pabloverse-nathan

[pabloverse-nathan]

For my feedback , I showed all the things I made for the project to my brother because this is the quickest and easiest way of me obtaining feedback .

The first thing he said that he liked was the lose screen and how simple it is with the colours on the black and white background .

Also he said that for the logo I could make it look better by adding some sort of coloured border to make it look more appealing .

I told him that I didn’t have a win screen because you weren’t supposed to win the game and that there was only the high score that would have popped up telling you .

I was also going to make a brick model but Maya wouldn’t load on my pc because I don’t think it’s powerful enough .

The improved work will be posted here :

Final evaluation:

The thing that has probably gone the best in this project is making all of the assets for the game like the logo and and things like that .

The main way that I have had to work is by getting tutorials on YouTube

Working in lockdown is pretty good in terms of not having to travel anywhere but it’s hard to do some pieces without help .

The thing that could of gone better is actually being able to fully complete the game but I couldn’t figure out how to do it .

The pcs at the college are better than my one because on my one if unreal has too much going on it starts to slow down .

I think the open brief was fine because it gave the option of making a board game or making It in unreal engine .

I don’t really want to have to make anything too complicated at home using unreal because the steps taken aren’t really explained much in a YouTube tutorial video .

[pabloverse-nathan]

Week 4

Media -

The first thing I played was rocket league and my favourite thing about the game is trading because you can trade all of these black markets for different ones and customise your car .

The gameplay is pretty good aswell and they got some good music on there .

I also played for a horizon 4 which is probably one of the best games out there and the graphics look really good still for a 2 year old game

There is more customization in this game than there is for 1,2 and 3 but the only thing I want to see is skill based matchmaking.

Polish something-

For the polishing , I took out the automatic replay and I added in the retry button so you have to click the button to go back to the play screen.

This is useful because it will allow players to play the game from the start every time they lose and gives it a more interactive feel.

I also made a lose screen and put it into the background of the button and I also changed the button’s colour.

When you click the retry button it brings you back to the start of the game

For the game itself I borrowed someone's free project from the unreal website.

Solved problem-

For me I had a problem with getting the lose screen into unreal engine as a .psd file so what I did was I went and loaded photoshop back up and then went to file and then I saved it as a .png and then I loaded up Unreal and dragged the png file into the empty space and it was in so then I just coverted it into a sprite and added it into the lose screen widget. 

These are the two files and one of them says .psd and the other one says .png so that is what was needed to fix it.

Theoretical Problem-

If I wanted to make this game multiplayer where people could go on the internet and battle other people to get the highest score then I wouldn't know where to start .

To counter this, there might be some tutorials on YouTube on how to do it or maybe there’s some info or tutorials on the unreal engine website which has been left by other users.

I also wouldn't know how to get it uploaded to steam or Epic but you could probably find that on the internet or get a steam live chat because they should know what to do seeing as they work for the company.

Recording feedback -

For the feedback I can probably just let one of my family play it and tell me what they think of it and what is needed to improve it. I can also put it on YouTube or something and there might be random comments or I can send it to friends on Instagram and see what they think about my work . 

They can then just say what they like about what I’ve made and what they think I need to improve on. I can save all of their feedback on my iPhone’s notepad or maybe on a tumblr post.

Weekly Reflection -

The thing that has gone well this week is making the lose screen in photoshop because I think it looks nice with the coloured button.

The thing that could have gone better is being able to make a detailed lose screen but I’m bad at drawing and I couldn't fit the whole word loser onto the photoshop page.

The thing that I’m planning to do next week is make a model of a brick that could be used in the game.

[pabloverse-nathan]

My title screen

[pabloverse-nathan]

Week 3 18/01/21

Media -

The first thing that I did was play assassins creed black flag a second time because the last time I played it must have been 5-6 years ago and the thing that stood out about that game for me is the fact that one second you go around assassinating people and the next second you can just play as a pirate and sink other ships while listening to shanties .

The next thing I played was GTA V and the thing I mostly like about gta is flying all of the different type of aircrafts because I like the way that they handle and some of them are unique because one of the is a tiny one with a rocket boost and then you have this massive plane that has 4 boosters .

Audience needs -

1.The first thing that the audience needs is a fun to play game otherwise they’ll lose interest and there’s no point in making it .

2.The next thing they need is easy controls so that anyone can pick it up and play just like Tetris you only need 2 buttons

3.My game will also need a leaderboard or some point where you can win and a lose screen where you have to retry

4.The audience will also need some sort of music or sound effects for the game otherwise it will probably be hard to keep your focus on the game

5.The last thing that the game needs is a good title screen / logo so that it distincts the game from all other games that are the same genre .

This is the Tetris logo which uses one of it shapes from the game in the title

Presenting the outcome -

I will be using YouTube to present the outcome of the game because i feel it’s probably the easiest platform to use

It’s only gonna be one player but you can take it in turns .

