Year 2 - Unit 4 & 5: Originate, develop and research an idea for a game - Task 2

Unit 4 & 5
Originate, develop and research an idea for a game
Task 2

(Links to content in blue links)

At the beginning of our idea creation I was actually in a completely different group so I missed out on the original ideas, however with my first group I took part in all of the generation. As there was only two of us in my first group I was given the task of creating the documentation for more than just the one idea. I had to create the mood boards and mind maps for the original 4 ideas, the first idea in a mind map was the one my teammate ended up choosing to do alone, it was called Demons of the Crest. It was a game that was simply put to be Big Trouble in Little China gone Dark Souls style, in this padlet I came up with the idea for the first two bosses, one was called Artemis (The Fallen Keeper) who once lived in the lower district of Silvercrest as a Gravedigger and the other was Faine (Shadow of the Abyss) who was the former priest for the Church of Silvercrest. I came up with some music ideas for the different types of scenes, the intense boss battles and fighting scenes should have symphonic metal in the background and dark ambient music for the loading screens and resting periods. The second idea was for a game idea called Rise of the Crest, this was one hundred percent my favourite idea because it was based on the mechanics of the game Uncharted. In this idea I came up with the ideas for the enemies to be Chinese Ninjas that fight you in a Chinese forest where the light seeps through the trees. The art style of the characters and environments should be 3D and photorealistic like what is found in the Uncharted games, combat mechanics include the use of guns, explosives, melee and the possible use of a bow and arrow. Sound effects that should be implemented were also included in this padlet, they consisted mostly animals, combat and objects. The target audience was also included to be towards any gender of the age 16 and above, this was because of the intense combat, take downs and the open gender tag because of the diversity of having the choice to be either a male or female protagonist. The third idea was called Kombat of the Krest and was never fully completed however we got as far as defining the art style which would appear to be 2.5D, the whole game idea was inspired by Mortal Kombat hence the name. The forth game idea was called Jackman, this game did not get any mood board ideas as I moved groups however, this game and the other three have fully completed mind maps that are shown below:



When I moved groups I did miss the first steps of coming up with the ideas however I was still given the task of making a padlet for each of the 4 ideas. After being filled in on what ideas they came up with I expanded them with some mood boards and further ideas, I created the padlets off of the Game Ideas document they created at they created at the very start which wasn't fully finished so I had to flesh out the ideas further on my mood boards. The first idea they came up with was a game called SUM TING WONG, as a padlet I included where it shall be played which was within the streets of Chinatown within of the many restaurants in that surrounding area and when it was set, 1980's. The second idea I developed was for a game called Big Truck; Little China, it would be an action adventure game that started in Canada's Western provinces. After starting in British Columbia you eventually end up in San Francisco's China town. You play the infamous Jack Burton who is employed as an Ice Road Trucker in British Columbia and Alberta, along your journeys you get in bar fights by night and the more you get intoxicated the better your fighting skills will be. You would also be able to interact with gas stations to gain fuel and a place to stay overnight, overnight thieves may attempt to steal cargo or your truck. The third idea was for a game called Jenny's Prison, this story starts off in China during the Japanese occupation in WWII, you are captured during the battle of Khalkhin Gol, instead of being transported to do 10 years of hard labour you are recruited into the Soviet Army to fight on the Eastern Front. After all of this ordeal you survive only to discover something much worse in the ruins of the Nazi concentration camps. The forth and final idea was called Jack and Cthulhu, this was the idea we decided to go with, we felt that it was best choice mainly because this had the most fleshed out ideas. It would be the easiest to actually pull off and create, it also had a lot of potential to go further and gain more content. You would start off in New Orleans, specifically The French Quarter and Jackson Square which is within the state of Louisiana. Jackson Park is a historic park within the French Quarter, this will be the centrepiece for the beginning scene of the game. You will play Jack Burton who's truck is taken by a cult, once following the cultist to the end of a pier not far from Jackson Square, your truck falls off with Jack holding on, you are taken by teleportation to New Zealand. Once in New Zealand you find yourself within a huge bayou, you must fight off all the enemies and then teleport to R'lyeh. In R'lyeh you will be given the task of stopping an enemy from awakening Cthulhu. Another team member (Sam) created the mind maps which also helped create the mood boards:

