Back at it again! - Reading 2

Hello everyone!

It's me, back to the world of the living. Back to another semester of college, this one full of new challenges aaaaaannnnnddd a book!

This week we have been preparing our research questions and also our research strategies for our chapters and sub chapters.

My research topics for this book are:
1. Visual Appearances and character depth
2.  Audio Design

The first step for this book is to come up with our research questions. The idea I have for mine is,
"How the visual appearance of a character and the depth of the characters backstory can affect the player's gaming experience".
      The second question would be something along the lines of "How audio and sound can affect the player's gaming experience"
      I plan for these questions to develop in time, as my research progresses and pulls different aspects of these topics into light.

To begin my planning, I did a brief 'brainstorm' of eacb part of the outline to see what I already knew about the topics.
      I then took each word of my original outline and researched synonyms of them to get a better idea of what I am going to be learning within the next couple of weeks.
Here are some of my findings:

This is my initial brainstorm of what I already knew about the topic.

These are all the synonyms for the words in my outline.

From here I decided how I am going to go about my researching and where I will get my information from. For now my research will be through books in University and through reputable articles and open source books online. I think if I start here, I can follow an information chain and really drill down into my topics core.

Although I am not that great with academic writing or formal writing, I am quite excited to learn ow to do all of this writing the right way. 

Signing off,

-A

404 error beta not found

Hi, and welcome back to Im freaking out about Unity.
this week we look at how my ENTIRE game has been deleted. So, I've had to start from scratch.
I am at about the same stage as two weeks ago with terrain and buildings. Which is just great.

Sorry for no progress

Signing off
-Ak

game testing

Image from here
This weeks reading was all about learning how to give useful criticism.
When it comes to criticism within design or business, it is good to get feedback that is unbiased and not opinionated.

The article is by The Closet Entrepreneur, here’s the link. (i hope it works)

Sometimes giving criticism can lead to disputes or arguments if it is not given correctly. A lot of the time people may say ‘ I like it’ or ‘ I don’t like it’ and huge very opinionated feedback about their feelings towards the piece of work. This is not helpful as each person is going to have a different view on the piece.
Constructive criticism is when the viewer gives honest feedback that is backed up by information so for example when it comes to colour theory, 10% of males are red green colour blind so using those colours in a logo is potentially losing customers, the same with suggesting a more suitable font type for a business.

When given correctly, constructive criticism can be extremely useful and may be the one thing missing from a piece of work.

Signing off

AK

Hero’s and Stories

Stories are something that we’ve learnt about in college from day one. Because of our course content, it is our job to tell a story through several means, graphic design, film, photography and especially games.

The readings this week helped to refresh our knowledge on classic story structure, as well as the hero’s journey, why they are predictable and why we still use them.

In John Sutherlands article about stories in games, he takes us back through the classical story structure. It is made up of three acts.
In the beginning our hero has a normal life. This is then disrupted by the inciting insistent which throws their life out of the norm. Following this the hero is faced with their first obstacle which they must overcome, followed by a second which is slightly more difficult and then by a third which is the toughest of them all, which then will usually bring back their normal life. Most games are a comic structure, meaning that the player can complete the game and have a ‘happier ending’ although their are stories, take Shakespeares King Lear, where the ordinary life is not obtainable at the end and the story ultimately has a sad ending, these are known as tragedies. Most games will follow this three act structure, but you can build more obstacles into the game to make it longer.

The second article by Bob Bates, talks about the hero’s journey and how it is used in most stories and particularly those in games. This stems from the use of parable and stories passed down from clans and tribes. These stories usually have some sort of message that teaches the listener or reader a life lesson, Bates uses The Good Samaritan as an example ‘love they neighbour’ and all that jazz. Bates talks about how, yes their is evolution in terms of survival of the the fittest but there is also survival of the smartest. This is due to ancestors passing down stories and knowledge about how the hunt, where to hunt and where not to hunt. This meant that these tribes and clans lived longer then those who didn’t share these stories and kept the information to themselves.
The hero’s journey follows a very similar path to that in the three act structure
We establish the hero’s world, there is a call to adventure, be that of curiosity or due to bad circumstances, entering the world, the trials they must face, meeting ‘the Evil One’, gaining the prize and then returning to their people.

Signing off
-AK

Week 9 Progress

Image found here 

Am I happy with my progress for this module so far this semester?
Not as happy as I could be.

I have gotten really bummed down about this module a couple of times due to laptop malfunctions, forgetting assignments are due and from being physically ill as well. Sadly I have not been able to make as much progress on this module as I would have originally hoped to. From the beginning of this semester to now, it’s been a like climbing a mountain range, going up for a little while and then back down again but I think I’m on a steep climb upwards at the moment. I’ve started to become more positive and just try and do my very best with this module rather than push myself too much.

