Just Say Yes

On the subject of volunteering, the words 'just say yes' are as suitable as any other if not more so. This lecture sought to raise awareness of the benefits of volunteering.



Volunteering was promoted as being beneficial in many different ways and although I've never done much of it myself, I know people who have.

Volunteering does have some good perks, and it was promoted as being a life experience in that you could make an impact on somebody elses' in life. It looks especially good on a job application as it means you are up to the task of a challenge, are willing to help out, and it means you are able to go travelling and see the world. Volunteering was described as being essential to creating an inclusive and mutually supportive society. I agree with this, even if the volunteering is on a small scale, it can have a significant or noticeable impact on the local society.

Other benefits include the experience of working with others, an increase in self esteem and self motivation, and tackling problems such as social exclusion and isolation. For those looking to increase their social circles, this is perhaps one of the best ways to do it, as you will find other people looking to do the exact same thing. Knowing more people with different ethnicities, from different backgrounds will make you a more well-rounded and acceptable person. You can gain management skills and gain work experience. You can work with professionals in the industry and get great advice, whilst at the same time boosting your portfolio. You may even meet contacts that will help recommend you for a job.

I believe volunteering could be used for anything. In the subject of films, games and animation, these forms of media could be voluntary brought to those who would not otherwise have access to them for them to enjoy as much as we do.

Local opportunities in Leeds include the Run for Life, St Gemma's Hospice, Leeds Children's Charity and St George's Crypt, Light Night, Festivals, schools and various other local charities. Globally, volunteering for recognised names like Unicef are nothing but commendable.

Sectors and Services

The UK's Economy is the 7th largest in the world and 3rd largest in Europe, a well globalised country. London is on par with New York in terms of being a financially central city, and the largest industries include aerospace, pharmaceuticals, and oil and gas from the North Sea.

An industry sector is divided into sub sectors; primary, secondary, and tertiary. Primary deals with extraction and harvesting of natural resources. Secondary deals with processing, manufacturing and construction. Tertiary deals with knowledge and services.

There is also the public sector, that is publicly or state owned, such as the NHS, the private sector, which is privately operated usually for profit, and the third sector which is voluntary or charity / community owned businesses for none profit distribution.

Industries include creative, education, health and social work, financial and business, hotels and restaurant, public administration and defence, real estate and renting, tourism, transport, storage and communication, wholesale and retail trade.

The creative industries alone include advertising, architecture, arts and antique markets, crafts, design, designer fashion, film video and photography, software, games and electronic publishing, music and the visual and performing arts, publishing, television and radio.

Most independent games and creative producers are taken care of by government set up fundings with endorsements from the EU. Groups like Creative England help set up the sustainable growth of independent creative business, by developing recognised talent and increasing awareness through publicity via exhibitions and distribution.

Evaluating

Evaluations are something I am very familiar with writing already. My personal way to go about it is to avoid descriptions about what things are, but why they are; how they are, how and why they are not something else. Generally the idea is to explain the reasons behind your point, when making an evaluation. You are not telling someone that a Ferrari is red, but why it is red, because of the connotations associated with the colour red. It is explaining the cause and reasoning behind an approach to something.

Typical things when writing an evaluation are similar to a review. You once again look over what it is you have been asked to do and how your final product compares to the brief you are set.You are looking at the good, the bad, what could be better, what could be worse; the strengths and highlights, unique features and common mistakes, regrets and proudest achievements behind whatever you are evaluating. In the case of evaluating my own work, I tend to follow all these examples.

"Working with Unity and Maya proved somewhat tedious but rewarding as more effort was invested. More time went into introducing subtle changes like particle effects and getting the lighting right than I would have thought, and I spent a good amount of time planning and considering what assets I wanted. I think the planning stage was very helpful, otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to jump into Unity and simple spew out anything that came into my head; it likely would have been a very messy game environment."


Here, in the most recent evaluation I have produced, I address several issues. The difficulty of working with programmes, the problems I encountered and how I overcame them, the consequences of actions I have undertaken in response to unforeseen circumstances of producing my work as intended.


Analysing and reflecting on your own work is critical, but it means reflecting on everything; not just what you did, but why and how you did it, and what you didn't do and for what reasons. To evaluate is to effectively summarise the reasoning behind of the decision behind all other decisions made in critically reviewing work.

Copyright

Copyright is not as modern a concept as people may think. It is designed to prevent theft of original ideas and make more easily established the legal owner of an idea. It refers to the creations of your mind. Inventions, literary and artistic works, symbols, names, images and designs used for commercial purposes are covered under copyright, just as films, games, photos, designs for more abstract things such as fashion, and is even inclusive to food recipes.


