EAE Capstone II

Hello!

David McCall here  I am writing my blog for the second half of my year course. I actually took this class backwards believe it or not. This semester just like last semester I joined a team of talented individuals, this semester I got to experience how it was like in first weeks of establishing a concept for a game from the very essence of where it came. I got to experience as an individual what game console we were presented and was able to experience off hand how I would approach the pitch to my game.

In the beginning of the semester after we were told that we were going to create a game for the PS VITA, I knew right off the bat that I needed to get familiar with what games were already out there and see what kind of control scheme i wanted for the game I had in mind.

The PS VITA is a handheld game console manufactured and marketed by Sony Computer Entertainment. It is a successor to the Plantation Portable as part of the PlayStation brand gaming devices.

During the process of having to pitch a game each student in the class had to come up with an idea that they wanted to create on the PS VITA. Each member left and came back with fantastic ideas, our mission was to to learn how to pitch a game and learn how to keep our audience excited with such little information.

My ideas for games were very random i was unable to establish a connection with the VITA as I did with the Xbox360 this game needless to say my ideas were an off shoot of what the class came up with.

After grouping up and going through our pitches together in a group I found that most people really like the idea of the last game pitch i came up with which was  "Special OP's Princess"

         ***SPECIAL OP'S PRINCESS***

The story behind this game was to not follow the traditional norms of what we think is right and actually what always seems to be the case but to take a leap behind the norms and branch out.

Special OP's Princess! You are tired of being the damsel in distress you are tired of waiting for that "Knight in Shining Armor", to come and save you,  and you are suppose to thank him for all the time you've spent locked up in this castle waiting for him. Pfft'.. your thinking of a different kind of story, Specials Op's Princess finds away to sneak out of the dungeon she is trapped  and goes out gun's a blazing  till she fully gets out of that Hell hole herself.

I wanted people to picture the movie "Kill Bill", and think of the destruction that Female lead caused destroying all the men that came in her way this is her Story alone not yours!!

The pitch actually had a lot going for me at the time, no one forgot my pitch but it just didn't have the visuals as the other games that were picked which  I regret not doing. I noticed down to the last 3 games that were picked in the beginning pitch it already had a "game mechanic" and some type of direction.

After the pitches were done we were told to vote on the games that we really liked and would like to be a part of, the game I really enjoyed right off hand was the Drunken dwarf game because In my earlier years I played NeverWinter Night's and roleplayed a Drunken dwarf and would of had a lot ot bring to the table.

My second pitch i really enjoyed was Meteroid which later became "The Galatic Labors Union" also known as G.L.U. this game was so fascinating, it took a more educational approach to the galaxy with a mix of "Google Skymaps"

 

This game had something really amazing about it and it was the essential game mechanic which was the use of the gyroscope. I was taken back by how fantastic that sounded, I pictured everyone playing that game and moving all over the sky scanning things  and destroying them.

Needless to say I jumped on that project as quickly as possible and chose it to be my second pick if the dwarf game was not picked. I came to class the next week and Roger and bob showed us what teams were picked and what team i would be on for the rest of the semester and i was extremely excited to see that I got picked for the Meteoroids team.

The group started out as two programmers and two artists. 

Kira Booth - The Lead idea and foundation of where the game came from and programmer

Russell Canning - Programmer and very hard working

Ryan Jiang - A Great Sketch Artist and Character Modeler.

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In this small group we wanted to get something together where we could pitch  work together to try and put something together some of are concept art in the early peroids of the game was like this:

We had a lot of ideas for concept art that I put together which were very vivid and colorful...

We left the mechanics of the game up to Russel and Kira and Ryan and I made models we wanted to see in our first game sprint.

The first sprint ended up being  a 3D Skybox with meteroids inside of it where we would interact with them and touch and make them dissappear.

Kira put together a full video showing the movement that would be approached in the game on her GO Pro which was pretty awesome and we also let everyone know that the D-Pad would be useable as well.

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Our game was picked out of a group of different games by the judge panels to create for the bigger aspect of things, we were extremely stoked about it because we at one point didn't believe that it would go that for and were happy, Roger and Bob had our backs.

Our group extended from 4 people to 10 people. the workflow reminded me of last semester where would have continuous sprints to get things done and important stand up meetings to tell everyone what were doing and working on and if we had any issues.

I began cranking out more skybox's for the game below or 2 screenies..

 

I was put on tasks which involved modeling of Asteroids, making of sky boxes, and making comets. Also i looked up information on what we could do and couldn't do on the Vita and came up with 50 names for our game.

When i made the comet that had to be my most cherished piece, unfortunately i dont think it will make it in the game due to  PS Vita's Rendering.

I can't wait till next semester!!!