saianne-capstone

[saianne-capstone]

Check-in #9 // Reflection Video

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Check-in #8

Dealing with the music and sound effects had to be one of the most irrationally difficult problems I had while coding the last bits of the game. The background music that I had initially chose was too big of a file and wouldn't upload so I had to fin another one. Luckily the second one only gave me a runaround for two hours because I was trying to figure out why is still didn't want to play no matter how many times I coded it in. Luckily everything else that I added sound effects too were corporative and coding went easily for them.

Coding has never been something I spent time learning so its not my strong-suit but I think with the hand I have been dealt with this capstone project, I've done the best that I could. It's playable, it has key interactivity and there are both music and sound effects. If I had spent all ten weeks working on this version of the project It would have been much better than it is now, but at least I have recouped what I once had on Unity before my files became corrupted.

I was easily able to download my game as a ZIP file and upload it to itch.io! this is the link to my game and despite all of the problems I had, I am really proud of what I was able to accomplish. If you have a chance to play the game, I'd love to see when you do so! I left the comments open on the page so people can give feedback or talk to other players if they'd like!

[saianne-capstone]

Check-in #7

My last update was a little dramatic, but I still have not forgiven myself nor Unity for what happened to my almost finished game. As of right now, My project is in shattered piles of code as I try to rewrite my game into another coding language, java script vs. C#. Java script is much easier for me in the aspect of understanding what I am writing, but also difficult because all of the code I had already written was already serving it purpose. I can't help but mourn what once was as I try to re-code moving and the camera following the player in P5.js. The website editor was not actually intended to create games, rather NFTs, but it seems to be serving my purpose so far.

Lines upon lines of code, all neatly labeled and categorized. Having them all on one file rather than compartmentalized helps me. It made my professor grimace when he saw it during my other class today but he gave me a lot of useful feedback that will hopefully fix some of the issues that I had been running into. Every time I see the player character model I wince though because in Unity it was possible to have an animated character but I haven't been able to find a tutorial that works in P5.js that can replicate the same effect.

Below is a screenshot of what I see when I log into the project!>>

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Check-in #6

It's all gone. Every single working file I ever had for Unity, gone. Lost to corruption. I should have known better than to try and work between two vastly different operating systems.

Before this evening, this was going to be an excited update on how far I had progressed with my project and hopefully would be able to peer review the day after. Now I am just in shambles. My entire project, down to the few assets that I had on my laptop were corrupted somehow. I don't even use that laptop for anything other than school work so I don't know how it could have happened.

Confusion and shock turned into anger and then sadness as every video and website I looked at to try and reverse the corruption led me to dead ends. My files were gone and there was nothing I could do but pull together what was left of my assets and re-download the few files that I had stashed on my drive. After an extensive breakdown and shower of course.

Unity truly is dead to me now, at least for the time being. Since I am in a class that is actively using P5.js, that is what I have turned to in order to try and create a playable game this late in the semester.

[saianne-capstone]

Check-in #5

It has been a second since the last update, how is everyone doing? Good good! I have been in the coding trenches trying my best to figure out how I am going to make the mechanics of this game actually work. It seem very easy to code, very straight forward at least but I am having a difficult time. I have no idea why, but Unity doesn't seem to like my desktop, a Mac, or my laptop, a windows, and tries to make both of them explode any time I try to code ANYTHING.

So far I have the movements coded in, left, right, jump, but that where it ends. Right as I was trying to start the coding process, Unity updates for Mac and now most of the tutorials I try to follow try to get me to use mechanics that no longer exist in the Unity library so I get left with error codes. When the player jumps, they float down like a feather unaffected by gravity when every other movement reacts perfectly as intended. I've tried multiple different tutorials on how to fix this, but nothing seems to work. I even went as far as asking Ai, scandalous I know, to try and explain what I did wrong in my code. Seeing as the update was so recent, theres not many tutorials on how to use if or much trouble shooting that I can find online. I will simply just have to grit my teeth and try my best to work through it.