Patents, trademarks, registered designs and copyright all categorise under intellectual property. The first patent taken out was for a Typewriter in England, including a QWERTY keyboard. This patent was taken as early as 1714. 


Logos such as the Apple logo, the Nike tick are instantly recognisable and protected under intellectual property rights to prevent other people from using their logo as a Nike product when it is in fact not.


Copyright that is breached is copyright infringement, and there are often legal battles between companies regarding material that each company may believe to be theirs. A recent example of this is Steam and Blizzard's claims to the name DOTA.

During the game's unveiling at Gamescom 2011, Gabe Newell explained Valve's perspective on acquring the trademark, which was that IceFrog desired to develop a direct sequel to DotA and that players would likely recognize it as such. Blizzard filed an opposition against Valve in November 2011, citing the Warcraft III World Editor and their ownership of DotA-Allstars, LLC as a proper claim on the franchise. On May 11, 2012, Blizzard and Valve announced that the dispute had been settled, with Valve retaining the rights to the term "Dota", while Blizzard would change the name of their map, Blizzard DOTA, to "Blizzard All-stars".

Breaches of copyright occur across the world. Another example in China is that of 'Obama Fried Chicken'.

  

Presentations

Making a presentation is about making an informative awareness to an audience of something, introducing an idea; showcasing something, explaining it. Sharing a problem and asking the audience's participation or their opinion of it, explaining your research and revealing your own opinion of it, and detailing and evaluation that summarises your thoughts on the subject.

A presentation that doesn't do these is bad; and the difference between a good presentation and a bad one can mean the successful pitching of an idea or the immediate failure to attract any attention to it.

Presentations should contain as little text as possible; small sections of information for people to be able to immediately identify the purpose of the slide and the information on it, without having to sift through irrelevant details. An explanation should be given over it explaining any other details, including ones already mentioned but more in depth, and ones not mentioned that are relevant but not entirely trivial.

Clip art looks cheap, rushed, and low resolution images make the presentation look ill prepared. Images should be crystal clear and of a high quality, so that people are immediately able to identify what the image is, and can appreciate that time has been taken to cast the image in a good light. A low quality image reflects low quality standards.

Bullet points can be boring and distracting although they work well when used in the right context.

Videos to reinforce points made as both valid and evidenced can greatly increase the impact of the points or ideas you are trying to make, even if in the form of research, and can better hold the audiences attention.


Simplicity, efficiency, connections and a minimal but concise amount of slides are paramount to a good presentation.

Social Media Success

The lecture was about thinking, talking, learning, seeing, hearing connectively, being creative and looking at networks.

In recent times networks have expanded beyond electronic links and can now more accurately describe a vast network of socially linked medias and communications. Facebook is used for more than just talking to friends and keeping up to date. Every modern business and every famous person has a page for them or multiple groups dedicated to them, sometimes with hundreds, a few with millions of followers. Biz Stone, CEO of Twitter, refers to it as an information network, rather than a social network - as news is instantly broadcasted to thousands of people every second.

MySpace is similar but has a particular niche in recent times for musicians and songwriters to host their music and videos, similarly to YouTube. Flickr and Photobucket fill a similar niche for photographers wanting to share their photos, just as DeviantArt is home ground for many traditional and digital artists of an ameteur or professional level.

Skype is a software application that can be used to make free voice or video calls over the internet, and even make group calls and be able to host online conferences.

Who Are You?

In this presentation we were challenged with defining our characteristics through our capabilities, ways of thinking and styles of working. These are the aspects of our personalities that enable people to understand our approach to our work, what it might be like to collaborate with us and how we might perform in a team situation. These are the professional aspects of our personalities and are known as Personality Type Indicators. 
 

We were asked questions such as:

How your personality traits work in your favour or create barriers for others to overcome?

Do do you make judgements about others based on their occupations or the way they dress?

How much do your skills say about your personality?

How do others perceive you?

After answering these questions we were given the necessary steps required to help understand ourselves better and how to more effectively communicate our ideas more clearly. We looked at examples and case studies, people who had also tried to define personalities, through archetypes; something I was familiar with from the first module. Carl Jung, from 1875 to 1961, describes The Self, The Shadow, The Anima or Animus, and The Persona.

Eventually we came to discuss our personality descriptors and were given the means of finding out which we were and what it means. I found my description to be quite accurate but found myself in agreement with other summaries as well, as I don't think you can accurately judge a human being from any single personality test. I came out as an ISPF, as did many other people.

This chart also helps define one's personality by scoring each topic out of 100 on level of importance. The idea is that the more space the red line encompasses, the more balanced your life is. I feel that this is personally more appropriate for judging someone's personality as you are then able to reflect and change on seeing the results, rather than simply dictating what sort of personality you have, and your strengths and weaknesses and vices according to the results.

