Blog Entry #4

[game start]

You wake up in a dark storage facility. A siren blares outside, and static rings in your

head. When you approach the door, you hear shouting from outside. When you step outside,

you see a man fighting off two plant monsters. He kills one; the other kills him, and then

heads towards you. You fight off the plant monster. The static in your head turns to a

radio signal and you hear someone calling for help.

[New objective, find the source of the radio signal].

When you get to the source of the radio signal, you find it is coming from a house. There are a bunch of enemies outside. Kill them all and go inside and recruit your first companion.

[level break]

//radio guy says that he got seperated from the rest of survivors, so he radioed for help

//you're confused, so he explains that x amount of time ago, a virus hit, and people

//mutated into plant monsters that you've been fighting. For some reason, some people

//are immune

//radio guy asks for help getting back to his group

[end level break]

So now you have one companion and one new objective, get to the house. You step outside

the radio building, and you discover that the streets are full of enemies again. Backtrack

to the house where the other survivors are and you finish the level.

[level end]

//three people in the house, the other survivors

//radio guy says thank you, and you join party of survivors.

//they say that a reclusive scientist in the city caused this mess with her experiments

//they believe she was meddling with biowarfare

//They decide: "LET'S STORM HER LABORATORY, WE KNOW EXACTLY WHERE SHE IS"

[level two begin]

Objective: get to the laboratory. A few enemies scattered about, test out some of the new

characters' abilities on your way. Reach the house, go inside, and then...

//AI talks about it's motives behind releasing the disease

Defeat AI, discover you were the scientist that made the AI.

//End of story, android scientist starts working on a cure.

[game end]

Mechanics

Head radio/GPS system [this explains knowledge of map and quest markers]

Glowing objectives [ie, doors, items; robot vision allows this to happen]

Range of motion and range of attack per turn are determined by individual stats

Must complete objectives to finish level

If android dies, must restart from last objective

Battery/crystal source must be gathered to use laser arm

Movement confined to tiles on square grid; cannot go outside of grid/level

Some squares cannot be accesed, as in, you cannot step onto an occupied tile

Turn choices: move, attack, or go into defensive position

If character dies, resurrects at last objective point in x amount of turns

Doctor character can heal others (maybe doctor can resurrect)

Art

For android speech, black box with green text and serif font

No central art theme for right now, while we gather resources from the internet

Maybe cartoon, maybe realistic

Dark and gritty elements; after all, it is an an apocalypse

Whatever we can make

Simple

Electronic music, woodwindy sounds

For now, one background sound, and attack and walking noises

Android and AI voices can be just generated speech

   

Technology

Unreal Engine

Blender

How elements relate to eachother:

The visuals of the game make gameplay more engaging; music sets the tone for a

better user experience. Blender allows us to fully experess our ideas for setting, enemies

and playable characters, furthering the intended experience. Because Unreal is user and

beginner friendly, we can go about creating our game without focusing too much on the

coding portion; we can dedicate more time to story and experience. Game mechanics keep the

story moving; objectives allow you to unlock more of the storyline and finish levels.

Minimal prototype

I would think that a good minimal prototype for this game would just be a small room, with a short corridor leading to as grid square labelled WIN or something along those lines. The player would have two characters to play with and an enemy would be blocking the corridor leading to the WIN square. The individual character and stats would be on display, and the stats would be set in such a way that the player must find a way to position all of their characters and attack the enemy in such a way that (hopefully) keeps them both alive. After the enemy is defeated, the player can move one of the characters to the WIN square.

GAME ASSETS

Sorry this is kinda crappy, its the first full project thing I've done in blender.

This is a magic staff. It can be used to attack, or maybe the magic could be used to access certain areas or solve certain puzzles. It was made in blender. I can't figure out how to post the actual fbx formatted object here, so I'll just email to the professor.

