Dragon Taunt

     To charm up our game I had to think of something silly that would make me laugh. Sometimes game production isn't as much fun as it should be. When I start feeling down I try to think of silly things to put in my game to make me laugh. This is when I thought it would be fun to have our normal mapping dragon reference become the antagonist. This dragon taunts you when you die. He has a list of scripted things he says to make fun of you. There are humorous and sarcastic. I found that it was a nice way of adding some charm to the game. It is also a nice little easter egg for those who know what the XNA Normal Mapping dragon is.

New Level Screenshots

Here are some great new screenshots. I removed the player and its components to take screenshots. I only kept the player shadow so I knew where I was while I took screenshots.

Avatar Trials: Ninja Uprising Progress

We are really starting to nail things down and it has been a fun path. The level design and game design has dramatically changed ideas. It has been a rollercoaster. The level design once started out as one big island, then a bunch of small islands. Then, it became a coastal area with a mountain. Finally, we have reached this idea of sky islands and floating platforms. They are floating over water(with sharks!no...) and you will die if you fall into it. You are an incredible ninja that can't swim. Level 1 starts you out with all of your abilities. You will find scrolls that remind you want you can do while the level forces you to use certain abilities. This way we are directing the player down the path of learning the ninja's moves. We give the player "nets" that catch you if you fall, but you have to walk back up and try again. At the end of the level the player should know all of their moves. In Level 2 it is similar to the first, but without nets. The level is also more difficult. Level 3 is very hard and without nets. The player is told that they have no chance to defeat this level.

Game Update 5

Ninja Royale has been green lit! This is a happy day after all the hard work that went into the prototype. I am also excited about how we have such a great team! I have a good feeling this is going to be a great experience.

Our group met at the end of class and we traded contact information. I was chosen to be the art director and I had to divide out some tasks. We need to identify, "What is an indie game?" Our game suffered from being too much like mainstream games. We do not have enough time to make the next Splinter Cell or Assassin's Creed. We have to find a unique hook to keep the players interested. Second, I set up the dropbox folder for the artists to import their assets. Finally, I showed them the rig that we will be working with.

Everyone seems really excited, but fall break is next week. I can't EXPECT anyone to do anything, but I think they will. Hopefully we can start prototyping our art style soon.

Game Update 4

We finally got everything ready for our presentation today to the industry panel. It was very exciting and almost too exciting for me. I hardly ever get nervous about a presentation. I have been serving at restaurants for years and I am usually fine. However, our team did very well! We got the one pager done, shot video of the prototype, and prepared a stellar presentation. Creating the animations for this prototype were very fun and I hope this game moves on so we can create some more. This game really has the potential to be a great multiplayer experience. It has personalized avatars, great animations, battling, and capture the flag. As an artist I wish it was easier to set up lighting, normal mapping, UV mapping, and shadows in XNA. It would have allowed me to create a better looking level. Did I mention wall run animations are difficult? That was tough to visualize.

Here is our one pager:

Game Update 3

Looks like Paulo and I were able to make some sweet animations using Maya and the xbox avatar. We were able to create a front flip, back flip, ninja run, pull up and grab, and hopefully the wall run soon. The wall run is a very awkward animation. Imagining someone doing a run cycle sideways and crooked. I had to go out and buy mannequin to better visual how it will look. It's not all that helpful. I will just have to finish it and iterate on it later. Either way we are making some great progress.

We have a simple level built and inside XNA. We went through 3 different physics engines to figure out which one would work best. The physics still need work, but the game is starting to look good. We also had to use Maya, 3dsMax, and the Soft Mod Tool to get the animations working properly. For some reason the leg IK handles are broken when exported from either Maya or 3dsMax. If I delete all the keyframes for the legs the animation works great, but broken if they are animated. So I have to create the animation in Maya export as an .fbx file as defined by certain settings. Then import it into the Soft Mod Tool and export as an .fbx. That is the only way to get it to work properly, annoying, but it works. Yay! The game has avatars with animations, physics, and a level.

Now we need to get all the animations inside XNA, we need textures, and hopefully some sounds. I am going to put textures on all the cubes in the level and maybe have enough time to put sound in.

Game Update 2

I was able to get the avatar rig for Maya to animate and import into XNA! There are specific export settings for the animation, but they are pretty easy to follow. Something else that was weird was that whoever made the rig decided to turn off the IKs. When I went to into the channel box there was an IK setting that was set to 0. If you set it to 1 the controllers will deform the mesh. Supposedly IK handles have issues with ragdoll physics.

I was also able to move primitive objects with different colors pretty easily which will advance us into designing levels. Paulo created a basic indoor Dojo level for when we get a controllable character.

For the prototype were going to make sure the parkour mechanic is nailed down tight. This is the most important part of the game. These are things like jumping, climbing, running, wall running, and flips. Were even hoping to get a rope to make climbing buildings easier.

After all that and our game is green lighted we can think about a bigger level with other objectives than parkouring around.

My most important objectives are the front flip, back flip, and wall running animations.

Game Update 1

This is the first of my "Game Updates". I will start labeling these posts to show important updates. Some of my other labels will include "Assets" and "Research". Look for these as well to find out some of the new assets that are going into the game and cool research.

We use a great project management system called Asana. Look this up if your development team is looking for a clean, browser based approach. Our prototype team consists of Me (Maxwell), Blake Sleight, Adam Durant, and Paulo Alves de Matos (Paul). This team could change once we narrow our eight games down to the final four. Paulo and I are the artists and Blake and Adam are the programmers. Currently we are going to build a simple White Box prototype. This will end up looking like a bunch of cubes and rectangles, but this is necessary for quick prototyping. A game should still be fun at this level and if it's not we will find out fast.

I am responsible for moving the avatar rig from Xbox into a program called the Soft Mod Tool 7.5. This is based on the Autodesk SoftImage program. Note! The rig does not work in SoftImage! You must install the mod I mentioned. Then I will do our custom animations and export into XNA as an .fbx file. It is pretty cool how simple this is once you get the rig from the XNA community and Soft Mod program. Since we will be using the player's avatar and applying to a pre-built rig, this will save development time by like...a lot. Hopefully, this means more time for designing levels, creating weapons, abilities, etc...

I am also responsible for creating some basic shapes to represent buildings. I am still unclear at this level if we should build the models outside or inside XNA. We will have to find out!

Summary:

• Team members have assignments.
• White Box prototyping has commenced.
• Max is creating custom animations for the Xbox avatar.
• Max is creating basic shapes to represent levels.