I have been using Unreal ED for 2 years now and find creating levels relatively easygoing, but this is the first time I have tried to effectively script bots in the 3D environment. To get my head around this part of the editor I used Brian’s walk through at first to establish an idea of what I could and could not do. Then I moved on to using the big red book to increase my knowledge and understanding.
I did create my story board and my Visio map before I created the map and cinematic sequence; I understand that they do not match up to what I eventually created. This was due to my lack of experience using the tools for the assignment. I can imagine that I will be marked down due to this.
I did encounter a few difficulties mainly with setting up the A.I. Script, bot and first path node. But when I eventually figured out where is was going wrong the rest of my sequence was relatively easy.
I found it difficult to get bots to shoot at each other and I will spend time over the coming weeks to get over this problem.
One thing I did get to work well was the slow-motion option in the matinee tool. I really enjoyed creating this part of the video and will be using this in my further work.
One thing I have learnt is how long it takes to create the scripting sequences, I didn’t allow enough time in the end to reach the 1.50 min time constraint. So I future assignments I will make sure I allot enough time for it. All in all, I think my final piece was a short but good example of an action sequence. With my new knowledge I should be able to create a very good piece for the final assignment.
Tuesday, 25 November 2008
Wednesday, 29 October 2008
Machinima Museum Piece
Hi,
This was my first attempt on my own to produce a UT2004 short video. I found the experience to be really fun and enjoyable. I slapped on some music and really found my rhythm when creating the video. What I particularly enjoyed was getting the video the flow seamlessly. One of my pet hates is videos in games that change camera angles suddenly and glitch at bizarre points; I can safely say my video had none of these attributes.
First of all I decided to create an Egyptian level purely because there is a lot of static mesh and textures available for such a level. This would make creating the level fast and would only take a short amount of time so I could focus on the video. I spent 4-5 hours on the level creation and about the same for creating the video sequence.
I did not attempt to attach a storyline to the project as it would distract from the main interest of the video itself, but I did want there to be a sound track running through out. On my home PC I wanted to add the track form Moby’s album play entitled rushing, due to technical difficulties I ended up using one of the standard tracks in UT entitled KR-Ghosts-of-Anubis. This track in retrospect that works better than the one I had chosen because of the Egyptian them that runs through it.
One of the things that Brian and the rest of the team noticed about my video was it came across very samey. Although I agree the camera angles were similar for each exhibit I do think that it show cased my skills as a level creator and now machinimator.
For my next attempt I will defiantly mix up the shots and use the tools to really create a powerful piece. This is going to be the start of something great; I am really looking forward the rest of this module. I can’t wait to get some NPC interaction going on to really add even more to my Machinima skills.
Lewis Drinnan
This was my first attempt on my own to produce a UT2004 short video. I found the experience to be really fun and enjoyable. I slapped on some music and really found my rhythm when creating the video. What I particularly enjoyed was getting the video the flow seamlessly. One of my pet hates is videos in games that change camera angles suddenly and glitch at bizarre points; I can safely say my video had none of these attributes.
First of all I decided to create an Egyptian level purely because there is a lot of static mesh and textures available for such a level. This would make creating the level fast and would only take a short amount of time so I could focus on the video. I spent 4-5 hours on the level creation and about the same for creating the video sequence.
I did not attempt to attach a storyline to the project as it would distract from the main interest of the video itself, but I did want there to be a sound track running through out. On my home PC I wanted to add the track form Moby’s album play entitled rushing, due to technical difficulties I ended up using one of the standard tracks in UT entitled KR-Ghosts-of-Anubis. This track in retrospect that works better than the one I had chosen because of the Egyptian them that runs through it.
One of the things that Brian and the rest of the team noticed about my video was it came across very samey. Although I agree the camera angles were similar for each exhibit I do think that it show cased my skills as a level creator and now machinimator.
For my next attempt I will defiantly mix up the shots and use the tools to really create a powerful piece. This is going to be the start of something great; I am really looking forward the rest of this module. I can’t wait to get some NPC interaction going on to really add even more to my Machinima skills.
Lewis Drinnan
Machinima Presentation Evaluation
Hi,
Here I am going to discuss how; the short Machinima presentation went, evaluate my performance and finally evaluate the group’s performance.
The entire group worked well together, we were quick to divide the work between each member and all group members produced sufficient research for the slides.
Peter and Mathew presented our presentation; I think it would have been more beneficial for the audience for Peter and Mathew to practice the presentation.
Although the presentation was “off-the-cuff” I think they did very well in conveying are research to the audience.
In retrospect I think are slides were a little inconsistent, they lacked cohesion. This was because each member produced the slides individually. Although we did vet each slide and made sure fonts, size and colour where the same we did not look at content. Two sides in particular had far too much written content for the audience to absorb.
One point raised in the group discussion was that some text was difficult to read because of the colour of the font. For my next presentation these will be a priority to get right.
Personally I think the grade we were given matched the effort we put in as a group.
I will be more accurate with my presentation in the future and make sure that all the little details are correct; this is the main reason why we did not achieve a higher grade.
Lewis Drinnan
Here I am going to discuss how; the short Machinima presentation went, evaluate my performance and finally evaluate the group’s performance.
The entire group worked well together, we were quick to divide the work between each member and all group members produced sufficient research for the slides.
