gavinmddn243gamedesignblog

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Final words

In the end, before submission, I’ve completed the map, have the enemies in place, health and keys placed as well, re-skinned old assets that I felt didn’t look good enough, and added all the animations for the final boss and main character, with the exception of their death animations (due to time constraints). 

There were some problems we couldn’t quite fix or figure out, such as some layer issues with the map, and the stand attack having a rather unreliable hit rate (it works, just not very well and in certain circumstances). I also might have made a section of the stage a tad bit too unforgiving, and maybe I should have either shortened it or placed more health items, but with a good dose of determination and some faster reaction speeds, its still very much possible to beat the game.

I’m most proud of the Final Boss that my Coders made, and it really gives the game that special final fight that isn’t some giant oversized monster that fills the whole screen, as well as the mini map at the top corner and the game menu and pause function.

I’m happy with the art quality of my game artists, and while one of them really disliked pixel art, I’m still glad he made the effort to try and do so anyways.

 Gotta say I’m also really thankful to RENOX, a Japanese musician, who allowed us to use his music in our game. Honestly wouldn’t have been the same without it.

My coders have done a wonderful job in following my directions when making this game, even when they had other commitments. My artists have also managed to adapt to pixel art very quickly, which is impressive considering that they are used to traditional drawing. Throughout the project we had no infighting or flaking happen, and things went as smoothly as they could, even if some last minute disasters happened 2 hours before hand in, like nearly deleting the entirety of a members coding work. Gotta say, that nearly killed all of us. But I’m glad we managed to get that sorted.

I’m really happy to have been assigned this team, and I’m happy with how the game came out.

And thank you, Player, for playing our game.

Sincerely,

the KVETCH team.

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Things that didn’t make it

Unfortunately, we didn’t manage to get everything into the game. The enemies and final boss didn’t get their death animations, and certain features like the Stand attack did not work as well as we wanted to. But in the end, the game is still playable and functional, and its been pretty well received by blind playthroughs. Maybe in the future when we have more time we can make a more polished version, but for now, I’m happy with it.

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Ending scene and some other stuff

Reusing some footage from the cutscene, I made an ending sequence. 

Also redid some parts of the map to be longer and filled with more enemies so its more complex and less like a simple 2 floor platform section.

Also decided to keep the background pitch black because it actually really doesn’t look bad at all, and works well with the background pipes I added.

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Cutscenes

I got Josh to code in a start menu screen and a pause menu, and it works great. To go along with it, I’ve made cutscenes to go long with it, and  plays just before the game starts. It was a pretty quick job and I’m happy with how it turned out.

Also, I got permission from a Japanese music composer called Renox, and he’s agreed to let me use his music in the game. 

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Updating assets

Using sprites made by Tessa, I’ve reskinned and reanimated certain assets, such as the tutorial text and the upgrade capsules. I’ve also started putting in the new enemy skins so that we have a variety of different enemies now. 

We’ve also added a health asset as well. 

I do have a death animation ready, though whether we have time to create a death state that doesn’t immediately respawn the player depends on whether we have time to properly implement it.

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Tiles and backgrounds done

So I’ve recoloured and reshaped the background elements so that they no longer look as busy and messy. I also made them into tiles so it’s easier to edit their length and size. Tessa will handle recolouring the purple, red and green versions based on my original yellow tile.

They will serve as landmarks so that the player doesn’t get too lost, and they will also have a map. The colouration of the tiles will help in navigation as well:

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Main character (mostly) done

After some extensive recolouring, the main character is done. Technically however, they should have two more animations which I’m gonna work on now, but its ready to go with its basic movements and attacks.

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Mini Chase bosses done.

Short update, the two bosses that attack you during the chase sequences are finished and animated. I’ve also changed their role from a boss that bounces around the room to a chase boss, where the player must run or dash away from it until they reach the end of the room. This saves time in coding and also acts as a jolt that surprises and wakes up players as they near the end of the stage.

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Map Progress

I’ve retiled the entire map and added different coloured sections to each areato make it easier to navigate in.

The map layout is pretty much done, and now all I need to do is tweak it based on test playing comments.

I’ve also redesigned the break blocks to correlate with the area they are placed in, so that they don’t look too janky or out of place in terms of colour.

The only concern of mine is that players may not immediately notice them and miss them, but then again they have a nicely sized flashing blue indicator on them, so I think it should be flashy enough. It is an exploration game after all, don’t want to spoonfeed the player with extremely obvious breakable blocks.

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Boss animations and how I’m gonna reskin it into the main character

So I’ve done all the animations for the final boss.