The Bouncer

The Bouncer is a short film made for Channel 4 I found a while ago but forgot to blog about at the time. The film depicts the recount of a man who acts as a bouncer for a nightclub, who is training in the gym. Only the particular event he is recalling is of the night a rowdy man kills his work friend over a petty dispute, and the Bouncer takes out revenge on him by hunting him down and killing him. The Bouncer is then told to stop strangling his mate in the gym by a police officer, having been lost in his memory; and the audience then comes to the realisation that the gym they are training in is in a prison.

I like this short film because of this interesting plot twist in the narrative, because we are lead to assume that he got away with it until the very end. The film carries many moral messages, both subliminal and explicit, and the audience are left to different interpretations of whether what the bouncer did in the film was right, wrong, or a confusing example of both at once, as in my view it was sort of vigilante justice. I found the story very compelling and it received a lot of positive reviews from people, especially bouncers who can relate to the subject matter and have been through similar experiences. I have read some of these accounts online and found that the film is very truthful and honest to life, no matter how brutal it may be.

Voice Actor - David Hayter

As with the two other voice actors I've mentioned, this one worked primarily in Metal Gear Solid and I don't know them for many other roles; but what I like about him is the distinguishable and unique nature of his voice and how well it fits the character he plays. David Hayter is another of my favourite voice actors. He also has a resemblance to the character he plays.

David says he feels great about portraying the voice of one of the most recognised game characters ever, even though one can get known for voicing any character, and that it is a good way to express himself. This demonstrates that even voice actors can get into character and connect emotionally to the personality they are being asked to, or trying to portray. Even here it's hard to imagine that he is the voice for Snake; his normal voice doesn't sound anything like him, but I suppose that's part of the voice actors job; being able to sound different.

David, like the other VAs, has also done normal acting work but it is his role as Snake that makes him most widely known. This goes to show that even voice actors can have breakthroughs by voice acting a  character just as normal actors can suddenly be catapulted to fame by a successful role in a successful film.

Voice Actor - Phil LaMarr

Undoubtedly one of my favourite voice actors solely because he voiced Samurai Jack, I later found out that he also voiced Vamp in Metal Gear Solid and many other shows and games I used to play in my youth. The fact that one man voiced so many inspirational characters, is an inspiration in itself - especially when he did it so well that I didn't even realise until recent times.

Phil has voiced both old and young characters of various ethnic origins; it was hard for me to put a face on him until I actually saw what he looks like. That is one particularly unique thing about voice actors. If they do their job well enough, the face you match to the voice is that of the character, rather than the person voicing the character. This requires a good level of skill and talent at acting, that famous actors can't achieve in the way that audiences go to see a film because of the actors rather than the characters they play. The same thing might be done with some voice actors, but I don't go out of my way to see films with voice actors I know about.

The rising popularity of video games, animation, and films, along with combinations of the two such as machinima and heavily narrative driven games, means that the call for talented voice actors is on the rise, and I would count Phil LaMarr as one of my primary inspirations.

Voice Actor - Quinton Flynn

I think voice acting isn't as important today as it will grow to be in years to come; film, games and animations are increasingly reliant on actors who are not seen, but heard. Quiton Flynn is one of my favourite voice actors because of the characters and work he has been involved with in so many different things I like; he has played Raiden in Metal Gear Solid 2, Reno in Final Fantasy; Advent Children, Kael'thas in World of Warcraft, as well as providing various and additional voices for countless other games.

The popularity of voice actors is on the rise I think; some claim it is very easy whilst others claim otherwise. Often, notable voice actors for films, games or animations have specifically been already famous people. Now, voice actors are becoming popular by themselves in their own right, and admired for their vocal talent and the range of voices they can use. Voice actors are well considered before they are approached for a a role. The same voice actors have played the different characters and it can be a long time before I realise this if the actor is good enough.

Portal Live Action Film

I watched this a while ago and after recently re-watching it, it's still as good as I remember. Having played the Portal games myself I can relate to what the film is about in relation to the narrative of the actual games.

Watching the making of was fairly interesting but doesn't display anything new. I wasn't expecting much, given it is hardly a high budget Hollywood breakthrough of a film, but does show that even conventional methods of implementing special effects into a film can make a wondrous difference. The film doesn't focus too much on plot although it's clear there is a thought through narrative to the character and the environment, and I think it was made mostly for the viewing experience.

It would be cool to see a full length film of Portal. I think it would be a very interesting concept with a lot of opportunity for interesting shots and cinematography. It would be very CGI heavy and it would take a good story to give sense to the otherwise senseless using portals to travel everywhere, but if it were combined with a genre like crime, I reckon  a Portal film would be a good film if made feature length and high budget.