Other than that, I have been working on having the camera follow the player as they move through the level. The next part I will be working on is the priorities the player will be tasked with collecting. I have a simple idea on how the Ui, user interface, is going to look for this feature, but it is a matter of coding it into the game that I am a little worried about. I have a couple of ways to have the priorities the player collect to disappear and show up in the Ui but until I code it in, I don't know which I am going to choose.

On the social media portion of this project, I am having a harder time getting my game out there than I thought I would. I think it is a mixture of when I am posting and how often, seeing as many others will post multiple times a day, and I just don't have time to do that. Currently, I don't have any donations on my kofi, but I expected that because my account doesn't get that many views.

below are the finished backgrounds>

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Check-in #4

The past week or so has been very project and art focused. After finishing the sketches off for the background I have been hard at work on the color tests and seeing how I want to go about the final versions of these backgrounds. Initially I want to vector the backgrounds using Adobe Illustrator but as I worked through the tutorial level, I realized that it was going to take way longer than I expected. If I had more time to complete the game I would 100% vector the images but as of right now, I have a little less than two months to completely finish the game for playing. I've decided that I was just going to render the backgrounds in Procreate that way they'll still be high quality but can be finished in a much more timely manner.

Above is what I have so far for the finalized colors and general sketch line art. I will be going though and finalizing the line art once the coloring is finished.

After I am done with the backgrounds, I will start on the animation sequence for the player character so that Oul, the characters name, can have an animated idle, movement, and jump. When that is completed, I will be finishing up the rest of the assets, such as the Priorities, and the User interface.

[saianne-capstone]

Check-in #3

I don't think that Tumblr likes me very much because once again, I thought this was posted but it was not...

These past two weeks I have been busy trying to finalize the sketches for the backgrounds of the three areas/levels of the game. I have also been focusing on how the player will look along with the priorities that they will be collecting in each level.

Above is the finalized sketch for all four levels of the game including the tutorial level. As it took much time to come to a final sketch, the vectored version is not complete yet. I will try to have them done by the next update.

Above is the sketch page for the finalized title screen/title of the game. It aqlso includes the official character sketch and the main movement key frames that I will need to vectorize so the player is dynamic during game play. Also a beginning for the priority bubbles that the player will be collecting during the levels.

Overall, these couple weeks have been very busy as I try to balance work, school, and this big project. Anyone I tell my schedule to is shocked with how much I am trying to balance and I don't know if their compliments should make me feel proud or embarrassed. I'll be going on a trip next week though so I don't know how much I will be able to get done even if I bring my laptop.

I've also created the Instagram to follow this project! The username is @ priorities_devlog, so feel free to follow there as well to find more informal and constant updates rather than just every two weeks or so.

[saianne-capstone]

Week 2 Check-In

Hello and sorry for the late update! I thought this posted, but I was wrong in the worst way unfortunately... below is what was the original update...

Hi everyone, glad to see you're reading this and I can't wait to tell y'all about whats been going on! For this past week, i've been working on the nitty gritty details that come with developing a games narrative. No one really thinks about just how much dialog and writing goes into a game until they have to write their own. I've also been getting friends and other peers to look at the ideas I have narrative wise and so far I think that I have a working idea of what will eventually be the final product. Similar to other role-play games and simulation type games, my game will let the player make their own character and dictate what they choose to spend their precious time on. As I further develop this idea, the thought of having to do the coding becomes an ever present concern. My ideas for this project seem awesome and fun on paper, but looking at them from a coding standpoint is quickly becoming a great concern.. *sighs into the void* Although the document is well underway, I can already see where I will be finding a difficult time pulling off the ideas I dream of. Thank goodness for peers and friends who have offered their assistance in light of my concerns. Currently, I will be continuing to work on my Workback plan and the game document. Hopefully they'll be done soon and I'll finally get to work on the part of the project that interest me the most, the character design and illustration portions. As I move forward, you all will finally start to see this idea coming into fruition. Thanks for sticking in there! ~Saianne W.

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Introduction Video for all and any who are interested!