as the game has been conceptualized and planned to a good degree. It is now time to put into action some preliminary white box levels and start building the mechanics. Alongside this we want to start production of the assets in game because we know that no-matter what, we want the game populated with a variety of assets.

The visual style of the game was my decision. We are aiming for a bright hand painted non-PPR style. The game is set in a jungle rich cove with tribal inhabitants and a sandy shore. Pirates have washed-up and are attacking. In order to better convey to the group how I intend the game to look I have gathered plenty of references and created my own assets to show as an example.

As production on assets has begun it has become apparent that our team needs more visual guidance to create assets. I have now created a sheet of concepts for most of the objects in the asset list that can be used to exactly model from. The details of many of the assets can be left to texturing, and even achieved with opacity in the case of foliage, so our modelers should try to match the concepts whilst also thinking ahead to not go too detailed on the assets.

Trello

Trello is a group task management app which our team are using to assign work throughout the project. We have one Trello board as a dedicated asset list and another for overall game milestones / engine tasks.

We decided Trello was the best place to start in this progect because of the sheer volume of work we are about to undertake. This software allows us to prioritise and organise the assets and assign members to each task. I created the categories in a way that emmulated Agile work practice in which tasks are given priority every Scrum and if not completed in the desired time-frame would be easily flagged up. Trello also meant that collaborative actions could be taken and ideas conveyed about assets all in one place. For example, after creating the concept sheets for our assets I found it was easier for the team to have those images separated onto their respective Trello tasks so that modelers could act quickly and easily for each task rather than search for resources.

Development methodologies like Agile and Scrum are being favoured in the games industry more as they offer a more flexible and organic system for production where older methods led to backlog issues.

> 20 October

Today our group kept working on our individual tasks. My computer didn't let me work on Substance or Blender so I changed PC and worked on the chest model which is now texture ready. Then I worked on colouring concepts for the tribal assets. I've got a lot of files on the drive and my PC I need to organise and rename. I also feel that the amount of stuff to edit, unwrap and texture is a lot so I want Abbie to help me as soon as she finishes her own tasks. I think Owen and James' models are good but I find myself tweaking them a bit so it might be useful to video myself tweaking and show them how they can help me. If they could unwrap it before handing it over at least 80% that would also be stellar.

Overall I think the early stages of our game have been really productive as we have been proactive in our approach to tackling each task, thinking about scope and ease of production along the way. The concepting of our game and creation of accessory resources have led to a more united team and idea which will lead us in good stead as we make progress.