Cyriak - Bits and Bobs

Some of Cyriak's unused or old animations. Why they're unused I don't know, they're rather funny but equally creepy. I can't help but notice a lot of the time you can see Patrick Stewart.

I'm a fan of Cyriak's other animations and I like seeing things like projects or animations that go unused, so I can see them simply for enjoyment.

What these animations were intended for or why they were not used isn't exactly stated. Cyriak only states that they are 'a compilation of left-over animations I found lurking in the dark corner of my computer'. 

Pure Pwnage

Pure Pwnage was a web show started by two people, Jarett Cale and Geoff Lapaire; based on the lives of flatmates Jeremy and Kyle. Jeremy is a 'pro gamer', or actually just an unemployed man who plays games all day and does not fit at all well in society, and Kyle is going to film school and he documents Jeremy's life as a gamer including typical day to day challenges. The first episode was picked up by PC Gamer, who featured it in their magazine, and new audiences began crying out for episode 2, then 3, then 4, and it eventually became a fully developed series complete with an actors, a story, character development and all the norms of TV media.

The success of the show lead to a Canadian TV station signing them on to produce a TV show. I think this is an admirable story about the power of the internet reaching to audiences that were never previously targeted in general mass media, and it is generally good to see them where they are now as I have followed their progress over the years since they started with my two brothers. Catchphrases from the show are now part of gaming culture, and is the indisputable source of 'Boom headshot!'. The show also makes references to popular gaming culture, so gamers and people with an interest in gaming alike can refer and relate to it. As a gamer myself I still find it hilarious and even my parents make the occasional reference to it now and then.

The show is usually only available in Canada but there are a few episodes available on YouTube and likewise over the internet. They have since stopped making the webseries. given their new schedule and the accidental death by car-crash of one of their actors in the show.

Metalocalypse

Metalocalypse follows the lives of the death metal band Deathklok- the most successful cultural force of entertainment in history (at least, in this fictional universe).The idea for the series came about after creator Brendon Small asked what would happen if there was a death metal band that was fifty times as famous and successful The Beatles, and what would happen if the bandmembers happened to be incompetent idiots who didn't know or care for anything else outside of being death metal.

The show became a success and a 4th series has recently began airing. Demographically it targets 18 - 30 year olds, and includes a lot of violence, drinking, drug use, and typical stereotypical activities undertaken by famous rockstars. Some of the episodes revolve around minor and trivial problems that the Band to to great lengths to solve, perhaps even unnecessary lengths.

To be honest there's so little they could do to make the show better besides promise people they won't stop making it. As a general supporter of the death metal genre overall it's both relevant to my interests and funny as hell. There is a real narrative behind the show but the band doesn't really know about it, and is usually the focus of the ending episodes of each series.

Diablo III Trailer.

The highly anticipated additional to the Diablo series, Diablo 3, was released today: and whilst I myself have not been anticipating it as much as others, my interest in the game did pick up significantly once I watched a few trailers and cinematics. I am familiar with the game on a mutual level. I haven't played any of the preceding games, but like Diablo III, I know them to a small extent.

Firstly when I watched this trailer I couldn't but admire the animation in it, at first made to look like an illustration in a book becomes a fully realised war between the factions of Heaven and Hell. The occasional pauses or slowed down moments remind me of Zack Snyder's "300".

It then cuts to an equally admirable but more realistic 3D animation that takes place in the presumed present times, as opposed to the past time of the war we saw in the book. As a sequel, the trailer doesn't need to establish as much story as most games do, as most players will already be familiar with it. However, even for people like me - who only know about Diablo and it's story through what they have willingly gone out of their way to learn; it makes a lot of sense and I want to play it all the more.

This is probably the video that assured me I would download the game and play it on the night it was released. Whilst that didn't actually happen, and I do intended to get it downloaded and play it when I can, it was this video that changed my mind completely. It's strange to think that of all the gameplay videos and information that was already availible, it was an animation produced by the collaborative efforts of the games production company, Blizzard - and that of an independant animation firm Titmouse, (whom I am also familiar with for producing Metalocalypse) that got me into the game.

The animation is wonderful and I really think the collaboration was a great success. I'm hoping to see more like it for the Warcraft series, because quite frankly that would be awesome.

Moral Combat

Moral Combat is a documentary presenting both sides of an argument on the subject of video game violence and their effect on modern society.


Shot entirely in high-definition video, the full-length feature documentary studies the controversial, polarizing subject of the video game controversy through a series of interviews with experts on both sides of the matter – some believing that violent games should be banned, others supporting their protection under the First Amendment.The film makes extensive use of green screen technology to blend the subject matter being discussed (games, characters, archival news footage) in the background, while keeping the interviewee actively in the shot.