Extra: Class game story idea

Until fifty years ago, the picturesque island city-state of [NAME OF CITY] was considered a paragon of culture and the forefront of technological innovation. But one mysterious Event fifty years ago changed everything. The city swiftly closed itself off from the rest of the world and the city Council suddenly tightened a vice-like control over its' citizens. All references to the Event have been thoroughly eradicated from all records. Anyone too young to have witnessed what befell the city fifty years ago cannot ask those who had lived back then, for fear of the Council and what they do to anyone who dare try speaking any details about it. But recently, strange things have been happening in [NAME OF CITY]. Strange things that to Alice, a young citizen of [NAME OF CITY] has a feeling stem from the Old Quarter, a part of the city that has been closed off and closely guarded ever since she was born. She is sure that the Old Quarter and this mysterious Event are connected, and when the phenomena around the city begin to threaten lives, she decides to unravel the secrets of [NAME OF CITY] herself, with the help of her close friend Theo, a city guard who gains access to the security cameras within the Old Quarter. While Alice explores the Old Quarter, Theo watches from the security cameras and guides her through, warning her of the many dangers within the restricted area, such as hidden traps and oncoming guards along the way. Together, Alice and Theo delve deep into the city's dark history and uncover the secrets behind the Old Quarter, the Event, and the reason behind the Council's ever enclosing grip on [NAME OF CITY].

(To be honest, I don't have much more of a story beyond what I've typed here. I was going along the lines that there was some sort of immense power somewhere within the Old Quarter that the city leaders wished to harness, but had to use the whole Quarter of the city to run tests and harness the power etc. The totalitarian bit would be to ensure that plenty of labor would be secured for the processing etc. of the power without knowledge getting out. The power could be mind control, or potential WMD or something. I know its not very thought out, sorry about that. I was trying to build around the idea that you'd have one character running around doing the platforming part of the game, while another one was controlling the camera, since it was decided in class that we wanted a 3D platformer with multiple fixed cameras, and it seemed to me that that would work best if the player knew when each camera was being switched and had control over when the cameras changed. It would still be a one person game, the player would just be controlling the character (Alice) and the camera (Theo). Also, I'm really bad at making up names for cities, so again, sorry.)

Blog Entry #3

(this description can also be found on our google doc here)

1. What type of Game will you be creating?

Our game will be a turn based strategy, with movement and activity set to a 4 by 4 grid. The game will alternate between player turns and enemy turns, and the player must maneuver their characters around the map according to the which character has what attributes, the placement of enemies on the map and their expected activity, and the variables on the map itself, in order to fulfill a certain requirement to advance to the next level,

2. What is the quintessential experience you want the player to feel?

We want the player to feel excitement and heroism. Excitement will come from the threat that comes from an enemy that outnumbers the player's characters and actively pursues them both established in the plot and experienced in gameplay. Heroism will come from the player's characters' determination to eradicate the large threat to the world despite the personal risks.

3. What is the theme of your game?

The themes are action, adventure, and man and machine vs. nature and machine, The action and adventure themes come from the combat that is the center of the gameplay, where characters battle enemies and progress through the world and discover more and more information concerning the plot. Man and machine vs. Nature and machine comes from the main characters vs. the main antagonists. The main character and its party consists of robots and surviving humans, while the antagonists consist of plant-like zombies and an AI controlling them all.

4. Provide an initial storyline

The main character, an android, awakens with few memories, and steps outside to discover they are in the middle of a zombie-like outbreak. The main character traverses the zombie-infested city and collects "recruits" along the way, consisting of surviving humans and some robots. As the game progresses the player finds out the source of the zombie outbreak. A scientist (gender yet to be determined) was trying to create a perfect AI whose purpose was to help mankind, but this AI, after observing mankind for some time, came the conclusion that humans would work more efficiently as hive minded, plant fused zombies, and releases spores into the city to begin the process. The scientist wants to stop the AI, but is infected. Before the scientist could fully turn, they uploaded their consciousness into the only robot available to them. This is the main character android from the beginning of the game. The android and it's recruits then make their way to the AI controlling the zombies and defeat it.