Making something new-

I'm using a tutorial to make a high score so that it comes up every time you load up the game.

For this tutorial though it counts the shots fired and loads the save game up that it creates to remember the score.

In this photo it says 24 shots

And then when you reload the game and shoot again, It says 25 so it saves from last time .

It starts creating new save files aswell.

The code is using a branch to check if a save game exists and if one does exist then it will make an overwrite to update the numbers. If one doesn't exist then one will be made.

Win lose states- 

For the win state I am planning on making just a high score that loads up every time you start the game. There might be tutorials online on how to do this.If this gets too complicated I will probably have to make a certain amount of points to win but I want to avoid that .

For the loss state It will be just a pop up with a button saying reload game and maybe a quit button.

Implementation of win and loss screens-

The win screen won’t be there because it’s just going to be a saved high score and I could try and add a screen popup widget in if you beat the high score.

It would probably be made in photoshop because it will be better quality than pen and paper.

If I was going to have a win screen It would be if you hit a certain target of points which then will cause a win screen to pop up.

For my loss screen I’m just gonna use the restart button popup so that you can retry or I can try to add a quit button as well .

Weekly reflection -

I think that I haven’t done too good this week because I will have to find a tutorial on YouTube on how to make a Tetris / stacker game so that I can make mine because I want it to be 2d and I want the blocks to move left and right by themselves .

It’s probably easier going in because It’s easier to get help when you’re there.

The think that went well is probably the media section.

Next week I’m planning to start making the game using tutorials from YouTube and help on the internet.

[pabloverse-nathan]

Week 2 post (11/01/21)

Media I have used this week:

Games- the first game I have been playing this week is rainbow six siege and the thing that stands out for me in this game is the physics and tactical gameplay. Most of the things you look at in this game can be broken like you can blow up walls and stuff. 

For the tactical side you have to use drones to gather intel and gadgets in defense mode to protect the objective.

The only wierd thing about the physics in this game is how if you shoot somethings like a TV a few times it will begin to crumble into nothing .

Tv show- South park 

The thing that keeps south park interesting is the humor . Because after all of the seasons they’ve used the same animation style and it still manages to be enjoyable to watch . The way the add in the jokes flows naturally and they can also be out of no where and that’s what keeps you watching.

Culteral sources:

1. For the stacker game instead of cakes I could use smashed up cars so its like you’re in a scrapyard and all of the different types of cars can be .

In games that are based in china like sleeping dogs , they use these run down cars and also small cars and vans but in the UK you see different types of cars so there could maybe be a few different levels using different cars 

2. Pinball 

In 1966, the first solid state electronic pinball machine called spirit of 76 was released and it was then followed by pinball which used a video screen in 1998

 .

Pinball was originally made in 1871 by an inventor in Ohio and pinball originated from a century old game called Bagatelle which has a similar layout and concept and his idea was just pretty much improvements on Bagatelle and bagatelle was made in Italy .

Nowadays there’s different spinoff versions like sonic spinball which was on the megadrive .

3.Space Invader-

Space Invaders is a game that takes advantage of colours because without colours it wouldnt really be as fun to play . You can still get space invaders on the switch which shows that people still enjoy it and they also have different spin offs to surive.

Space invaders uses the principle that you are shooting aliens out of the sky so even in 1978 people were thinking about aliens.

4.Asteroids-

This is another game which is based on space and uses physics like gravity because of the way the asteroids move freely in space . The spacecraft also has floatiness to show that theres no gravity. The game was made in 1979 so could have been inspired by the 1969 moon landing.

5.Stacker -

This arcade machine was a more recent one from 2004 and it could be found all over the world in places like Spain and the UK. The company was founded in Australia called LAI games and I would have expected it to be created in Japan because thats usually were you see arcade machines like this.

Furthur audience discussion

1.The games that I have used for the culteral sources have got bright coloured lights. For example space invaders , each row of the different enemies is different colours .This is good to make the game look interesting .

2.Like in these culteral games I have looked at , there are no real main characters so what I was thinking is just to make the game without a character or try to make a crane animation but it might be too hard without photoshop.

3. I could take photos from google that been taken then they can be  the backgrounds for different game levels  to match the neon bars you have to stack .Kind of like cyberpunk cities and how they have neon.

Research being implemented-

The things that I am going to take forward from my research is that from some pinball games you have this neon glow effect to them and it makes them attractive so I was thinking instead of cakes I could use neon glowing bars as the thing to be stacked in my game.

The thing that I want to try and leave behind is the whole cake idea because the whole idea of having a game based around cakes just seems a bit boring and It wouldn’t really keep the attention of older players who are playing the game and the age range would end up being for very young toddlers which is not want I want really.