The trailer was uploaded to YouTube on December 27, 2006 and was met with overwhelming concern and dismay from gamers around the globe who felt it sensationalised the topic and serves as a rhetoric piece for anti-games and anti-gamer activists and political figures. The trailer was viewed over 100,000 times in the coming weekend and spurred debate on scores of websites.


Interviewed in the film are leading politicians, journalists, academics, consumer advocates and special interest group executives, game developers, retailers, trade associations and publishers.

                                                                                       - Wiki


My own thoughts on the documentary were that it was fairly unbiased, though I am still sure myself that video game violence is only as bad as the parents of the children playing the games let it become, and that the actions of one radical individual who may take the influence of a video game too far do not accurately represent the majority of gamers. I grew up drawing pictures of people getting their heads cut off and all sorts of violent things; I played violent video games and watch violent films. Yet I'm the least violent person I know, and I have a sense of self responsibility; I don't drink, or smoke, I'm not unhealthy and I see video games as an inspiration. It isn't proper to blame the video game when it is the responsibility of the individual player to decide how they react to it. 


Firstly, game violence is reacted to much more negatively than violence found in any other media; films, books, comics and radio to name some examples. The problem with people buying underage games lies with the parents, and as reported in the documentary, 80% of people playing underage games do so because their parents bought the game for them. It is the parent's responsibility to make sure that the games they are buying are adequate for their child to play.


I myself am familiar with this; my brother's copy of GTA San Andreas was taken back to the store by our parents after they read an article about how the developers removed a sex mini-game. I didn't agree with it back then but I can respect my parents decisions now.


The documentary did provide some good points though. Violence in video games like Postal 2 is agreeably pointless, and does not contribute much to the game. I am a firm believer that violence is dramatic and often necessary for story and narrative, or as part of character development, but when it is involved in the game for nothing but the violence, it shouldn't be involved at all.

Concept Art

This was the first piece of concept art I produced for my environment. I made it gray scale, dark and atmospheric, using silhouettes and generic lighting to portray a story of a feudal land in Japan. I hadn’t worked with Photoshop to make art all that much and it was an advance in the development of my game environment as much as it was an advance of my skills. I had ideas for assets I wanted to make already; torches, buildings, trees and a misty fog.

This was second piece of art I produced and features much of the same I made in my last piece. However, I feel that the sky I used in this one created a much better effect than the gray / black night sky in the last concept art. I acknowledged here I would probably never base my whole environment on one picture, but take the best parts of each picture and utilize each of them in the environment when I would come to make it.

This was the third piece of artwork I made and I decided to test a different source of light to portray a different time of day. This environment is portrayed at sunset, and I kept the theme of using silhouettes and black against the gold light of the sun. I knew I here I wanted my environment to be atmospheric, and I started thinking about sounds – the ones I would like to include and the ones that would be best left out.

My fourth piece of concept art I decided to set in a different landscape; high up in the mountains with rope bridged connecting the temple on each mountain to each other. I feel that this would make a very atmospheric environment and I do not feel up to the challenge of trying to re-create this realistically enough for my own liking in game format. I also realized that the scene does not appear as dark and brooding at daytime and decided I would have it set at night.

My last piece influential on my design philosophy for my environment; it is very atmospheric, and I decided the scene would be set at night, and that I would have a nearby lake in the scene and have assets such as a Shinto shrine introduced into the environment to better reflect the theme of Japanese culture in a fantasy environment. I also liked the idea of a house isolated on the top of a hill, and wanted an isolated home in my own environment.

Environment Music / Inspiration

Whilst developing my environment I did not solely refer to pictures; I listened to relevant and fitting music. As I like to mention, I believe the power of sound is very often underestimated, and music has always been a great source of inspiration for me, often more so than visual pictures. Music can trigger ideas and creativity in me and rather than question it, I simple nod my head and get on with it. It's hardly something to complain about.

That said, many songs I listened to were from the video game I played in my youth, Tenchu 3: Wrath of Heaven. It was a very fun game to play and pretty much cemented my interest in everything old-Japanese for years after, and even before I had an active interest in historical figures like the Shogun and samurai.

I listened to this music whilst developing the level and would like to think that it added atmosphere. I originally planned to include one of these songs in the scene but thought that a more simple song would suffice because it sounds more local and solemn, more appropriate than a fully orchestrated musical ensemble.

Assets I Didn't Use

There are a few assets I made that saw very little or even no use at all. This may have been because of a change in ideas, a realisation when shaping the scenario or simply a lack of necessity. I used a wide ranged of assets and developed some late in the project, whilst some I worked on early on never ended up seeing any use.

Many of these were very insignificant; boulders, rocks, and bits of trash I originally planned to have strewn around the landscape to make it looked more lived in and rural. Some remain in the final scene but not as many as I originally planned. This was an asset I did use, but one I didn't use as much as I originally wanted to.

