Cart CGD

Presentations:

RAF: “The Damaged”

• Game about a damaged world, with six major cities/areas/rooms, in a medieval setting.
• World is populated by 6 categories of evil (drug addicts, gluttony, alcoholism, violence, greed, laziness, etc) like Shadow of the colossus.
• Each city has a “boss”.
• Some regular people, some “damaged” characters, with a vice/problem.
• Dynamic between these 2 types of people.
• Main character half-god?
• Through exploration, see who you hate the most, begin killing off the damaged people.
• You are an omnipotent-style character. You start killing one type of
• people in this world but the other types take over the space previously occupied by the types you just killed (cannot actually kill them all) you must make a choice: try and fail or join the ranks (needs some expansion/clarification)

The look:

• Creepy characters, rich, dark, grungy atmosphere
• Like some old great civilization that has fallen, now inhabited by useless, broken people.
• Medieval, fantasy, horror theme

Game genre/mechanics?

• First person style game play.
• No levels, just exploration. Medieval GTA
• Not sure about the ending of the game, needs help with the development (ex: what is the motivation to go on the quest?).

STEPHEN: Idea #1 “Ohme”

• Prefers to explore mechanics over sound or storyline. He can do design, does also graphics and programming.
• A side-scrolling game populated with cute, unique characters, doing what they do. Ex: road crew drives around fixing holes. Ex: crazy science dude mixing chemicals and burning holes in the ground.
• Possible forest setting.
• Example: Raccoons! With some industrial guy wanting to kill the forest, you would have this guy going around trying to make things right.
• So, dynamic solutions to puzzles by interacting with the different characters.
• Dialogue: you can pick stuff up and use items, like feed road crewà they follow you around and help you (creative, procedural dynamic stuff, creative problem solving)

Idea #2: “Noir”

• Interested in accessible games: to people with disabilities (difficulty holding a controller, visually impaired)… Using senses other than vision to solve a puzzle game.

Inspiration: Pit

• Wants to extend this into more of a puzzle game; can’t get a sense of the space around you; compact space.
• Somehow you get into a “spot of bother”
• Adventure game, figure out a way to escape…
• Setting could be a detective who is thrown into a basement and has to figure a way out of that space by using his other senses to navigate around and figure out puzzles to get out. Example: he could try and crack a safe by listening to the mechanical ticks of the safe dial to get to the items inside.
• Short game, not many rooms

Things you can do:

• Try to listen to noises…
• Drips of water/puddle to see yourself…
• Can feel along walls…

Idea: Wii controllers—use vibrations for some feedback for example.

He needs good level design, and good sound design!

MAX: “Battleschool”

• Multi-player first person shooter based on the book “Enders game”
• Zero gravity, 2 teams on opposite sides of a cubic room.
• Can’t just get from A to B, have to jump around—movement is important, starting and stopping is tricky.
• Sliding gate to get into the cube.
• Randomly appearing smaller cubes could provide cover.
• players are kids. Shooting someone shoots a (tagging?) beam so when a specific limb of your body gets shot, that limb looses hit-points.
• Limbs are unusable when their respective hit-points reach 0. Not being able to use limbs, like legs, can affect movement or, if arms are affected, aiming.

• To win, eliminate all opposing players or capture the flag-like goal.
• Possible other mechanics like hooks to swing around in 0 gravity and a “golden snitch” mechanic for an alternative method to winning

For next week:

-       If you haven’t yet, post your name, skills, what you’re interested in on the blog in the section “Who We Are”

-       Next meeting, we will be discussing our goals.

-       Concrete teams should be forming now, pre-production finished by the end of the semester, with design document.

Fellow Cyborgs,

The Interactive Mobile Gaming Clan blog is at  http://www.urbanambush.com/img_clan/

Our mission statement explains the concept and criteria for designing our game.

Our team is in need of core members who are interested in the initiative, but I also invite anyone and everyone interested to contribute their input, ideas, and suggestions, and am hoping to involve the larger CCGD community in discussion, research, and testing

anyone interested can email me at: thehandwordandlaw@gmail.com , or leave some info here or on the IMGC blog

Courage, victory, and strawberry pocky,
Brian A

Hi again…

So this is where each group will answer their own question. Think about what you’re trying to say with your project–what problem are you solving, what is its reason for being??

This will help us understand each other, but it’s also a good exercise for people who need to get used to explaining their artistic intents when submitting to a show or applying for a grant…

Hi guys,

Please respond to this post with your name, your program of study, what you do, and what you’re interested in!

Thanks!!

Hello everyone!

Sorry it took a while to get this out.

The most important things that came up during the meeting are in the email I sent to the group; if you did not get it/have a crazy filter and don’t even know it’s lost in a sea of emails (you know who you are),  I will reiterate. Or just copy+paste.

