Introduction to Computer Game Design MDDN 243 Marina Voronova: 2013

Sunday, November 3, 2013

I found this project very challenging. Because working in a group was pretty hard for me. My hospitalization unsettled me for two weeks in the very beginning of the project and distracted my whole subsequent work on the project because I didn't really feel as a part of the group. I wasn't sure if we should all equally participate in creating the game or just follow the leaders ideas as the game was created by one person in the first place. I was trying to participate as much as I could, however mostly we followed Tui's and Max's ideas. So when I was trying to bring in my own attitude to the game, I had to keep changing the images. And I found it pretty upsetting that the final start screen was changed and I found out about it from the stencyl files, when it was already part of the game... So hopefully my future teamwork experience will be better =)

Saturday, November 2, 2013

Start screen.

Some sketches for the start screen.

1 based on sky level, just the name of the game in the clouds.

2 prob black background and white and red for the pattern
3 Have all the maraes in the background possibly a bit faded out
4 simple old school background. I was thinking we could have mushrooms jumping in each corner if it's not too hard to code wise hv animated start screen.
Or we also could hv the first scene a bit blured and have a name in front and when you click the start button the name will fade out and the scene will fade in.

My groupmates agreed on the 1st one, but Max asked me to add a taiaha beneath the name.

So I came up with two versions. However when I showed it to Tui he said that the font should be changed. He wanted me to use this kind of font:

Retrieved from:http://images.wikia.com/nintendo/en/images/b/b1/Super_Mario_World_Logo.png

and that taiaha should be wider on one side. And he also asked me to make it a bit more pixelated.

So here's what I came up with.

Health bar.

As we still needed a health bar for the game I made a possible version of it and showed to my group, to see what they think and if they want me to change it, so Tui said that we'll discuss that later and I started doing the start screen.

Here is my work in progress. I am using the red guidelines to make sure that the angles are the same. Also I showed to my group that if we add another level to the pyramid, it's gonna be cropped from the sides and the whole thing won't fit because of the screen width.

This is my 3-level tower. I redrew the stairs and the yellow tiles in vector and added the handrail and some torches (I was thinking it would be if the fire was animated).

Unfortunately the fire wasn't used in the game and guys also asked me to remove the bottom level because it's too big for the scene (just as I warned earlier).

Thursday, October 31, 2013

Unfortunately after all that time spent on cave and changing and developing mountain my group changed the idea. Apparently the cave is not gonna be used in the game at all. Instead we are going to make a sky level and the perspective should go well with Max's sky temple which is very different from the sketch I was relying on.

by Maximillian Kerr-Hislop

Also I had to make some sort of the tower instead of mountain. So here is what I thought would work.

Retrieved from: http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100104210332/zelda/images/3/36/Pyramid_(A_Link_to_the_Past).png

Guys liked it better, but wanted me to change the angles of the front diagonal edges (make it the same angle) and add one more.level to the tower. Also Max had the yellow tiles done in pixels only (no vector), so I had to redraw it as well. Also guys wanted the stairs to be straight (same width on every level). I mentioned that I might add some extra details like a handrail or something.

So now when basic stuff for the cave is ready I am working on the mountain. In class we decided what the mountain should look like. Tui (the leader of our group) drew some sketches and relying on those I started drawing the mountain in photoshop. The idea was to have it really tall 2-3 screen widths and character is supposed to walk up the stairs and get inside the cave

So here's what I came up with. And Tui asked me to fill the brown area with the rocks.

So here's what I got but it still wasn't quite satisfying. And I was asked to make it "less perfect".

So I tried to make a bit more random and less symmetrical.

Here is what I came up with.

My group seemed to like it, but asked me to make the bricks darker.

Cave inspiration.

My group mates asked me to make a cave. Unfortunately I don't know much about caves and not really sure what a cave in the game should look like and what could be in there... So I surfed the net for some examples and inspiration. Also I find it challenging because when you are thinking of a cave you are usually imagining the ceilings of it as this is the most interesting part of the cave, not the ground, but in our game we are using top perspective. So I am feeling a little stuck.

Retrieved from: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6d/003._Cave_du_cur%C3%A9_-_Aqueduc_du_Gier.JPG

Retrieved from: http://www.explorecrete.com/crete-west/images/zoniana-cave-inside.jpg

Retrieved from: http://aceflashman.files.wordpress.com/2009/11/the-entrance-as-seen-from-inside.jpg

Retrieved from: http://gamesthatexist.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/cave-start-copy.jpg

Retrieved from: http://www.bigfuntown.com/Games/249.jpg

Retrieved from: http://cdn.wikimg.net/strategywiki/images/thumb/e/ec/Zelda_ALttP_Byrna_cave.png/180px-Zelda_ALttP_Byrna_cave.png

Retrieved from: http://www.blugadgets.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/fairy_cave.png

Retrieved from: http://www.consoleclassix.com/info_img/Legend_of_Zelda_NES_ScreenShot4.jpg

Wednesday, October 30, 2013

I showed my work to my group mates, and apparently they didn't like it because of the perspective of some of the elements. So I'll try to pay more attention to that further on.

So I added some grass and flowers, now it looks better. I am still not quite happy with the colors, even though it's getting slightly better.

Here's possible view of the screen. Just tried to put everything together and see what it looks like. It still definitely needs more details... Also I am not sure about the colors. It might be too depressing for a kids game.. So may be something brighter would work better

Some trees and bushes.

Stump

When I am thinking of a poisoned forest for some reason I cannot imagine it without stumps and some sort of dirty green-color kind of grass...

My frogie

Inspired by images below I drew my mushrooms and frog however I noticed that the image is super smooth and needs pixelation.

I compared my new pixelated version with the ld images and was quite happy with it. If I need to pixelate it more I can do it as I go.

Here's another element for the poisonous forest, the poison itself, glowing, spilled. I think that would look cool in a game as I usually associate glowing liquids in a round glass bottle with witches and fairy-tales, which, in my opinion, are appropriate for the poisonous forest area. We could possibly animate it. For example when character steps on the poison he loses health. Could be a cool idea to have a magician or something like that as an enemy and Rangi would have to defeat his magic powers.