Monday, 28 April 2014
PPD2- Showreel
Friday, 25 April 2014
PPD2- Budgeting for a project
The budget for the proposed project required us to look in
depth at resources, materials and equipment required for a 3 month period it
would take to create a basic full working level of apocalypse fantasia. In terms of
resources we would have to hire 6 personnel. Two artists, a dedicated animator,
two programmers and a project manager (with an all round skill set) would be required to create a working
game from a proposal document. Furthermore details of codes of practice and
regulatory issues needed to be assessed for each member of staff, as well as
health and safety training added to the budget. The team would need industry
standard software such as complete Microsoft office software and tools of the
trade such as Maya and photoshop. These would also need to official
licences to comply with the federation against software theft standards.
Finally we needed to equip the office. This would require it to be fully
furnished as well as top of the range hardware for the individual team members
to suit the requirements. For example all team members required 2 monitors.
High performance desktops were chosen for the 3D artists,
programmers and project leader in order for them to fully test the game demo,
animator only required a basic desktop. This put our overall budget at
approximately £55,000 (including wages).
Working to a budget, constraints apply in regards to software. Lightwave for example is a cheaper modeling package without the limitations of only a year subscription for little over £600.
Hardware
Members of the team will have premium
Alienware systems and others will have Dell desktops, if there role in the
development does not require a top of the range system. But all PCs will have
two monitors, HDMI cables and precision mice. I looked into the letting of
these machines within the UK,
but only universities have these in this country and they are not current high
spec.
- Alienware 's Fastest DesktopEVGA NVIDIA® 790i SLI®Quad Graphics Starting at: £2,973.05 x3
- DEATHADDER?, 1800 dpi 3G Infrared Sensor [RZ01-00150100-R2M1]£114.55 (£97.49 ex VAT)x5
- ViewSonic VA1916w 19" Widescreen TFT Computer Monitor £99.03 (Inc VAT)x10
- Flat HDMI Gold Plated Cable Lead 5 Metres£7.99 Free Delivery x10
- Logitech OEM S120 Black Speakers (2.0) £7.58 & this item Delivered FREE x5
- Brother Flatbed network-ready Printer/Fax/Scanner/Copier£146.86 inc va
- Trust TB-7300 A4 Wide Screen Wireless Graphics Tablet£119.99
- Wacom Intuos3 A3 Wide Tablet - Grip PenPrice:£487.55
- Logik LOG37LW782 37" HD Ready digital LCD TV£447.00 Standard Delivery £19.95
- Xbox one Console £229.99
- Panasonic DMC-FZ50EB-S Camera Silver £338.98 inc vat
- Dell XPS 420/4068 desktop £799.99 x2
Software
All systems will be equipped with full software packages from
Microsoft, however only the 3D artist, programmer, animator and project manager
will need Lightwave. Likewise only the texture artist, animator, programmers
and project manager will need photoshop.
- WINDOWS 7 Pro - 1PK - SP3 (PC CD) £104.48 & this item Delivered FREEx5
- Microsoft Office 2007 Ultimate Edition£549.00 Standard Delivery £5.95 x5
- ADOBE PHOTOSHOP CS4 (WIN) £449.95 x4
- LightWave 3D 9.3 + Training DVD + Free Upgrade to 9.5 (PDF Manual) Mac/Win £609.14 x4
Office equipment
Most of these items are office essentials. Fire safety
was also taken into account, with relevant equipment and notices as well as a
fire proof safe that will contain the master files burned onto DVD –RW.
- Luffield 1800mm Crescent/Radial Desk Set RRP £613 Our Price £399x5
- Premium Office Chair(Item No. FU321) Contemporary Premium Office Chair£89. 00 x5
PPD2- Creating a game studio
Ideally the members of my uni class and friends who want to be involved in this project will volunteer there time for free, certainly i'd hope in terms of the demo process over the next 12 weeks of summer. However there may be a case of the product produced being disputed by the parties involved. Essentialy if this can potentialy become a profitable product then an actual studio environment needs to be set up and established.
Legal requirements will need to be adhered to.To protect myself as a potential employer and the employees, I have looked at some of the processes.
Relevant URLS
Legal requirements will need to be adhered to.To protect myself as a potential employer and the employees, I have looked at some of the processes.
Contractual obligations
The structure of many industries contractual agreement is
uniform regardless of the media involved in the job title. Primarily the
employees name and the business’ address should be printed at the very
beginning of a legitimate business’ documentation, this is most likely followed
by the terms and conditions of the employees job title and the
responsibilities. Furthermore the details of annual salary of collective
earnings (may include bonuses and royalties) and weekly working hours may be
covered.
Many employers give
the new members of staff a temporary position, so terms and conditions of a
probationary period (usually a 3 month period) are covered in detail, this will
also most likely feature details of contractual termination, upon failure to
achieve during that period mainly, as well as long term employment termination
issues covering disciplinary and grievance procedures. A minor misconduct will
usually be a written or verbal warning depending on the scale of the
misconduct, whereas a gross misconduct will be written warning, final written
warning, or even instant dismissal. These will also go onto the employees’
permanent record for a set period (usually 12 months).
Furthermore, the contract will detail of the legal rights of
the employee to have annual holiday pay (roughly 30 days including bank
holidays). Contractual obligations of maternity/paternity periods (up to 52
weeks which is split into obligatory maternity leave and additional maternity
leave) and payment will also be covered. Likewise the statutory sick pay will be
covered, this usually does not come into effect until 4 days of absents. Beyond
that the employee may be subject to internal investigation, this may have the
necessity for a doctor’s note if the employee is not able to work for a
prolonged period resulting in half/quarter pay over a set period.