As I have said in the past two posts, most of my blog posts and work are done either on the bus on the way home from college ( like this one here, gotta make use of those four hours) or in the evening after I’ve done a lot and I just want to go to bed. The latter is probably not the healthiest way to do this module and may be a contributing factor as to why I slipped a lot where I didn’t want to. I definitely could be doing better and getting things done on time to allow myself more time for actually working on the game itself rather then getting so worked up about the tutorials and commenting. I really do enjoy this module, even if it is most likely not going to be the area that I will hopefully go into after college. But you never know that could all change in the next two years.

Moving forward I want to get the weeks posts done earlier and not leave them until last minute. I definitely want to leave more time for the project so that I can genuinely feel like I have made progress and I’ve actually putting my skills to use. I’m determined to not leave everything until last minute, starting with this post being a day early and I plan on doing my feedback and commenting later this evening, leaving time for my project ( and maybe some fun extra credit as well!).

TIME TO DO SOME COMMENTING
signing off
-AK

review week comments and feedback

Speech bubble art found here 

Feedback is something that we are getting a lot of this year. In comparison to last year, there is constant feedback and always someone suggesting something new of a different way to approach the project, not only in this module but in all of them. We have had several sessions, both in person and online or through audio files where lecturers have given us our feedback on our projects.
I think feedback is one of the most important aspects to our college course, especially when a lot of our work is done outside lab and lecture time and all uploaded online. The fact that the lectures and other students are interested in what you are doing really inspires me to work harder for the grades and final result that I want, be that from game design or graphic design or even film.

The feedback that I found most useful so far this year has been the people asking 'WHY' or 'HOW'.
These types of feedback really made me think about certain areas of my game ideas that i may have glazed over or just avoided altogether. One week in particular that the feedback was very helpful was the week we designed our GDD. the feedback from other students really helped to to go back and edit the work  i had done or fill in gaps that were missing.

As regards to the feedback that I am giving out, it really depends on what time of the day it is when I am giving the feedback. I’ve really enjoyed reading other people’s blogs and came documents. When giving the feedback I was trying to be as honest as I possible could while trying to give helpful comments and feedback. I think it’s always helpful to give someone your opinion because it can give them another point of view for their project, especially when it comes to our games.


From commenting on other people’s blogs I have learnt a lot more about the people in my year. By the end of last year I believed that I knew my year pretty well but there is even some new things that I learnt about my close friends through their game design thoughts or through their introduction. I’ve also learnt a lot about each persons style of design from the way they are designing their game or by the way that they have designed their blog.  I really enjoyed reading people introduction posts because I have learnt a lot about their personal lives outside of college that we haven’t been able to see due to our huge work load. From people’s work and career to their everyday interest and even their hobbies like performing, sports, art and even using their skills they are learning in college and putting them to use in the real world. It’s very inspiring and it makes me want to do more outside of college and my regular hobbies like art and ballet.

I think moving forward I would like to give more detailed feedback for people’s games. Most of the time when I have been giving feedback it has been late at night after I’ve completed maybe three other assignments so I feel I could do much more on that front.

I think that’s enough blabbering from me for one day
Signing off
-AK

Week 9 reading and writing

the readings have been a time for me. Most of the time I would actually do the reading on the busses to and from college, because you know, don’t want to waste those 4 hours hours by doing nothing p. If I’m not doing assignments then I’m catching up on sleep or the other way around.

Not going to lie there has been a couple of times where I will wake with a start and think “THE READINGS”. But I think they have been beneficial. Coming into this module I hadn’t really thought about how much thought and prep goes into games, or how many different elements there is to consider. I suppose it’s just something I took for granted.

In the beginning they seemed like a bit of a chore but after the second week I really started to enjoy them. I think my favorite reading so far has been, week 6`s Game GDD. That week we really looked into the different game pieces and how the aesthetics of games effect the players overall experience. Like I mentioned earlier,this really seemed to be something that i have overlooked when playing games,even with my art background.even though i would look at a deck of cards and think , woah this deck is so pretty, I would ever consider, well why is it that you like it so much?
Learning about the way that color, shape and size DO matter when it comes to game design opened my eyes for my own assignment.

From doing these readings I’ve found that I absorb readings better in the morning and then writer better when I sit down at night after a day of college. I think this is due to me being more open and honest the more tired I get. This is something I’ve noticed even in my other college work as well as my own art pieces. I may feel like an old person who can’t stay up past 10pm but you’ve got to do what you’ve got to do I suppose.

Am I happy with my own game project so far? I’m not going to lie, I’m actually a little disappointed in the lack of progress I’ve made so far. I had hoped to have a lot more completed by now but due to personal health issues and computer technical issues,that hasn’t been the case.

Art of witch found here 

This is probably my favorite image that I have found for this module. The image actually gave me the original idea for tomb town, the sort of soft spooky feeling, the softness being trough the use of low-poly assets.

I think i need to start doing the reading assignments earlier. Doing them on the Monday rather than an  hour before the deadline like tonight. Doing this may encourage me to spend more time worrying about my actual project and may even leave some time for some extra credit assignments (which i could really do with completing...).

That’s enough blabbering on from me for one night i think,
Signing Off
-AK