Avatar Trials: Ninja Uprising Moving Forward

Now that Avatar Trials: Ninja Uprising will be published on Xbox Live, we have to think about the future of Avatar Trials. Depending on how well it does we might take it to the next level. Windows has come out with Windows 8, Surface, RT, and a phone. What if Avatar Trials was ported to those systems, then...wait for it...we port Avatar Trials to the new Xbox 720/Durango! The exposure would be amazing. Windows has been shifting to the growing market and becoming more mobile friendly. This is believe is the best way to stay in business. I would think that we would add more levels, work with the art, and animations to make a better game for the port. In the meantime we need to think how are we going to make this port happen. This is a very exciting idea and I hope we move forward with it.

Avatar Trials: Ninja Uprising PASSED!

Avatar Trials: Ninja Uprising PASSED the XBLIG reivew process! We get to publish! This means that 4/26/2013 is the day of the Avatar Trials! This has been a long journey of iteration and hard work. I am very excited to see how the game is received. During the EAE demo day that was followed by 3 local news stations: See the #1 game program on the news! Fox 13:http://bit.ly/15PO9c8 , KSL:http://bit.ly/ZnoHra , DesNews:http://bit.ly/10yIHtF , we had many people play our game and there were pretty impressed! They liked the use of the Avatar, ninja abilities, levels, and the platforming. We had people play our game and beat the first level. They would then leave. However, they would come back for more! They had to beat the other 2 levels. It was exciting to see how much people liked our game.

XBLIG Review Process

Getting a game to pass through XBLIG is not always an easy task. There are an incredible number of ways to crash your game. Using xbox profiles, purchasing, demos, storage, etc. can make it very difficult to get your game published. We have gone through 2 review processes and failed. There were some interesting bugs and great comments. Things like game crashes here, camera clipping here, or even art suggestions that help the game flow better. I really think this is a great way to test your game. There is a great community of developers on XBLIG that for free will test your game and give you feedback. The catch is that they hope that you will test their game too. I hope that Microsoft does something similar to this and XNA in the future. Indie devs are the future!

Avatar Trials: Level Evolution

In my last blog I mentioned that iteration is key. I am posting the evolution of the Avatar Trials level design.

The earliest levels I have are below. Level design is a lot more complicating than it sounds. It seems like you can just throw a bunch of assets in and be done. That works if you want a level that feels like poo. The pictures below may look very lame, but they could be a fun level to play on. The reverse is that you could have a beautiful level, but could play like crap. This post is about how iteration makes your game fun!

The pictures above were some concept art done by Derek Young. This was to show how the level layout of our main level and how the player gets around. This idea was mostly scrapped. This concept centered more about stealth and parkour. We instead evolved into a time trial game with floating platforms.

This was the first level created. It was on an island and this island would contain the player. They would have to run around the island to complete tasks and parkour.

This concept art was to show instead of being trapped on one island, the islands instead float in the sky. This creates tension with the player since if they fall, they die. We took the floating idea to the next level. In the current levels we use floating platforms and floating islands.

This concept art was to show instead of being trapped on one island, the islands instead float in the sky. This creates tension with the player since if they fall, they die. We took the floating idea to the next level. In the current levels we use floating platforms and floating islands.

                                         

Level design is all about iteration and play testing. Don't be afraid to throw everything out and start over, but learn from what you did. Also, don't make your game a secret. Let everyone play your game. Even people you know that don't play games. If they can't pick up and learn to play it then something is wrong.

Challenges with Avatar Trials

     Avatar Trials has been a great experience. We are able to make a game at the top school in the nation for making games and instantly export our title to Xbox 360 for testing. We have a great team of 12 and two semesters to do it. However, there are great challenges in video game production.

    Unless you are a giant prodigy, making games is difficult from early concept to pre-production to marketing. As the art director for Avatar Trials: Ninja Uprising, I had some tough challenges to help get this game to the Xbox Live. Project management is one of the tougher parts of this project. When I work alone it is easy for me to get in a groove and create cool stuff, but in the groove I make things only a certain way. It is tough for me to hear criticism from eleven other people and make the change. The other way around I have to make decisions and tell people things need to be changed. Artists can get a bit emotional, but that makes artists great. I tried to change my style and help others too.
     Another problem is iteration. Iterations are huge in video game design. Avatar Trials went through revision after revision until we decided how we could make our game fun in the amount of time we had. I could not be attached to an idea that I liked if it was not fun. Video games should be at least entertaining. Iteration is key.
     I also had issues with staying to a rigid schedule. When school, life, and work gets in the way of my video game it was important to keep everyone on task. This is harder than it sounds. Everyone is busy and no one has time. Make Time!
    Finally, when managing a team communication is key. Making sure that everyone is on task and communicating with each other is vital. After 3 game projects I still have a hard time communicating and keeping everyone on the team talking to together.
    To wrap up: Be ready to throw out everything and start over. Work in a team. Iterate over your game. Create a schedule you can stick to, but don't burn out. Communicate!