Unreal engine timer-

From YouTube I found a tutorial on how to add a timer and It showed me how to make a retry button pop up as soon as the timer finished so then I tested It and it worked so this could be used for the stacking level timer.

As soon as you click retry the level will reset.

This is the code for the timer set up.

It starts with an event tick and it uses 2 branches and 2 integers called seconds and minutes. 

If the seconds don't equal 0 then it will start to take 1 away each time .

At the end it shows the mouse cursor and pauses the game when the widget pops up so you can click restart.

There are 2 bindings that are the same for minutes and seconds.

This is the code in the level blueprint .

Weekly Reflection-

I think the thing that has gone well in the past week is learning how to make the timer for the game because it should help me with the project. Also deciding not to use cakes in the game was good.

The thing that could have gone better is the cultural research because I didn’t think there was much related to the arcade game stacker but now that I think of it Tetris might have been related.

What I’m planning to do next week is design a title screen .

[pabloverse-nathan]

Stephen Hawking

Stephen’s theory resolves a cosmic paradox and it also paints a path for astronomers to find evidence of existing parallel universes.

The thing that this theory resolves is that einstein said the universe began nearly 14 billion years ago.

Stephen and Hartle’s idea used a different theory called quantum mechanics to explain how the Universe arose from nothingness.

There would be other universes out there that have earth but with subtle changes like dinosaurs not going extinct.

Hawking’s final paper of work has solved the puzzle by drawing on new mathematical techniques developed to study another branch of physics called string theory.

Multiverse Opinion :

I think that there probably is other universes out there and that some of them are probably similar but the thing is I don’t think that it matters that much because like Tyson said that there may be different physics on different planets so you might just get there and just blow up.

[pabloverse-nathan]

Neil DeGrasse Tyson

Neil said that the community thinks that the laws of physics are set in the early stages of development of the universe. And also quantum fluctuations would be responsible for another universe to have slightly different laws of physics.

The multiverses will never be able to see each other unless they overlap .

It also might be dangerous to go to another multiverse because the different laws of physics might harm you because of different electron levels.

[pabloverse-nathan]

Brian Greene

Briane Greene’s nine types,

Here are the nine types of multiverse that Brian predicts.

1.Quilted- This multiverse will only work in an infinite universe and this is where something will happen an infinite number of times and the speed of light will stop us knowing about the other events.

2.Inflationary- The inflationary multiverse is composed of various pockets in which inflation fields collapse and form new universes.

3.Brane-  The brane multiverse version postulates that our entire universe exists on a membrane which floats in a higher dimension or "bulk". In this bulk, there are other membranes with their own universes. These universes can interact with one another, and when they collide, the violence and energy produced is more than enough to give rise to a big bang.

4. Cyclic- The cyclic multiverse has multiple branes that have collided, causing Big Bangs. The universes bounce back and pass through time until they are pulled back together and again collide again , which causes the old content to be destroyed and new content to be made.

5.Landscape- The landscape multiverse relies on the string theory.Quantum fluctuations will cause a lower energy level .This then creates a pocket in the surrounding space

6. Quantum- The quantum multiverse creates a new universe when a diversion in events occurs

7.Holographic- The holographic multiverse is made from the theory that  at the surface area of a space can encode the contents of the volume of the region.

8.Simulated-   The simulated multiverse exists on complex computer systems that simulate entire universes.

9. Ultimate-  The ultimate multiverse contains every mathematically possible universe under different laws of physics.

[pabloverse-nathan]

Max tegmark

Max tegmark’s four levels ,

Max is a Swedish American physicist who is a co founder of the future of life institute . He also also received donations from Elon musk to investigate existential risk from artificial intelligence.

His research mainly focused on cosmology combining the theoretical work with new measurements to place on cosmological models and their free parameters.

1. He had a prediction of cosmic inflation which is the existance of an infinite universe. He said that all of the universe will have the same physics laws and conditions 

2. The whole of the universe is always expanding infinitely but some regions stop expanding and form gas bubbles which may break and form different physical constants

3.  Tegmark argues that a Level III multiverse does not contain more possibilities in the Hubble volume than a Level I or Level II multiverse. In effect, all the different "worlds" created by "splits" in a Level III multiverse with the same physical constants can be found in some Hubble volume in a Level I multiverse

4. This level considers all universes to be equally real which can be described by different mathematical structures.

[pabloverse-nathan]

Hugh Everett,

Hugh was an American physicist who gave the idea of the many worlds interpretation . The MWI idea is that the Shrödinger equation never collapses and that all possibilities of a quantum superstition are real .

Nearer the end of his life , he received more credibility for his MWI theory with the discovery of quantum decoherence and has received attention for many decades .