The bridge was one of the first assets I made. I was sure at the time that I wanted to have a small pond with a bridge over it. The player wouldn't be able to walk over it themselves so I made it as I made my 2D tree plane assets for distances to cut back on polygon usage, and made the bridge out of just three planes.

In the end I didn't end up using it because I had nowhere in the scene I had settled for to implement it, and I did not want to compromise the design of my environment simply to use this one asset when I felt I would have been just as fine without it, as it did not make that much of a difference.

Looking back I think I could have made it cross the lake in some way but I still think my environment turned out fine without the bridge.

I did use the shinto shrine at each end of the bridge, however, at the top and bottom of a set of stairs that I made that lead up to the nearby temple in the game environment. It's fair to say that I did make use of half of this asset after having made it, and the 2D plane imaging I also used in the trees and temples I used for distances. Whilst I didn't use the original asset, I used pieces of it, and the knowledge I learned after I made it came in useful later on.

Unity - Importing Assets

Introducing custom assets into Unity after making them in Maya is an easy process. After making the asset, freezing transformations and combining the objects if the asset consists of more than one object (this way the asset is not as memory heavy), the file can be exported as an FBX and saved into the asset folder within the Maya project folder. This can then be imported as an asset directly to be used in Unity.

Unity - Particle Effects

Unity's particle system allows you to create many different animated effects using customisable particles. These can be made to move along specific coordinates at designated rates, and can be made to look like many common things seen in games; water, fire, smoke, or substitute for magic effects in fantasy environments.

The amount of settings available means that people are able to tune their particle emitters to act almost exactly as intended. Whilst the level of settings take some getting used to, once you know what each is for then it becomes easy to create simple particle animations, as only complex particle animations would require a lot of fiddling around.

The shape the particles take can be edited with either an imported package or a self-made particle in photoshop. The colour of the particles can be changed as can the rate at which any specific coloured particle occurs during the animation.

Game Development - Game Concept

If by circumstance your game concept has been approved and a wealth of reference material is gathered, the time has come to develop it. Rather than tackling the game as a whole, this entails breaking the idea down into it’s component parts and identifying their individual development needs. 

Creating the concept drawings of the game assets like characters, levels, vehicles and so on is a job for the designer or artist. This process is similar to the visual work undertaken in the film industry to develop the look and feel of a film. This activity will produce a great deal of concept art - both traditional and digital. This is used later by the modellers and animators when they are creating the 3D assets.

All digital games have an interface to enable the player to use them. At a basic level, this begins when the player loads the game and must navigate to the point where he starts to play. On-screen information is also presented to the player during gameplay - this is the graphical user interface (GUI). This may take the form of a head-up display, quite common in first person games, or information such as statistics and hits. The design of this important information is crucial. A well designed interface can add to the mood of a game before it is played.

Game mechanics are a crucial factor of design as well. There is always an opportunity to develop existing ideas for game mechanics, deploy them in different ways, or even develop entirely new ones. Remember though, that the game mechanics directly affect the way a player experiences a game - perhaps more so than other factors. Games with poorly designed or over-complicated mechanics are unlikely to be successful.

Sound within a game is a critical aspect. There are specialist musicians and sound technicians working in the games industry, and it is their role to help build and implement the sound in a game. A designer’s role at this stage is to suggest sound effects and dialogue to give the sound engineers direction in their work.

If the game is an adventure style game with a story this will need as much care over its development as a film script or novel would. Game players as a film script or novel would. Game players can be very critical of poorly thought-out or naive plots when the story may take the form of a write up of a typical game noting all the points a player may go through.

Games consist of stages or levels. As the players progress through a game, the levels generally increase in difficulty and the story develops. The designer must create a series of challenges for the player as they progress through the level. This means that the design of individual levels is closely linked to the design of the game mechanics.

Game Development - Research and Development

Many people will have ideas for games, the first step on the path to that idea becoming a reality is to undertake some basic research and development in order to expand the idea into a robust proposal. There are several ismple considerations that the designer can make in order to turn the idea from a whim to a solid concept. A word of warning - it may be tempting to jump straight into designing characters and levels and icons and other details. This is best avoided, as if the game changes in the early development stages such work will be wasted. Good practice is to spend a relatively short but valuable length of time at the outset of making sure your idea has the potential for development.

Look at games similar to the one you have in mind. Usually there will be something comparable in the same genre. If there is nothing truly similar out there you may have a new idea. Look at themes and mechanics. Keep notes about the good and the bad, not just one or the other. What games fail to deliver the promised experience, and why. Have other people’s reviews of the game noticed the same thing? You can build upon your own game by asking the right questions and questioning the philosophy of not only what makes the game work, but what doesn’t.