1- We will be having a second Pitch Day next Monday night at 6:00pm (11th floor, same room 11.707):

• This is for anyone who was unable to make it last week, or who just joined.
• There will be no re-pitching of pitches. If you’ve pitched, you’re done!
• On that note, anyone who did pitch an idea, make sure you’ve written up a summary/saved a slide show/whatever for those who were not present last week.

2- There will be a new section on the blog for both a) “who we are” and b) “the answer to your question”:

a) When you have a chance this week, you should add a small blurb about yourself to the “who we are”,
i.e. your name, what you do, what you’re interested in, what program you’re in.

b) If you’ve pitched an idea, or have already been thinking about it, we are trying to get people to post “the answer to your question”.
What does that mean? Well, what question are you answering with your project?
More specifically, what is it you are saying with your project, and what is it a response to?
It would be great if we can get used to explaining our intentions, especially if your group would like to show the end product, or are applying for grants!

**web people, does everyone in the group have permission to edit the blog?

3- The deadline for applying for special projects grant with FASA is this Friday the 12th, at midnight!
I attached the form to this email–if you would like it, feel free to email me–you also have to write up a separate detailed budget and project description.

4- Finally, and most importantly:
Although there were no koalas present, we did get attacked by a bunch of huge birds flying out of the wall, and then got really bored.

———————————————————-

Now for the notes:

After a giant, cheesy round of intros,  we went over the pitches from last week. If you missed them, here is another (really) short summary:

Ramy’s concept:  perspectives

• Think of the tent in Harry Potter 4….

Moh: creepy creatures

• Ugly, obnoxious, but you want to empathise with them
• Surreal, deformed, no blood/obvious horror, but scary in their own right.
• Merging idea with Ramy’s environment

Samir: sound

• Using it as a core element of a game, used to summon objects
• Sound effects created by people
• Mix between Drawn to Life and Scribblenauts (but in 3D)
• User calls in objects, the game recognizes them

Peter: growing a planet

• Create vegetation, flowers, trees, planet grows itself, kind of a sim thing, but take out the chore aspects, more of an experience (sand box)
• Will make a small prototype first
• Sean will write a story/gameplay
• Alexis will work on the programming
• (see emails for more info!)

Brian: interactive game for mobile phones (see emails for more info!)

• Make use of player’s geographical area as a playing ground (multi-pl)
• GPS tracking, marker recognition, augmented reality
• Work with a server application to take care of the tracking of GPS
• GPS tag visible to anyone else within range, can tag them
• Have data, properties associated with them
• See Urbanambush.com

Pedro: 2 ideas

1-small fear of light, controls the basic human function, the body

• control the sphere inside the human body-basic stuff…
• MUST EMAIL/POST HIS PRESENTATION

2-“panel kill” imagine if a bunch of comic books scattered on the floor, jump into each other’s stories

• interact with other characters & their stories/worlds

Nancy: “Tuesday” 4 friends at a bar

• Hardware hacking: use a remote as a breathalyzer
• Wario war-type games to keep it interesting
• Explore 2D flash with live video
• World changes as the alc level goes up
• Applying for a grant!
• Concept of how ppl go into different personas when drinking

Jonathan: 2 ideas

1-zombie game, take drugs to stop from becoming a zombie, otherwise ppl seem tastier

• Playing with ppl’s perception with the game world

2-platforming with fighting, merged!

(Nancy’s stickman zombie stumbling off a platform)

———————————————————-

WHAT WE ARE TRYING TO ACCOMPLISH IN NEXT MEETING:

• What is possible?
• What are the goals for the summer?

———————————————————-

More on scheduling:

Our production cycle is one year.

Winter semester: design document (due April)–how the game will play, sketches, references, tests, etc
N.B.: ONCE DESIGN DOCUMENT IS DONE, IT’S A SHUT CASE

Summer semester: production!

Fall semester: (December) is the end! + drinking!!

Pacing is important!

PITCH DAY NUMBER 2!! Next week.

OUR GOALS:

• Make not only the fun game aspect, but look into things like ex: motion capture
• Are we creating games for festivals & get hired at existing companies, or make our own mark? What does it mean in the market, etc in Post-production. But it might be helpful to ask these questions now… Who are we designing them for? What is it that makes game fun? Wake-up call: what do we want to achieve??
• Tip: only ask the question you need to ask.

–>For this week, answer the question! Put it up on the blog, organized by project.

