Stressing out - Just a little

This week I got a lot done with the goblin. I took on modeling the dragon while Ryan worked on the the rig so once that was done I got right to work animating. So far I have finished the run, static, jump, dragon hat, and jester hat animations. I also got a lot of work done with the dragon. It isn't complete but it is a very good basis for us just to be able to puff out his chest or whatever we need to add some more character.

This week I still have my work cut out for me. I still need to animate the Viking, and Archer hats, a rope climb and swing for the goblin. I also need to rig the dragon once Greg puts his final touches on it. The enemy characters have now changed to 3D assets due to some collision and other programatic issues. Because of this I need to create a 3D enemy character that we can re-use a lot but be able to put clothes/costumes on so that it will still fit the theme of each level. I don't think I can manage a rig for the enemy along with my other classes assignments but I will really try. 

I am really concerned about our newest member zack. After showing him a few tricks about texturing I found out that he has no modeling experience whatsoever. Today I had to show him how to move a vertex. So this means that I need to make up tasks that don't exist now just to be able to give him assignments that wont poorly effect our game. I am still keeping a cool head about everything but tensions are getting high in the group and I want to try to organize something for the group to do that does not involve this project so they can cool down themselves.  

ZUG IS DONE

This last week I finally finished what we will use as our last rendition of the main character. I created two characters to work with based off of ideas discussed with the other artist as well as some of my concepts during our christmas break. What we decided on is much more similar to the original goblin in the pitch for the game. I had a bit of a struggle making him different from other goblins and also childish looking but I used some art inspirations from Jon concept and the movie UP. We also decided that we can still use the other character I created for tutorials or as other goblins or your helper through levels. I also textured him with the other goblin. We also really need our main antagonist so I started the head of the dragon - it only needs to be modeled so that the mouth can open and then it's done. In our saturday meeting and did some work with Will and Chris on implementing the enemy. During the week I also did a bit of work getting Zack implemented into all of our Scrum, Group, Wiki, and server share systems.

This week I will be getting the model back from Ryan so I can begin animations. I will animate the all the basics Jump, Static, Run, Impact, and Die. I will also begin on animation for the hats and I will probably get two of them completely done. John N. figured out that he is too slow at Maya to get the dragon's body done at a descent time so I will also be finishing that model and working on the rig - but I have never done an animal so I will be working with some tutorials and doing some research on good tactics.

The start of a new semester

Looking at our main character as it is now it leaves a lot to be desired. So this week I have the task of creating two main characters for us to choose between.  I did do some work over the break on a few characters so I should have the model done by Thursday. From there I will do the final touchups to the model then texture it before I rig and animate it.

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Last Sprint

I'm glad to report that much of the team is finished with there main assignments. Since this is the last sprint many of the programmers are jumping onto other peoples sections to clean it up and make it function much better. The other artist are coming to me with questions of what they can do to make the level better. I think we are a great track to a fun game. Even yesterday's guest seemed to have fun playin around with our arrow function in multiplayer.

This last week had some bumps and bruises. I finished an almost final Player Icon Texture sheet. I just need to change one aspect to fit the art style and it is a very good looking health/hat/player icon system. Also this week I was in charge of doing some animations (at least one for every hat). John called me up and told me that the model however was 40 times too big. So I had to build a new model, new skeleton, new riggin system, and rebind the character and start the animations over. During the process however the file was corrupted and I had to build another character,skeleton,rig and again start over the animations. I have caught back up with a run cycle, jump, static movement, and the 3 moves that the elf hat allows. Since I am at work and don't have access to my files I will be posting the movies/images later today.

My assignment for this last sprint is to make the rest of the moves for the goblin. There are 3 moves for each hat and there are six hats so I have my work cut out for me but with this new rigging system it should work out much better. I want to have artist work cutoff by friday though so that the programmers are not struggling to put a lot of assets in on the last day.

Getting Close To an Alpha

Ok so this week I finished a lot - I built the three enemy characters, animated them with a run, jump, die, static, and a hit animation. I also created a Viking Charge, Refined a jump, Created an Attack, and built the basis for a few more animations - but I need to fix some problems with the rig because I have no control of the elbow at the moment. I also finished the elf hat and did a lot of work with john to try to trouble shoot so exportingmodel issues.

For this week we will be working on a lot of polished items, Tom is on background, James is on weapons and enemy attacks, Greg is putting the level assets together, and I am working on the Texture layout of the user interface, I need to create a single document with all the hat, button, character, health bar, and UI icon representation in a graph layout, then once the character rig is fixed I will be trying to finish making at least one movement for each hat.

Games "they are a changin"

Ok so again some more big cuts to the game. In an after class meeting the decision was made to stick with a standard platformer game so that we can concentrate on gameplay and not visual stimulation. Although we can create somewhat of the same visual effect with background PNG items and very simple looping animations.

My progress - This last week had a lot of work. I concepted an enemy character, cleaned it up in photoshop, then created a 3D model of it. I also cleaned up the Main character - since the original was a bit feminine. I also created a basic tunic for the goblin and created the 3D hats for him. After i fixed the character I sent him to Ryan who rigged him for me and then I animated a run, jump, and static animation. The only thing I did not get done was the decisions on the text but I did take on a few things that weren't planned so they were pushed back.

This weeks sprint I have a lot as well. I know it's a holiday but this is my baby and it will be the best game EVER!!! I need to start creating a basic attack animation for the main character, and once my other tasks are done, create specific animations for the hats. My other tasks are to create more assets for the forest level, create the other two enemy 3D characters, and animate a run, static, and two attacks for the enemy, a impact, and a die animation. It is a lot but I have been doing a lot of similar forms of animation this semester with another game I have been working on called 'Fat Knight' I don't think i can do more though. The list of the hat animations is a little daunting so I will taking it one step at a time. 

Big Cuts

Ok so this week we have made the decision to cut the alpha down to one level with all the functionality in hats that we would have had in all the levels we had planned. It was a hard call because I know that it is possible to do that much work if this was everyones priority but with the rate of production it seems far fetch to produce more than just one level at this point.


This week I did a lot. I created a flipping page book for the pause menu and the level selection menu. I also researched a bunch of texts to see what we might like for the UI. Last I took Greg's outline for the forest level and input a lot of art assets and color. Last I hounded a lot of people about there progress particularly the artist who have the least marginal amount of progress completed.

For this sprint I will be converting the hats to 3D models for the new completed characters. I will also clean  up Greg's Goblin model and as a side wish add clothing for each hat (but that last part isn't part of the sprint). I will also be adding some more text to the menu and pause menu assets. The programmers are holding off on the menu till next week so after we begin on that then I will make whatever improvements are needed to the current system. Last on my docket - I will be doing concept enemy characters for the forest and once they are cleaned up by Tom to the art style I will model and animate them.