Re-using the same game engine for many different game titles is not entirely unheard of. The engine is the unseen code which drives the visual game action on screen. Within the engine are rules to the way the game world works; and how objects and characters behave. It is a fairly simply task to remove the visual aspects of a game and replace them with other visual and model data, to create a new game which is very different. Due to the fact that a game’s code is usually very expensive to develop, the starting point of working with an existing game engine makes excellent financial sense for a game developer. An example of this is the re-use of Valve’s Source engine for Day of Defeat; more famously used in Half Life 2.

A strange but efficient way to begin the design process is to ask several important questions to answer, to give your concept form as a game and avoid a poorly defined idea. 

Can you describe your game? Can it be described in one paragraph? When selling an idea you need to grab attention and a good description will include the premise of the game, any unique features and it’s potential market. 

Can you summarize the story? The story is different from its description. A story summary should be a short paragraph which captures the essence of the story and allows others to appreciate and enthuse about it. 

Which platform? Is it more suited for consoles or is it PC exclusive? They may be specifically designed for hand held games consoles, or even mobile phones. It would be best to focus on the platform the game would feel most natural on, rather than stretching it to fit everything.

What’s the target audience? Does your game appropriately target the audience, and would there be any compromises in your game if you had to change it in some way so that it was? 

Does it fit a genre? Can it be categorized, easy to understand?

By listing description, story, platform, genre and target audience in a concise document you will compile a quick reference tool with which to answer questions arising during development about the game should be - and what it shouldn’t.

Game Development - Starting the Design Process

This refers to the ideal way in which a computer game should come together. From ideas to finished code handed over for manufacturing, this process can be complex, even for a small game. There is no set order for an end result, and each company will have it’s own preferences regarding how they go about organizing their resources. Companies change continuously and refining their development processes to suit their games. The start of a design process comes when there is an idea. This spark can come from one of many and any sources.

Existing intellectual property means that the game is intended to embody a previously existing idea. Possible sources include TV, comics, films and previous installments of games. Development of an existing storu or concept is quite a common feature of the modern game development world. It can be a lucrative proposition. Competition for rights to certain intellectual properties can be fierce; deals between the cinema and Marvel industries for example allowed a select group of producers to make films with an entirely new basket of ideas. 

Working with similar themes are a common start for games. As an example, if one game company has a successful title concerned with classic racing cars, then as the director of another company, you might ask your designers to come up with a similarly themed game with enough differences to avoid copyright issues. This could be criticized as a lack of imagination, though sometimes this second game is better than the first as you can take existing ideas, in some form, and re-shape them to be better. 

New ideas can come from combining old games with new inspirations, that can stem from a ‘what if?’ conversation. Mixing and matching ideas both old and new can lead to new interpretations of older stories through different mediums, such as Lego Star Wars. Warhammer 40k introduces races like Elves typically found in fantasy settings rather than sci-fi setting.

Brand new ideas are the riskiest propositions. Few games designers have achieved critical acclaim with entirely new ideas. As a result, developers are weary that gamers will not accept new titles as readily as titles that are already well established. There are many puzzle games out there but only one Tetris. Mario is perhaps the most iconic original character. However, even if you don’t develop an idea for a whole new game, the ideas might come in useful in some other way.

Ideally, games development teams should be structured to work collaboratively. Having a designer involved at an early stage can generate some new concepts whilst a programmer can point out technical opportunities that might be applicable. As a number of ideas take form and the teams expand, the majority of the work is for the designers and animators, with the programmers closely following, developing the code to bring the game to life. As the process goes on, so does the need for 3D asset generation, level design and the implementation of the programming that will make the game run. Alpha and beta testers will then go through the game and find any inadvertent faults before declaring their satisfaction. Throughout this process, the relevant managers and AQ staff monitor, guide and enable the process to its conclusion.

Designers are responsible for the look and feel of the game; they generate the concept, the story, gameworld and mechanics. They are concerned with the aspects of the game that grab public attention and hopefully make it a success. Roles like game designer, script writer and level designer can fall under this name. Posts in seniority can range from junior to leads, who manage staff.

Art and animation staff give visual form to the designer’s ideas, from 2D drawings right up to the 3D models and animations. These visualizations are necessary to develop the game’s unique style. These roles overlap with that of the digital modelers and animators who create the assets to be included within the game.

Sound and music engineers are very important; I frequently uphold the opinion that sounds in games are more often undervalued than not. These roles may cover that of the sound effects producers, musicians and may cover technical aspects such as incorporating the soundtrack into the game.

