studio-gameOn

Today we made some improvements to the player states and began adding new features. Colin and Christina fixed a few bugs and improved the state management systems. Alex also made some improvements on the collissions and actions, to fix some bugs in that system; whilst Josh implemented character rolling, the ability for the player to grab and throw bottles and assisted Alex with his mapping work.

~Christina

Today the programming team has made some significant progress. The overhaul to the game system architecture has been completed so the character body is now one body comprised of three shape objects. This enhances the character object so he can be positioned dynamically (eg, Crouch, slide, etc). The action key has started to come into effect with the character now swinging on the chandelier in the first stage. The character movement has been greatly improved so stuntman now has a more natural and smooth feel to his movements.

Josh T

The programming team has made a little progress today. After realising what is needed to be done to get the character to crawl and slide, we have had to do an overhaul of how the system architecture works. In doing this we’ve had to adjust where different sensors are etc. Tomorrow we will still probably be working on sensors, character movements and the core system architecture.

Josh T

Today the programming team began expanding our prototype, planning for the week ahead. Colin and Christina worked hard giving our Stunt Man more realistic movement, adding a range of tweaks, creating more control and filled in more player animations. Alex began work on action sensitive hotspots and valve collisions.

It’s almost impossible to believe that a fortnight ago, I was enjoying the end of my holidays.  It was less than two weeks ago that we ferried furniture and machines into the fishtank at the top of the QUT creative industries building we now call a studio.  It was less than two weeks ago that four programmers sat down and began learning to program in ActionScript3 for the first time.  And it was less than 2 weeks from project commencement that the first prototype level was due!

Today was always going to be a big one, it was a major milestone for the studio, and in the end, it was up to the programmers to ensure that the prototype was in working order for inspection by the industry board.  Needless to say, it was one of THOSE afternoons.

Add sound, add art, construct level barriers, tweak physics … it all sounds so straightforward when it’s put that way.

Christina devoted her morning to the implementation of sounds, and working on the menu system.  Alex continued improving the overall engine, wrapping new features in, and debugging.  Josh worked on fine tuning the controls while I established the boundaries for the levels and modified the physics so that the player could navigate through each challenge successfully and bug free.  Again, there was considerable task overlap, as we frequently assisted one another and shared the load.  By lunch time, we had a working prototype … the only essential task remaining was the incorporation of sound and the final background image for level 1.

Sniffing an early victory, we also decided to add animated characters rather than the stills … which triggered a considerable degree of consternation by breaking the whole program.  After an intense debugging session, Rory, our producer, decided that we should go back to the pre-lunch prototype that worked, but lacked a significant amount of improvements.  As he was about to commit the reset, Alex identified the issue, and had us up and running again with half an hour to spare.  To our surprise, and probably the shock of the rest of the studio, we made it!  I am sure I saw a distraught Pixel and an optimistic, grinning Ian exchange Rubles once it was submitted … mind you, that may have been more to do with their Unreal Tournament deathmatch!

Project B-Grade had sound (pretty dodgy, but it was there), it had art (incredible art, a quick shout out to the art team who really delivered … those guys are GOOD!), it had working physics, and … ok, it has bugs … a few little bugs, mostly concealed or of minor influence at this stage … and let’s face it, what’s a good prototype without a few nagging glitches?   It worked, and studio manager Shez told us we had exceeded expectations … which capped off the week’s efforts quite nicely

So now we await the Industry Board’s feedback and try to forget ActionScript3 exists until Monday morning.

Colin

Another usual day for programmers. Josh worked on improving the camera’s movement and also modified
character controls to better suit the environment and the requirements
of the designers. Alex wrapped the existing code into the engine and developed the level start and exit markers. Colin worked to improve game-play and began constructing the first prototype game level using the latest code. I worked on the sound effect and music’s volume control for the options menu.

Christina

Today the programming team made some more satisfactory progress. After we had a visit from Duncan (3 Bloke Studios), the team was revitalised and was given some key direction in what elements were essential to get a working prototype happening as quickly as possible. The rest of the day revolved around assertaining artwork from the art team, programming the camera to move with the lead character and inserting static frames for the character to interact with player movements.

Josh Taylor

It’s been over a week now, and the programming team (Josh T., Alex, Christina and myself) are enjoying a strong sense of unity as we push on with the development of the engine and features required to implement the game design as specified. While part-timer, Christina, was absent today, the rest of us snuck out this morning (with a steady supply of morale boosting M&Ms) and found a quiet place to finalise the overall architecture of the program. With a newfound sense of direction, and a strong sense of optimism we came to a consesus … “This works, that works and this part is 90% there … let’s put it all together!!!”

Ahh, the best laid plans!!! We then spent the afternoon watching as a sequence of ’shoulds’ made the demoralising transition to ’should haves’. Still, the code is now assembled into one large package and , as I scribe this blog, the redoubtable Alex is making the (theoretical) final touches to the all important Contact code which, once nailed … it’s a milestone as far as we are concerned.

Today involved a lot of collaborative work as each of us explained how various things needed to be integrated and we worked on reolving various issues. Tomorrow will be more individual work as we push forward to deliver a full prototype level by Friday afternoon.

Colin

Today the super programming team was super. Christina began work on the game menu, Alex worked on a “map creator”, Colin argued with the Physics collision and Josh tweaked control and player class code.  The team is nearing a point of integration with the Design and Art team. The team also discussed this weeks tasks and is feeling confident that we will meet our objectives.

Had a visit from the industry board. Was really good. Very insightful. The main character for the game (we call him “Captain block”) is now moving gracefully, like a swan on heat. Some collision detection is still being nutted out but out look is very good.

Josh Taylor