And So it Begins

We started this week off with a bit of research. On Monday we played Roborally to get some ideas of our game and its world. It was a fun game where you are racing with other robots in order to get to a "goal". The environment you are working through has obstacles such as spinning tiles, conveyor belts, and holes. It was a fun game and gave us some ideas on how we can make our environment be a bit more interactive. This will be well with some of the other changes we are making with the game.

We are taking out the puzzles (at least for now) and focusing mainly on the combat against other robots. Our protagonist will be fighting in a factory that has conveyor belts, pits, etc. against the other robots. This will make it so that the player will need to pay closer attention to his surroundings. This will also do some interesting thing with the time mechanic.

For this week, I've got a box that is taking the player's commands and responding appropriately. As a placeholder for the enemy bots I have a sphere. The sphere has a simple "AI" where it wanders around until it gets within a certain distance of the player at which point it closes in for an attack. The player can also attack the enemy. Damage is taken and one or the other will successfully die. I also have it so that the enemy will drop and item which the player will pick up. I also have it so that the player can slowdown and speedup time. The way we depict this is by having the player always moving the same while everything else will go slower or faster. I ended on just adjusting velocities of the other items in order to get the speed changes to work.

So far I have written seven scripts. The enemy controller, enemy status, player controller, player attack control, player status, item script for picking up, and the camera control that follows the player so that he remains in view. This amounts to about 700 lines of code (many more if you count the lines that have been cleaned out from failed attempts).

Next I'm going to work on getting the level in place. This will involve scripts for conveyor belts, pits, turning areas, and crushers for now. If I get a design I can build the level, otherwise I will just work on the functionality so that it can be put in.

Group and Game Assignments

My game was not chosen as one of the lucky seven to be created in class. Downer. In other news I'm playing musical chairs as far as groups go. First I was assigned to a group with one other programmer, an artist, and a producer. Then one of my instructors asked if I would switch to a group with only one programmer because that programmer didn't think they could keep up by themselves. That is, trade places with that programmer.

Before I continue, let describe some of my view points about this class. These projects and assignments are to prepare us to design games professionally. It is practice for a job, and therefore I treat it as if it were a job. That means, if the boss wants me to do something, I do it. I told my instructors that I would be willing to make the switch if that is what they wanted, and it happened. So now I am in a group with a producer, two artist, and myself (the sole programmer). Let's hope I didn't bite off more than I can chew. :)

That said, our game is about battle and time manipulation, with puzzles. The player is a robot in a factory that is battling other robots in order to turn off the malfunctioning Main-Frame computer. The robot also has time capabilities that allow it to speedup and slowdown time. This manipulation takes up some energy. Puzzles will be set up in certain places that will need different speeds of time in order to solve. The robot can also change the time of certain other Bots for a certain amount of... well, time.

The scope of the game seems to be a bit big and I'm sure we will cut it down a bit, but this is where we are starting. My first task is to figure out all that I need to get done and then make myself a schedule. I'm also going to see different ways I can do the time manipulation in Unity.

The New Semester Starts

The beginning of a new semester with new projects. Our first week back we are setting up appointment to pitch a game we would like to create in class. I've got a game and I've got an appointment. Let's hope the pitch goes well.