Programmers create the code for the engines that deliver games. Despite coming from highly technical backgrounds. programmers have a very unique creative aspects when implementing their skills to the creation of a fully functioning playable environment. Though creating code may be an unforgiving logic exercise, if it is to deliver the sound of a delicate breeze, or the effect of a football kicked through the air, the code must be created by someone with sympathy for the subject matter.

QA professionals and testers make sure the game works and that it meets specifications. Testers have a pivotal role in achieving this, finding and locating problems that developers may have overlooked for whatever reason and can then work on fixing or correcting or improving upon. 

Beta Testing My Level

The feedback I got from a beta testing session of my game level yielded mostly one result; I needed to introduce some box colliders to stop people falling or going into places they shouldn't go, and places I don't intend for them to go. Most of the criticism was this suggestion alone; I'm hoping people did not simply repeat what was said above unless they believe it needed re mentioning and was truly the only criticism they could see, aside from other small inconveniences and quick fixes such as cubes I had attached sounds too I had not disabled the mesh renderer on so they were still visible.

 I added a bit more lighting as some said it was a bit too dark, and expanded the play area a little as some said it wasn't the right size. Most fixes were quick and it was otherwise alot of positive feedback. Other feedback got was positive; atmosphere was praised as were textures. Sound and use of minor, trivial, but contributive assets was also noted.

I have since introduced a bump-mapped asset or two to simply demonstrate I'm capable of doing it as well as it looking a bit better than being un-bump-mapped. 

I have acted on all the feedback I've gotten and now my environment is a much more playable, and interesting place to be, with most of the annoyances and bugs corrected and fixed.

Game Environment

Two early drafts of plans for my environment depict a lot of what hasn't changed besides perhaps the arrangement and the scrapping of some ideas. In the end I didn't implement a valley and make an abundant forest because I did not have the polygon count to account for these. I could not make the landscape as large as I wanted. I still feel I made a good achievement in fulfilling what I could of these plans.

The first one is an overview of the entire scene; everything that would be in the project. This consists of the locations of the village I originally wanted to include in the distance, notable mentions of a large cliff drop. As mentioned however, not much as changed; the player is still confined to their playable area.

In this second picture of the plan, it focuses solely on the playable area. This remains very similar aside from arrangements and locations of some assets, albeit I also scrapped the lowered down area on one side of the pathway. I also swapped the firefly lamps with flame lit lamps. Assets and props such as ropes and pots I made but didn't include or deleted in order to preserve polygons. Some props I did include as I felt they were necessary, such as the shrine and the shack, which I decided should be a more appropriately build house in itself.

This is a more accurate and finalised layout of my entire game environment, including the locations of hills, heavily forested areas, the locations of temples, shrines, lamps, the pathway, the fencing, the nearby temple and provides a very clear layout detailing the locations of anything notable. Another version of this focused on the player only area as done above I feel would be irrelevant as just about everything is covered here, aside from trivial assets such as rocks and flavour assets such as the paintings and chairs.

Unity - Sound

Introducing sound to Unity projects is also a simple process. An MP3 file can be directly transferred for use in Unity, and assigned to an object, usually a cube which through disabling the mesh renderer can be made invisible. The sound can be a 2D or 3D sound; a 2D sound will occur universally wherever the player is and is suitable for ambient sounds such as wind. 

3D wounds occur only at a certain area and are surround sound, better suited to sounds for fireplaces. The sound file can be made to loop repeatedly, and either happen when clicked on or interacted with, or to play immediately and automatically if Play On Awake is enabled. The volume at which players hear the sound at whatever distance can be adjusted through the Rolloff Mode editor. 

I have used both 2D and 3D sounds in my game environment for fireplaces, musical instruments playing, wind, and the sound of crickets at night - all of which breathe life into the game environment and make it much more immersive. I believe the power of sound in video games is very often underestimated or not used to it's fullest potential.

Unity - Terrain

Creating terrain and landscapes using the Unity game engine is a very simple process despite the ease of use. A use of tools that can be uses easily mean that anyone can create, raise, lower and smoothen and colour landscape to whatever end they want.

These settings are the base settings off which many things on the terrain will adhere to; specifically, I use this menu to control the settings for trees which I place down. For example, the distance at which they billboard, and the level of detail that can be seen after or before the player has approached or retreated a certain determined distance away from the tree. This is useful when wanting to lower polygon CPU usage in an environment, or increase CPU usage if desired.

Using this menu you are literally able to select a seamless texture to paint onto the terrain like a brush, using one of many brushes. Here I have a hillside grass texture and a rock texture that I use in my own environment that when used together can effectively create an aesthetically convincing terrain. Settings are adjustable so the opacity / clarity of the texture can be adjusted as well as how strongly it is applied to the targeted area; as well as how large the targeting area is. Other textures can be downloaded and added.