In addition to these primary contractual agreements,
collective agreements may be covered. These can include superfitial details
such as hygiene and dress code within the office area, even rules concerning
food matter within the office. Other issues that are not legally required
within the document will be health and safety (even necessary training that may
be required), and the rules and regulations of the company. These may be
essential to a game production, such as terms of internet use within the
office, or use of social networking sites. Primarily this will tie in with the
‘none disclosure agreement’ in regards to the confidentiality of a working
project. Also this area of the document will cover copyright law, detailing
that all images and likeness’ are legally acquired, or original intellectual
property of the designer/company.
It is also possible that further financial details will be
covered within this part of the document. Should the company potentially have
its budget dropped significantly, details of pay reductions or redundancy may
be covered. Though rarely applicable within the games industry, information
regarding overtime and where necessary expenses may be written into the
contract. These can cover travel expenses, but usually there is a small amount
of petty cash, for household goods.
Finally the document will require the signature of the
employee and a counter signature on behalf of the company, and also potentially
the start date of the position. In some cases a witness is required when the signature
is given.
Relevant URLS
Contractual Obligations
Employment
Rights Act 1996 s.1 (Basic Particulars)
Requirements
of HoA and terms of employment (contract)
Paper
on HoA
About
IP and definitions within a contract
Working
time limits
Opt
out form
Holiday Entitlement
Thursday, 24 April 2014
PPD2- Planning the project
Over a 3 month period i would want to develop a full working level, with a fully animated and textured player character, and two none player characters all of whom required working weapons with collision detection and the functionality to give/receive damage. The level itself needed waypoints and items. One of the most time consuming parts would be a simple but functional hads up display and pause system, this would form a work breakdown structure to map milestones across the production period.
For milestone 1, we'll be aiming to achieve the blockout working within the game engine. At this point it is still unclear which game engine will be used. In the previous game design project we used udk, a product that the artists were more comfortable with. However the programmers preferred unity, that while not providing as many options artistically could avoid the problems with building the game we faced previously. At any rate i will set this to week 7, creating a more detailed schedule when i have confirmed participants in the project.
We previously used dropbox to exchange files, this proved the simplest way to quickly exchange resources. As i'm spearheading this project, i will establish a dam structure for data management. This will hopefully allow for better organisation of files. Below is a visual representation.
PPD2- Game props and items
Magical items/weapons and shrines
Imbued weapons and unique items will be found in hidden areas within the rooms and corridors of the levels. These may be found by chance but hints and tips will be provided by he townsfolk through stories of the dungeon in relation to particular rooms, markings and descriptions.
Pick ups
These are the basic pick ups in the game.
· Health potions
These will restore a portion of the characters health 5 health packs will restore the player to full health. Health will regenerate over time.
· Energy items
Food and drink will allow PC to do special attacks and dodge.
· Mana potions
The PC will have limited magic attacks, these will be powered by mana that will regenerate over time.
· Weapons, Armour sets, and helms
Visible items that will be used by the characters. These may be generic low poly models or ideally will accurately represent the item when equipped.
· Rings, talismans, and skulls
Bonus items which will improve the characters stats, or to hit chance.
PPD2-Additional creatures/ Bosses
Among the characters, if time allows i would like there to be smaller creatures that would be easier to kill. a classic creature from the genre of the dungeon crawler is the giant rat.
Rats
These have limited animation cycles, but move much quickly and in numbers will prove a fair challenge.
Basic Animations
- Attack
- Run
- Sustain damage
- Die
Boss battles- Spiders/ Spider queen
Enemy characters will have same animation cycles as undead banshees, and spiders will have a generic scuttle motion which will be used in all directions.
They will have effect attacks (curse, slow, poison?) and as such increased damage. The characters actions would be similar to the wraith/witch npc.
Basic Animations Spider queen
- glide
- Float/fly
- Close combat attacks
- Cast magic/web
- Grab/restrain
- Sustain damage
- Die
Basic Animations Spider
- Move/scuttle
- Jump
- Attack/bite
- die
Boss battles- Demon womb
This will have limited animation cycles, but move much quickly and output high damage. Within the environment, explosive barrels may provide a method of additionally damaging the creature.
Basic Animations
- Attack
- Stretch
- wrap
- Sustain damage
- Die
PPD2- Non player characters
In addition to the player characters, NPC's will play an important role. they will be simpler models, with less animations. The different areas of the game will have varying enemies. By generally using humanoid creatures at the same scale (for the standard enemies) we will be able to re use rigs and animations.
The first area under the town hub will be the sewers, occupied by the thieves guild. These enemies will appear in multiples, the masks making it less obvious that the models are the same.
Thieves/rogues
Enemy characters will have same animation cycles as PCs, but move much quicker.
Basic Animations
- Walk
- Run
- block
- Close combat attacks
- Close combat execution move
- Back stab attack
- Sustain damage
- Die
Again, looking at the easiest way to utilise the rigs and animations we will create initially, if time allows i would also like to create the creatures character models for the tombs.
Undead
Standard enemy characters (skeletons/zombies) will have same animation cycles as PCs, but move much slower. They will have heavy attacks, and as such increased damage. Special enemy characters (Wraith/witch, far left) will have same animation cycles as PCs, but move much slower.They will have effect attacks (curse, slow, poison?) and as such increased damage.
Basic Animations- zombies/skeletons
- Walk
- Run
- block
- Close combat attacks
- Heavy attack/ cleave
- Sustain damage
- Die
Basic Animations- Wraith/witch
- glide
- Float/fly
- Close combat attacks
- Grab/restrain
- Sustain damage
- Die
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