Sum Ting Wong
Big Trouble; Little China
Jenny's Prison
Jack and Cthulhu

We did a survey that asked the public questions relating to video games and our ideas, we had a total of 23 responses to the survey with a mix of people who played games and who didn't. The thing that we didn't clearly think through enough was probably the fact that we didn't tell everyone about the actual game idea so the first question about whether or not people were interested in our game came out as the majority (54.5%) saying they didn't know enough about it to form a strong opinion. We only got 17 responses to the gender question so I do not believe that all of the results will be 100% accurate, with 58.8% being female and the other 41.2% being male or identifying as another gender. We added the gender question after asking our class to complete it and they answered the rest so if the responses were accurate the idea that our target audience would be mainly male would be correct. However, on the question that asks how old they are the majority being 73.9% said that they were 16-21 so out target audience age wise was completely spot on and we should cater to a wide audience. Another question that played in our favour was the one which asked what was people's favourite genre of game with Action-Adventure being the top choice at 60.9% choosing that, this is the genre of game ours shall be. The least popular choice of game genre was sports which has nothing to do with our game so we definitely have that upside. 30.4% of the people we asked said that they only play 0-5 hours of games a week, our game should only last under an hour so this works for the masses. The second highest choice was 21 hours plus at 26.1%, this means that our game can still be used by them but it just might not take up all their game time. The PlayStation platform was the most popular for people to play on at 52.2%, our game would only be on PC, luckily this option came second with 43.5% of the people we asked using it. 91.3% of people we asked said we asked said that we should include Easter eggs and collectables in the game, this is what we hoped for because we had a lot of fun coming up with the ideas for them so if no one wanted them it would all go to waste. 73.9% of people thought 3 levels was just the right amount to have however 21.7% of people thought that it wasn't enough so we will now probably think about adding one or two more if that doesn't overdo it. Relating to the playable characters 82.6% of people thought we should have more than just the one so we will probably think about adding another character, when asking who we should add if we choose to 68.2% of people thought it should be Gracie Law.

The constraints we had to consider were the time limit we had, I especially had to worry about this because I had to do my new groups and my old groups work in the same time it took everyone else to just do the one. This issue resulted in our first game ideas not being very fleshed out or in depth, however I feel as though we have managed to pull it all off in time. Costs never really became a problem through the process, this was because things like bubbl and padlet are free services so the develop of just the ideas was not difficult cost wise. Having three people in one group may seem a lot easier than working alone and in some ways it does, however trying to co-ordinate everyone and what they have to do can become very complicated. You can only go and certain distance with the ideas you bounce off each other but it does help to flesh out the original ideas. Resource wise is again very similar to the cost as well, we had the resources that we needed, this mainly consisted of our computers to work on and pens and paper to organise ourselves.

The legal and ethical considerations we needed to think about were things like privacy, this and data protection basically protect people from their information being shared with anyone, including ourselves. The survey we took kept the names of everyone private with it being anonymous, things like this are what made it a private and safe process. Race discrimination will not be tolerated in our game and we will have characters from all backgrounds and they won't be all stereotypical. Things that are more copyright concerns shouldn't have to worried about because as far as we know our main idea is completely original. However, the idea R'lyeh being a place and Cthulhu existing are not, not only this but the major copyright concern would be Jack Burton and Big Trouble in Little China. This is because we do not have the rights to create a game from the film, however because it will never be publicly released or available for purchase, neither of these issues should arise. I go into a little more detail about legal and ethical consideration with our first ideas here.

Year 2 - Unit 66: 3D Models for an Asset Library - Assignment 2

Unit 66 - Assignment 23D Models for an Asset Library

(Links to drawing in blue)

Stimulus:

The brief we were given is to create a game that is based off the film Big Trouble in Little China. We then gave ourselves the brief of creating separate parts of the game each whilst still working together.