I actually haven’t finished animating the main character yet, and thats because I did the boss first, and now I can just easily recolour it and its done. God I love Aseprite.

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Map Revisions

While the new tiles are being worked on, I have the map shape at around 90% completion. All I need to do is rearrange some assets and retile it with the proper tiles later.

Old Map:

New finalized version:

There is now space for the Tall elite enemy, the Floating head chase, and the final boss at the bottom. 

Speaking of the final boss, my Coder’s have been testing it out, and so far it’s been going smoothly. We should have it done by next week.

Just need to animate the tall boss’s legs and finish up the floating head design.

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Tile Problems and solutions

So we finally assembled the scene, and you know what, it looked pretty decent in the scene builder, but once we entered play mode however,

Yeah it looks too busy. For some odd reason, It looked perfectly fine when we assembled it in our spriting programs, but the moment we put it into the game, it suddenly became a flurry of colours and too much detail. I suppose looking at objects in motion can really change how a scene looks. Thankfully I’ve got Tessa recolouring the sprites, so it should be much easier on the eyes. I’ll also try and edit the walls somewhat so that its easier to make out the background.

I also animated a Background that i’ll set at the back:

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Some more assets done and tested

Finally sorted out the enemy boss design. Since they will share the same moveset as the player, recolouring and reskinning it shouldn’t be too difficult, since I have the basic design set. Might add something to the head but here it is for now:

Also made the walls an animated piece rather than just a png.

I have a few more small things to animate, like health pick ups, as well as bigger things such as wounded/death animations and the redesigned gate.

For now I’ve done the enemy death animation:

It’ll definitely be faster in terms of animation speed in the game.

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Plans for This week.

Currently, as we approach the final week, we will be meeting up for some meetings to finish up our work.

For backgrounds, I’ve adjusted the colours of Chen’s background and wall tiles to better suit the game’s artstyle. I’ll start finalizing the map tomorrow.

For the boss, I’ve given Josh a gif on how I want the boss to attack, which looks like this:

Hopefully it won’t take too long to code this into the game.

As for the other boss, I’ll be checking up on it on Wednesday.

For the main character, I have some animations in progress, but here’s the finished stand attack one:

The rest should be easy to finish, and hopefully, I’ll just need to add music and sound effects, a drawn map, some more bg animations, a parallax BG, and rooms for the bosses.

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Current plan and next steps

As of now, our main character is almost done with refinement; no longer grinding against colliders, a smooth dash that doesn’t stop with collision, and currently, the only thing left is to give them a standing stationary attack.

As for the rest of the game, I’ve drawn up the tutorial starting pojnt for the player, and we’re planning on making the jump ability an upgrade you get the moment you get into the stage (this is to teach players about the upgrade platform and how its not an enemy, as some players have mistaken it to be, also i’m gonna redesign it.) and another section is being planned out. 

It is not final yet however due to the fact that we’re considering changing the boss sequence and maybe cutting out a boss fight, due to complexities and time constraints.

However, I have a final boss in mind, which will utilise a rejected design for the main character:

Currently also working on altering the boss design from a teammate in order for the character to actually walk, and to make coding it’s attacks simpler and easier.

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Progress update so far

In terms of player controls, our character no longer grinds against walls when jumping! Now they can jump normally due to a raycast in front of them which prevents contact with the tiles. 

The map function is also nearly complete. All we need to do is finalize the actual map, then draw out a simple map layout and it will be complete. The next main step is to get the dash to work properly and to put in a basic standing/walking attack.

For the design side, One of them is working on the new tileset, and the other is working on the second boss and some enemies. I’ll be in charge of designing the second stage of the boss, and animating it and it’s attacks:

I’m also nearly done with the new character’s idle animation, and will start with their other animations soon.

Next priority is to start building the stage in Unity tomorrow.

[gavinmddn243gamedesignblog]

Gavin Au MDDN243 P3: Feedback and Plans

We’ve recently gotten alot of good feedback for our game, so we now know what to prioritize for our gameplay. This includes fixing up collider issues, smoothing controls and working on backgrounds and landmarks. As both my coders were sick and bedridden last week, I’ve pushed their work to next week for completion. Thankfully our schedule was made to accomodate delays, so we still have plenty of time. 

After receiving feedback, I’ve decided to remodel the stage to include a sort of hub world section so players don’t get too lost, and to make it easier to find out what actions need to be done to progress. I’ll be making plans for it soon. 

In terms of art, I came up with some new designs for the main character:

and one animated one, which was originally gonna replace the main character:

......But in the end I’ve decided to stick to KVETCH’s roots and redesign the original mech. Currently its still a work in progress, but hopefully I’ll be able to finish it soon, and start animating it.