Peter and Mathew presented our presentation; I think it would have been more beneficial for the audience for Peter and Mathew to practice the presentation.
Although the presentation was “off-the-cuff” I think they did very well in conveying are research to the audience.
In retrospect I think are slides were a little inconsistent, they lacked cohesion. This was because each member produced the slides individually. Although we did vet each slide and made sure fonts, size and colour where the same we did not look at content. Two sides in particular had far too much written content for the audience to absorb.
One point raised in the group discussion was that some text was difficult to read because of the colour of the font. For my next presentation these will be a priority to get right.
Personally I think the grade we were given matched the effort we put in as a group.
I will be more accurate with my presentation in the future and make sure that all the little details are correct; this is the main reason why we did not achieve a higher grade.
Lewis Drinnan
Tuesday, 26 February 2008
Paper 2 - Girls and Gaming: Gender Research, “Progress” and the death of interpretation
The authors might have a point about gender research being on sided but I haven’t been to other sources to find out if the opinions hold any truth. The paper itself does read like an academic paper but is a very confusing piece of writing I had to re read the parts of the paper to gauge an understanding of it. From the paper I found out that girls like to play games, they like to play the way boys do but encourage each other rather than beat them down. I have told you what the authors explained in 2000 words in 20 words, the word ramble springs to mind. All in all it is a very interesting research area for games designers to understand but seemed more of a well constructed rant rather than a well constructed convincing paper.
Lewis
Lewis
Paper 1 - Designing Games to Effect Social Change
I found this to be a very interesting academic paper which proves that games technology and experience could be used to help teach and explain complicated problems. I agree with the paper in that most people are active learners and learn by doing, games would defiantly help the existing education establishment further its expertise.
Games for change has a nice ring to it, but really seems a very shallow and broad comment to make. Social change only happens on great scales when entry city’s, countries are shocked enough into action. Can games do this? Can some thing which is “real” change the opinions of a nation? Individual I think games can affect opinions, but it is a very egotistic point of view if you believe your game can effect social change in anyone.
Games designers would they be called that anymore? Or would teachers be a more appt title. Educational Games will not replace existing teaching methods but enhance them.
Lewis
Games for change has a nice ring to it, but really seems a very shallow and broad comment to make. Social change only happens on great scales when entry city’s, countries are shocked enough into action. Can games do this? Can some thing which is “real” change the opinions of a nation? Individual I think games can affect opinions, but it is a very egotistic point of view if you believe your game can effect social change in anyone.
Games designers would they be called that anymore? Or would teachers be a more appt title. Educational Games will not replace existing teaching methods but enhance them.
Lewis
Wednesday, 13 February 2008
Games and level design 2
I have pulled out of Brian’s magical hat a word which I am struggling to think of creative ideas for. But we must strive on; I have found definitions of the word in the oxford dictionary which only elaborates on what I knew already.
This task is only worth 5% of the overall grade but I want to see if I can pull something creative out of my bag, I'm going to have to sit and think about all the possibilities. I have order a book of the interweb which will hopefully help me get my Hammer editing skills of the ground; I hope to get a rough idea of the overall look of my room bye the end of the weekend.
This task is only worth 5% of the overall grade but I want to see if I can pull something creative out of my bag, I'm going to have to sit and think about all the possibilities. I have order a book of the interweb which will hopefully help me get my Hammer editing skills of the ground; I hope to get a rough idea of the overall look of my room bye the end of the weekend.
Friday, 8 February 2008
Games History and context
To be able to view the history of games constructively and in an unbiased fashion, you must alleviate your misconceptions of it and base your opinions purely in the realm of fact.
You must become completely independent and objective in your view of the history of games, most importantly realise some source material may become void, because of the writers own biased position.
This being said it is difficult for someone of any era to objectively discuss games because of the emotional attachment they could place on the game and it’s characters; given that their knowledge and experiences of the early video games are invaluable to the discussion, you must beware that their view could be tainted not through fact but through there emotional observations.
I personally have a great affection for games like Golden Axe, Streets of Rage and Sonic 2. This is not because they made a breakthrough with the technology or that their game play was particularly groundbreaking; but because they have certain nostalgia for me and consequently I believe these games to be the best of the Sega/Nintendo console generation.
Assessing games of the past can only be by experiencing them first, only through playing will you be able to make an informed judgment on the quality of the game and its subsequent contribution to the gaming industry as a whole.
“There's more to the truth than just the facts.” ~ Author Unknown
You must become completely independent and objective in your view of the history of games, most importantly realise some source material may become void, because of the writers own biased position.
This being said it is difficult for someone of any era to objectively discuss games because of the emotional attachment they could place on the game and it’s characters; given that their knowledge and experiences of the early video games are invaluable to the discussion, you must beware that their view could be tainted not through fact but through there emotional observations.
I personally have a great affection for games like Golden Axe, Streets of Rage and Sonic 2. This is not because they made a breakthrough with the technology or that their game play was particularly groundbreaking; but because they have certain nostalgia for me and consequently I believe these games to be the best of the Sega/Nintendo console generation.
Assessing games of the past can only be by experiencing them first, only through playing will you be able to make an informed judgment on the quality of the game and its subsequent contribution to the gaming industry as a whole.
“There's more to the truth than just the facts.” ~ Author Unknown
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