Ideas:
Before I started creating my first NPC I did quick sort of brainstorm or mood board, this was for a character called the servitor of the outer Gods. It included the colour palette I decided on, basic sketches have been included of all the different parts of the creatures body, these included the tentacles and suckers it uses to smother its victims. Any of the colour was done with some basic oil pastels that were blended into the acrylic paper. After that first basic brainstorm I then developed this idea to a more in depth and clearer diagram of the main two different angles/perspectives. I did this in charcoal to try and use the smudge it creates for the haze that is shown over the creature, the haze grows as your sanity level decreases. This idea was then completed with a fully shaded side view that clearly shows what different parts of its body the enemy has. I used a basic sketching pencil in 2B and some blending stumps, I also used the stumps on the two documents before, once to create the haze effect and another to blend the colour of my oil pastels together. Although this creature is not an original idea it was developed in an original way, once I had the basic concept nailed I then added details that I could not research. The front view was something I made up and I messed around with the different scales of its body. I feel as though that when I go to create this in Maya I will struggle with the polygon count as it is a very detailed creature. Each of us in our team decided to the concept art for one of the main enemies each, one large, medium and small, this assured us that we could do some work independently and have a chance for our creativity and flare to shine through. This creature will appear only in R'lyeh, this is because it is only a water based enemy, it will serve as Cthulhu's minion and there should hopefully be many throughout the level that you must defeat. This was one of my final ideas because it was the first one that I had the intention of using, once starting its generation I realised how much I loved the idea of going further. I had to set the first two sketches with hairspray to avoid the colour/charcoal from transferring or smudging. Time Lapse for the first drawing of a servitor of the outer Gods. 
I then did some concept art for Gracie, this was one that completely came from my mind. I decided that I didn't want her to be like she is in the film, I wanted her to be more of a calm companion that could really see into the hearts and eyes of Jack and the enemies. This is why her concept art/sketch contains her cross legged and mediating, as a 3D model I like to hope that she will be wearing the clothes in my drawing and she won't be too difficult to create. Gracie never really had much development because her figure was made up, I started drawing what I wanted her to be and it just slowly developed into who she is now. Whether we actually use Gracie in the game is an idea we are still playing around with, however I personally feel like it could help the game gain a few more woman players.
Jack Burton's concept was probably the least thought out but most detailed drawing I did, I created the art from scratch with an action shot as a reference to base it off. He is decked out in his basic outfit from the film and is drawn in biro, biros are one hundred percent my favourite media to draw in however they are very hard to clean up if you mess up. I did slip up around his fingers on his right hand, I had the mistake of making them way to large in width, luckily with the use of shading I was able to define the hand further and more or less recover the drawing from its near fate. Biros are hard to work with because you can't use them like pencils to shade, no matter how much more or less pressure you put on the pen it will still be the same shade. To overcome this barrier I had to use a cross hatching technique to add depth to his finished character. 
I'm pretty sure the first sketch I did was of Cthulhu and this was an idea that we had as a group, he is probably the main reason anyone would really want to play the game. He is character who will be extremely large so the polygon count of his 3D model will have to be kept at the back of our minds at all times. Much like the servitors of the outer Gods he has a lot of tentacles, especially hanging from his haunting face, this is the thing that I really I had to focus on with his concept art because it's the most noticeable part about him. To achieve this I used shading to make his tentacles more pronounced, I only did his head as I wanted to create something that wasn't copied and the only way I could think of doing it without going in over my head.
The first environment concept art I did was of the pier, this was created before we decided to set in New Orleans so it isn't the most accurate drawing,  I saw an image pretty similar to the one that I drew that I decided to base my sketch off. I made my pier with the intention of it looking as though you were on it with the perspective used, it started off as a simple pier but then I added the foliage in the back with the water to add a little more detail as it was so plain without it.
I then created a willow tree with a uni-ball liquid pen, this media was surprisingly hard to work with as it smudged so easily. I started off creating the tree trunk but I then realised if I carried on this way it was be smudged within seconds. I left the trunk to dry and once it had I went from the left to right creating the weeping branches in a simple fashion. Once it was all dry I went back in and added shading with small lines going up the branches and trunk, without this it looked bare and unimportant. 
Surprisingly, the last thing I did was create a storyboard, once I had a sound understanding of our main ideas I felt that I could create a storyboard that fit our needs. The story was based on what we wrote as a team and I did some very simple sketches to add further illustration to what was being written down. I wrote the plot down first, numbering it in chronological order in coloured ballpoint pen. I then added the simple drawings at the end, I can't really explain much further what I wanted to get from it but you can just view it  as I think I made it very self explained.

Legal and Ethical considerations:

One of the legal things that we did consider was the copyright factor, this was not an important worry as unless our game was published the models would be ok to copy. However, although legally it wouldn’t matter the work still would’ve been plagiarised  and it wouldn’t be credited as our own work. Ethically wise I know that confidentially is not such a key thing to focus on, especially in games creation and 3D models. It protects the information of people involved, this could affect anyone we had take part in a survey to determine whether or not people would actually enjoy our game. They would enter things like their age, gender and other personal questions, this would be under the data protection so they wouldn't need to put their name or address for their own safety. Decency would contain what is considered acceptable, whilst 3D modelling this will include properties like nudity, blasphemy, violence and sex. Even when I created my first ideas I had to consider how I annotated them, any swearing would not be acceptable and may seem like the creation is not a serious process. Drawing and models shall not contain nudity or sex, our game has been given a target audience of the age 16, any game containing those would have to be used my gamers over the age of 18. The representation that I use is widely diverse and involves all genders, race, sexuality and religion. The reason I, and many developers, decided that it should be so inclusive is because the game then aspires to much more of a wider audience, also it avoids the possibility of a bad name for the game based on a sexist and racist front with the character art. If I were to relate this to the brief the most obvious issue would be not succumbing to the stereotypes of the Chinese people and culture, luckily the only real link to the film is Jack Burton and his truck so we have a lot of leeway with the character development and environments.

Specification:
Our target audience is the male gender who are above the age of 16, the maximum age will probably be around 30 however that does not exclude people over that age. People who enjoy the voodoo following and are fans of Big Trouble in Little China will also be included as well as people who enjoy action adventure games. The reason it will be towards people over the age of 16 is because children who are under that age and witnessing the violence would make the game be considered inappropriate. The visual theme of our game is very photorealistic, the first scene will be based off a real place so getting it to look perfect will require studying photographs of the place and making the environment and 3D models look realistic enough. The main character is Jack Burton who has swept back hair and a muscular body, this should come across in the game as strongly as possible without going over a specified polygon count. However this is one constraint of the many, the larger the polygon count the larger the file size. Having a high imagine resolution is of course quite a key part to the immersion of a game but again comes with a cost, large file sizes and even the possibility of it not being to run or render on the PC being used. If the output size is large then the export and import time will take a very long time, not making it worth the wait. File types can be a large issue, if you don't use all the correct types then you will most likely have issues in the future with getting everything to work together and opening files in the right applications. File sizes are what everything basically comes down to, large file sizes cause the issue of opening and exporting in a slow and ineffective way.