[pabloverse-nathan]

Multi verse

The Cosmological Multiverse , the story behind the this is that the universe expanded really fast after the Big Bang and then there was fluctuations that caused other universes to exist . The universes were not connected to each over so they were free to develop separately . They may have things like different physics.

String theory ,

The idea here is that there is over billions of universes which all have slightly different versions of each over .

Quantum multiverse ,

The quantum multiverse is where there is other versions of yourself in different universes and every single decision you make will reflect on the other versions of you . This would lead to different particles

The backwards universe ,

This is the theory where the Big Bang created only two universes which where the one filled with matter and the one filled with anti matter. There would also be a new type of particle .

It is also a parallel world where everyone thing is reversed for example up would be down .

[pabloverse-nathan]

Week 1 work  04/01/2021

Target audience, 

For my game the target audience would be kids ages 5-12. This is mainly because of the reason that these little kids are more likely to own a nintendo switch instead of an xbox because the parents wil think that the switch is more child friendly and get them one of those. And on the nintendo Eshop you can find all of these third party games that have been made so it would probably be easier to get a smaller game published on the switch,

The switch is also thought of a family console so it will be in many living rooms so that adults can also play the game aswell .

Carnival is a good example as it’s rated E for everyone 

There’s not alot of writing to the stacker game so younger kids wont have to go through menus you just click play or exit and the game will play or exit.

Game names;

1. Cake stack

2. Cake towers

3.Cake attack

4.Cake Baker

5.Cake frenzy

6.Cake Quake 

7.Cake maker

8.Cake Build

9.Cake earthquake 

10. Cake overtake 

I’m going to use Cake Quake because it’s short and snappy which also makes it memorable .

Work Planning,

For my work I am going to have to make the outline of the area for the cake stacking arcade game and then I will have to design the cakes on paper and then take a picture of the designs to import into unreal engine . Then I will have to make the cake models in Maya . Next I would have to make a grid so that the cake moves left and right in-between the grids to be dropped. I would also reduce gravity a bit so it would give it a floaty drop. I would also want to add a weight mechanic so you would have to balance out the cake to make sure it doesn’t topple but i’m not sure if i can do that.

This is the font that I will use for the menu and the screen that tells you you stack the cakes.

The cakes themselves will be rectangle and will look similar to this (but with more detail)

Covid- project affections-,

For this project we can’t go into the college to make the game . So the way that this has affected me is that I dont have access to photoshop but to counter this I I can use Maya and draw things on paper to upload into unreal engine . Also if there is something I’m not sure how to do It’s better to see how to do it in person but I can always just use discord and ask for help .

It can also affect the learning of new ways on how to code and different techniques on how to make assets for the game . But there is always resources online that can be used as long as they are using an up to date version of the apps .

[pabloverse-nathan]

Arcade game ideas

Idea #1 , An arcade stacking game .

For this game , I will make the game similar to the arcade game stacker but i will use cakes as the thing that you need to stack . 

I will make the design for the cakes by drawing them on paper and uploading the images to unreal to use for the cakes . The cake will decrease in size when a certain amount of them have been stacked so if you stack 20 the size of the cake you have to stack will be split in half . There will be a timer of 1 minute where you have to stack as many as you can before it runs out to get a high score. The space bar will be used to place the cakes down.

This type of game was pretty popular because you could always find one in an arcade but they’re not as common anymore .

Idea #2, 

For my second idea, I would be making a game where you are in a U.F.O and you have to fly around avoiding obstacles like birds and airoplanes . You get more points for avoiding larger obstacles and less points for avoiding the smaller obstacles . 

There will also be a 1 minute timer to try and get the high score and once the timer is up the game finishes

It will kind of be like the game asteroids but instead of shooting objects , you avoid them and the background will be blue and white to represent the clouds. The assets will probably have to be hand drawn because i don’t have photoshop.

Idea#3,

A brick breaker game, This will be where you launch a ball at the bottom of the screen and you have to keep deflecting the ball with the bar at the bottom to break the bricks .

The bricks appearance will be like normal bricks and as soon as you finish the level a new one will spawn in .

There will be a time limit to get as much of a high score as you can and as soon as you clear 2 levels , the bricks will then have 2 hp each and will need to be hit twice by a ball . You will get two lives which is 2 balls.

Idea choice, 

For the brick breaker idea , I don’t think it would be as much of a prefered choice over the other 2 ideas because it’s hard to keep focus on a slow paced game which will probably make it boring for some people.

Next is the U.F.O idea which I think is more interesing than the brick breaker one but is probably the hardest one to make so that means that I will probably be making the stacker one because it can be addictive and also fast paced where you have to focus .

For the game I plan on using Maya and Unreal Engine . I will use Maya to make the cake shaped models and I will use Unreal to make the game . I would have used photoshop but I dont have access at home so I can just draw the cake design on paper and upload it to unreal engine to use as a sprite.