The Art of A Display

The Art of A Display

Introduction

So this blog post, without hiding the it's true identity, is meant to show off the planing that I have done for my District Arts Festival (DAF) senior display. As you can see below, I have a draft of what the display will look like. It will be a triangle display made out of cardboard with a wooden center to help support the display. The display will incorporate two (rather heavy) IMacs for everyone at the DAF to play the demos for both Ninjio and Void. 

There will be two panels that will have the games up. Each panel will showcase the game's logo, or at least a work in progress logo, a controller for each game, and a small information section that will show how play the game alongside some various information about the games (like how long it took and target platforms). 

The last panel in the triangle will showcase screenshots from both games. I have a few screenshot locations for Ninjio in mind and am currently looking into where I can get some cool looking screenshots from Void. Void also will have a small, artistic panel showcasing it's current slogan which I will reveal down the road here soon.

The layout for the display. Note that each block is 3 inches.

This week's work log:

Monday April 23rd: Did some pixel art backgrounds for Void’s story cutscene.

Tuesday April 24th: Started work on Void’s story cutscene.

Wednesday April 25th: Worked some more on Void’s story cutscene.

Thursday April 26th: Watched Mr Bomboy’s presentation about District Arts Fest displays.

Friday April 27th: Signed up for District Arts Fest and finalized both Ninjio and Void, WE ARE DONE HERE!!!!!

The Art of Difficulty

Disclaimer:

Most of the projects that I will be doing are for a game that I am developing on my own code named Project Ninjio. In short, the game is a story action driven role playing game (common referred to as an action RPG). It features 2 uniquely styled areas, one in which the cities are built to flow along with nature, and the other where the cites are hyper futuristic. The game is set in a futuristic China, where after a large war, the country is split into the two settings described above. The game is built in the Unity 3D game engine.

The Art of Difficulty

Introduction

As I move to finish up both Project Ninjio and Void to the phase where I would be able to demo them at District Arts Festival, I have carefully been paying attention to the difficulty that each game presents on a per-level basis. This is all in an effort to make both games as playable and enjoyable as possible for the demos, because I believe that no one would like be stuck on level one of Void while to rest of the levels that follow it are much easier in nature. What I have been doing, in essence, is balancing the difficulty curves for the game to be both enjoyable and challenging.

A difficulty curve graph

What Is A Difficulty Curve?

A difficulty curve is simply a graph which plots the player's skill level and challenge level on two axises. Ideally the player should be kept in between the two curves to maintain both interest and to challenge players.

One way that I have been working on balancing this curve in Void is asking myself what levels are giving my playtesters the most issues when playing through them. I then have been ranking those levels and have been changing the order of the levels to suit those rankings.

This week's work log:

Monday April 16th: Finished up looking at classmate’s End of Marking period blog posts.

Tuesday April 17th: Started work on the Game Learn Work Area.

Wednesday April 18th: Did some UI work for the Game Learn Area.

Thursday April 19th: Absent from class but did do some light work for the Game Learn Area.

Friday April 20th: Did some more work on the Game Learn Area.

End of Marking Period 3 Peer Blog Posts Review

 End of Marking Period 3 Peer Blog Posts Review

After reviewing some of my peer's end of marking period 3 blog posts, a few of them stood out to me as very interesting and even a few showed some great progress on their projects. One example of someone who works hard and was able to achieve a ton this marking period was my friend Michael, with him not only being able to finish up the audio work for his humongous animation, but he was also able to start rendering out some of the scenes for the animation itself! Another person who made considerable progress this marking period is Keaton with his VR animation which we finally got to look at though his VR headset. It was awesome to see his work in it's final medium, even though the animation was just a set of stills taken from the huge spaceship he has been working on for multiple marking periods now.

Another individual who, although he not a whole lot to show for, I enjoyed their presentation was Mark with his attempt at making his own music. The stuff that Mark had been making was make with GarageBand and FL Studio, the former of which I personally use for production of music for my games (Void, Ninjio etc). I remember one time Mark came to me asking what software I used/ planning on using for my game's music and I recommended FL Studio to him, which he quickly got around to learning in conjunction with GarageBand.

Anyways, that has been a quick recap of what my peers have been doing throughout marking period 3 and I hope that everyone can end off the school year with a ton of progress to show off!

This week's work log:

April 9th - 13th: Looked at other peep's blog posts!

Void

Void

A sample level of Void

Void's trailer, as seen in the end of marking period 3 blog post

What is Void?

Void is, as stated in my End Of Marking Period 3 Blog Post, a little side project that I have been working on. Development for the current form of the game started this school year during game development club at school, however I was able to make a quick prototype in the last few weeks of game development club last school year. Void, unlike Project Ninjio, is very far in development currently and, like it's original intent, is a side project for me that is allowing me to test methods of iterating on a single, solid, concept. If all goes to plan, Void will be launching onto mobile platforms like IOS and Android in the next couple years.

The player's trail

Void's Mechanics:

The easiest way of easily summing up Void's genre is that it is a 2D platformer, similar to the earlier Mario games, with a small puzzle mechanic. Void's main gimmick, or mechanic I guess, is that everytime the player moves, they leave a trail of past instances of themselves. These trails that the player leaves behind will, if touched, result in an instant death. This mechanic may seem small, but it allows for plenty of moments where the player has to think out their actions and execute them perfectly, which is something that you see lots of time with a puzzle game like the Portal series or Bejeweled series.

The trail that also kills

Void also has collectable items called color clusters that are, supposed to (currently not working at the moment), unlock levels and reward players for perfecting their platforming skills.

Void's Art:

Void's art style is 2D, well it is a 2D game after all, pixel art that is mostly grayscale in its color scheme expect for a few items (but they are important for a reason)! The reason for the grayscale pixel art scheme was because, well I don't know... but it lends itself good to the story that I am planning for the game, which is currently still being worked on.

This week's work log:

April 2nd - April 6th: Viewed some of my classmate's end of marking period blog posts!