Miscellaneous info:
-Can maybe use motion capture at a lab at McGill: physics-based animation (talk to Shahin)
-Club members (again) please put down your name, program of study, what you do, and what you’re interested in doing  :)

Ramy D – Spatial Distortion
- Spatial Distortion to accelerate plot.
- Gateways can look THROUGH into completely different rooms. Ie: you can see a sphere through a doorway but only when looking THROUGH. The sphere is not actually PRESENT.
- The example can be found in some films such as “the Number 23, part 05 of 11”. Jim is up somewhere, the camera moves, and suddenly he is elsewhere. Continuous reality.
- PROGRAMMING TRICKS  NEEDS STORYWRITER. MODELERS. ANOTHER PROGRAMMING.
- Camera angles will be triggers. If you look at something a certain way, perspective changes and a key plot point is revealed. The world is malleable, everything changes gradually.
- Not looking for something visually complex but progressively detailed.

Mohannad – ART DIRECTION PITCH
- Very washed out, no obvious horror elements, grayscale
- Story Ideas; “Nature’s Evolution”. Humans are parasites feeding off the planet. Nature’s way to fix it is to slowly mutate our DNA to be closer to more valuable creatures/animals. People start developing weird deformations.
- “Consequences”. Wheelchair guy develops joints and bones to deal with his condition
- GAMEPLAY IDEAS: 4D painting that you can go into and live in. Static environment and characters except for minor animation cycles (eyes, water drips, etc.). Like modern warfare 2 ending “the museum”; acting out action scenes in “boxes”. Quiet other players, only bother you if you bother them.

Nancy – Tuesday: a tale of being terrible  http://netownsend.net/ccgd/

Pedro – PANEL KILL/BODY EXPLORATION
- Comic book exploration, like a choose your own adventure book.
- You can mix and match your characters ie: put Calvin and Hobbes into “Watchmen”. Mixing genres make the story more entertaining. Like exploring a comic book, moving panel to panel.
- GAME IDEA2: You are a ball of lights that “fixes” the body, repair dead cells, eliminate disease etc.
- Full 3dimensional space: locate yourself, control the white sphere and learn new movements with it. Collect points to get new abilities. Precise surgical tasks, like sewing arteries.
- Reference: Trauma Center Series, movements like flower.

KODAMA (Japanese for spirit)
- Grow your own planet. One flower into many, many trees, roots combine in the middle area
- Cute little white blog character. A specific happy/cutesy feeling, you are creating your own ecosystem.
- Little due holds a cloud like a kite and walks around to make things grow. Every time you restart, you make a new world.
- THERE ARE NO THREATS

Jonathan
- You are on the verge of becoming a zombie, you must take drugs.

Samir
- Playing with sound

EVERYONE WHO HAD A GAME IDEA, PLEASE POST IT TO THE GROUP!!

The distribution of key events in the Fourth universe.

Hello everyone, this is Nicolas Barriere. Some of you I’ve had the pleasure to meet and others sadly not. I’ve been working on a lot of things for the past week and I wanted to share it with it everyone. Principally:

- Ironing out the last few kinks in the Game Script. The script is now at its 4th iteration and I encourage to go read it as soon as possible.

- Making functional schematics of the Game Script. The script is actually quite exhaustive and this simply synthesizes the important points of the level progression.

- Making maps for every area traversed by the player during the course of the level. Detailing everything for the 2D artists and 3D modellers. Now there’s actual visual reference for all of the areas covered in the Game Script!

Here there are:

This page is dedicated to deadlines. People have things to do. This is where those tasks meet up to the normal calendar.

. . WEEK # DATE Paper Artists 3D Artists Programmers Audio Web & Video Production GENERAL CLASS . week 2: September 15th PREP (gmail, forum, personal schedules, concept discussion) General Presentation (Nancy), SVN (Alexis), OGER exporter (Ramy) . week 3: September 22nd Further submission of concepts/sketches. DUE: Character simple models Programming Abstractions done, Game Gui done DUE: concept ideas, sketches for soundtrack and sound fx DUE: Making of “blueprints” Photoshoot, SCHEDULE FINAL, Zbrush tutorial . DISCUSS: Color scheme, overall direction Zbrush learning character mechanics, level loading, sound Ambient sound recordings and soundtrack production -Fine tune making of blue prints+ adapt to web site -ccgd website part of this? . HOMEWORK: Work on refining ideas, continue sketching and concepting. Be more linear in your designs Normals maps and Kara and male/female generic characters level integration (gui+gameplay?) character class extension create a GENERAL list of required foley sounds as well as objects to use to create them. Record as many sound fx and ambient sounds as possible -Setup interview dates -readjust schedule if changes occured (using concept art++ as base illustrations for web site) -adap making of with website content / vice-versa . week 4: September 29th DUE: Story and Gameplay document FINAL. End of sketching/concepting period. Decide on overall theme/look. DUE: Character normal maps DUE: Level begun integrated in Game, programming bullet engine ray casting identifier DUE: list of foley sounds to record, Ambient sound drafts -indiv. interviews dates -final making of blue prints -final websites blue prints UV Layout tutorial . DISCUSS: Technical Drawings Texture types, materials character interactions, location specific interactions? Foley, soundtrack, and sound fx being used together check if sufficient visual material to extract style and adapt to web . HOMEWORK: Technical drawings begins. Begin some rendered scenes Texture character TESTS for generic male&female character interaction: grabbing, jumping, crouching, etc + animation? XML/Yaml parser for sound, lights, etc. Continue to record foley and ambient sounds, begin creating integrated soundscape recordings -design ccgd website -record interviews . week 5: October 6th The completion of at least x (to be filled in later) technicall drawings. This will proceed to go onto week 7 if necessary. DUE: Complete Character Models Character interactions programmed: jumping crouching, climbing, some auxilary actions DUE: Ambient sounds, General Foley sounds -design draft -video material Texturing tutorial . DISCUSS: Textures Buildings round 1 choices from concept artists production quality: starting game, playing game, crude distribution demo using SDK? Discuss results of recordings, co-ordinate with nick (level designer) discuss ccgd design, adapt . HOMEWORK: Finish the more technical drawings and begin final architecture plans for modelers. Begin buildings models round 1, begin interior details, tram and tram tracks playable level, some scripted events, world building tools completed Complete mixed soundscape of ambient sounds, fx, and music draft -record interviews -finish ccgd website -screen capture? . week 6: October 13th MIDTERM PRESENTATION technical drawings. DUE: Characters Rigged, Buildings round 1 trials. 3D PRESENTATION: Showcase models so far and map PRESENTATION: playable demo in blocked level DUE: Soundtrack draft PRESENTATION: Ambient sound, music track, foley sounds, fully mixed example of all sounds playing together PRESENTATION: -Video drafts -CCGD website MIDTERM PRESENTATION: . DISCUSS: Logo Building placements, insert into map, discuss additional props and details scripted in-game events sound integration . HOMEWORK: Texture work begins, rendering scenes, Logo sketches/ideas Buildings round 2 models, interiors continued with props sound engine integration, scripted in-game events refine everything, post-process sounds, record more foley and ambient sounds as required, co-ordinate sounds with nick’s (level designer) requirements, co-ordinate sounds with scripted events -record interviews -help audio if nothing to do . week 7: October 20th END of technical Drawings. Buildings round 1 models done, Subway track and subway models done, animations started scripted events co-ordinate sounds with game engine requirements, discuss further integration, continue work on foley, ambient, and soundtrack. Continue scripted events work . DISCUSS: Poster art/ad? Effects tests, buildings round 3 models particle effects? fire, smoke, fog sound integration issues as required, sync issues Enough material to start web site design? . HOMEWORK: Texturing, Rendering scenes Collaboration with programming for effects, buidlings round 3 particle experiments record, mix, refine! -record interviews . week 8: October 27th Documentary Draft Done, Logo Buildings round 1 textures done, buildings round 2 models done programmed particle experiments: fire/smoke/water/fog. post-production, sound integration web design draft . DISCUSS: NPCs, Logo if needed, make changes also (if needed) Map so far. Details remaining, Begin lower level physics supplemental any further sound recording required and engine issues

. HOMEWORK: Texturing, rendering scenes, Designing of some NPCs Extra props, lower level builds, central fountain additional physics effects record, mix, refine! -record interviews . week 9: November 3rd Buildings round 1&2 textures done, Interior models complete, ANIMATIONS DONE water phsyics effects done, continue sound integration, recording, post html/css layout w/ images done . DISCUSS: Additions to the lower level, continuing effects efforts shading, talk with Colin progress report . HOMEWORK: Texturing, rendering scenes Special effects with programming, texturing of interiors, upper building levels completed make great shaders! finish all recording and post-production, fix ‘bugs’. -record interviews -flash/javascripts/bugs/audio implementation in web . week 10: November 10th NPC characters All Buidlings + Characters + Animations + Textures DONE (textures may extend to the following week-Jos), Extra props. If have time, modelers can begin the other characters and worlds Cg shaders done, bug fixes, code clean up DUE: All sound fx, ambient sounds, soundtrack web site mostly done . DISCUSS: Story boarding lower level completion, anything left bug tracking any integration issues, rendered scenes sounds -Screen capture for making of? . HOMEWORK: Story boarding, Texturing, rendering scenes Extras, bugs, details fix more bugs fix bugs, do any final mixes as required -record interviews . week 11: November 17th Storyboarding end (maybe one more week, if necessary) Everything complete. Fix ups. Details bugs are gone? end of any ‘recording’ and post-production. Focus on game engine integration -video editing -implement video in web . DISCUSS: Final touches Final touches final touches final touches for web . HOMEWORK: Final touches Final touches final touches final touches for web . week 12-14: November 24th-December 8th End of rendered scenes. End of texture work (w13). Finished city. Panic/Drink <<<end of line>>> video editing .