Saturday, 18 December 2010

Project Blend - Design Document

So as of Friday we have completed and handed in Coursework 1, the Design Document for Project Blend.
It was a really great feeling just having everyone working together to contribute to this massive document. It ended up being  23500 and a bit words!

Personally I'm not sure how much in words... but I contributed mostly to the Story and Narrative section of the document. Re-doing the narrative arc, having a more in depth story summary, talking about how the story had developed etc.
I also as everyone else did, design some of the encounters in the levels. More specifically mine being encounters 4 and 5 in Level 1. We also all did a ton of proof-reading at the end to make sure the document was up to a presentable standard.
Erm... I also collated with Adam in the making of the Research Summary section.
All in all, we've all worked really hard, and I'm really proud of us all.

Sunday, 12 December 2010

Project Blend - Encounter Design

Final stretch for the design document now!
This week we all got assigned parts of levels to design. I got encounters 4 and 5 of Level 1, here they are ^^

Encounter 4



                This encounter starts with Master Dragonfruits death. He throws Logan his sword and explains to Logan how to perform a Standard Attack with his final breath.
                A group of fodder appear in front of Logan. He defeats them rather easily and moves forward. By the time he had finished with them however, two more groups have been called over. The higher numbers of fodder offer Logan more of a challenge. Logan can see Helon fleeing in the background
                Logan is now offered a brief respite and moves forward quickly. He is suddenly jumped by a group of fodder. He deals with these fairly quickly despite the surprise and moves forward again.
                He reaches four groups of fodder being funnelled by obstacles, this seems overwhelming at first is made easier by the fact that only one group is faced it a time. It is more of a test of endurance than skill.
                Logan reaches the sink just in time to see Helon disappear down it. He laments by his Masters body for a moment before continuing.  

Encounter 5




This is a short encounter leading to the sink. It starts Logan navigating his way through a small platforming section. He first jumps on to a seasoning cube, and then up to a pepper put that it on its side. He then jumps up onto a rolling pin, which he walks to the top of. He jumps up onto an empty knife block, jumps up the two stages of an empty knife block, crossing it to a pile of cookery books.
                Her he is swarmed with three groups of fodder that he takes out with relative difficulty. He jumps up onto a serial box which he falls through, coming out at the bottom. He fights two more groups of fodder before reaching the sink. Logan see’s fruit from the Bad Kitchen disappearing down the sink hole, and follows. 

Sunday, 5 December 2010

Project Blend – Music Presentation

My task this week was to create the presentation for when we meet with the music students on Wednesday, so that Alan can focus on the document itself.
Here it is for now

Project Blend

Although it may change following discussions in tomorrows meeting.

Thursday, 2 December 2010

Dissertation Presentation

So I did  a presentation today basically showing I know what I'm doing with my presentation. I was a bit nervous, but think it went pretty well.
Here's a link so you can view the slides online.

Presentation

And here's my notes I used during.

I shall try and expand on these later so they're more similar to what I actually said than just prompts.

Tuesday, 30 November 2010

Project Blend – Music Groups

Deadlines and stuff coming up soon!


 

Anyways last week was pretty good, as a group we've got most major things decided, as well as prototyped our system.

This week a few people have taken some of the levels and starting to design them. It shall be interesting to see what they come up with.

Personally I have been working with Alan and K as part of the sound team. We made a list of every piece of music that is needed for the game. We then split that list into a number of groups. This was felt to be appropriate as some songs have overlay or similar themes.



Group 1
  • Menu/Good Kitchen Theme
  • Kitchen Invasion
  • Return to Kitchen
  • Good Kitchen and Kitchen Invasion themes, should flow into each other.
  • Return to Kitchen should be a reprise of the Good Kitchen Theme. Should be slightly darker, more hardened.
Group 2
  • Helon's Theme
  • Bin Theme
  • Zomberry Helon Theme
  • Zomberry Helon Theme should be a combination of Helon's theme and the Bin theme.
Group 3
  • Bad Kitchen/ Grapevine Theme
  • Blender Boss Theme
  • Grapevine Boss Theme
  • Blender boss and Grapevine boss theme should share a key melody and flow into each other.
  • Bad Kitchen theme will be different, but shouldn't sound out of place between these boss themes.
Group 4
  • Battle Theme
  • Sub-Boss Theme
  • Rising Tension Theme
  • n/a
Group 5
  • Tragic Theme
  • Revelation Theme
  • Fridge Theme
  • n/a
Group 6
  • Credits Song
  • n/a

I shall continue to work with Alan and K on the sound document which shall be presented to the sound students next week.

Monday, 22 November 2010

Project Blend - Level Breakdown + Now with added sound!

Last weeks meeting contained a big discussion about sound. I worked with Allan and Chris to map out the music that is needed in relevance to the story. 
My task was to combine this with the story breakdown, so that it can be given to the school of rock.
I did this simply by adding a Music heading to each level. These contain a title for every song we need, along with a few key words/themes.
The team shall discuss example music on the forum and in person. This shall be added into this when we have reached a decision. 

Level  1

Setting
Good Kitchen

Plot Points
  • Good Kitchen is attacked by fruit from the Bad Kitchen.
  • They kidnap the Raspberries .
  • Master Dragonfruit is Killed by Horned Melon.
  • Horned Melon flees to Bad Kitchen.
  • Logan follows for revenge/ to save the raspberries.

Music
  • Good Kitchen Theme – Calm, Happy.
  • Invasion – Dramatic, Strong. (Must lead in well from previous song.)
  • Helon’s Theme – Boss Fight, Strong, Punk.
  • Tragic Theme – Tragic Sad.

Level 2

Setting
Bad Kitchen – Kitchen Side
Plot Points
  • Enters Bad Kitchen.
  • Grapevine is introduced, they explain the situation the kitchen is in.
  • Stealth’s way through kitchen.
  • Blackberries are introduced.
  • Caught and thrown in bin.

Music
  • Bad Kitchen Theme – Dark, Seedy, Edgey.

Level 3

Setting
Bad Kitchen – Bin
Plot Points
  • Rotting Fruit – Fight Zomberries.
  • Meets traitor Blackberries.
  • Finds out that Logan is a Loganberry.
  • Meets Helon – she tells Logan that the Raspberries are in the Fridge.
  • Fight way out of Bin.

Music
  • Bin Theme – Dark, Eerie, Death.

Level 4

Setting
Bad Kitchen – Fridge
Plot Points
  • Stealth way past prison guards.
  • Fight Captain/Boss.
  • Logan saves the fruit trapped in the Fridge. The Raspberries are not there.
  • Open the Fridge door, see’s the Raspberries in the Blender.

Music
  • Fridge Theme – Cold, Icy, Desolate.

Level 5

Setting
Bad Kitchen – Side
Plot Points
  • Stealth/Fight way across kitchen to Blender.

Music
  • Rising Tension – Tension, Fast, Stealthy.


Level 6

Setting
Bad Kitchen – Side
Plot Points
  • Showdown with Blender.
  • Blender is defeated.
  • The Raspberries are blended.
  • It is revealed that The Grapevine are the real bad guys.
  • They possess the Blender, Final Boss Fight.
  • Grapes are defeated.

Music
  • Blender Boss Theme – Dark and stealthy.
  • Grapvine Boss Theme – Epic battle music.

(Both tunes although very different should share a key melody.)

Epilogue

Setting
Good Kitchen
Plot Points
  • Logan returns to the Good Kitchen.
  • Harmony between Good and Bad Kitchens.

Music
  • Good Kitchen Theme (Reprise) – A reprise/remix of the Good Kitchen theme, to show harmony.


Additional Music
  • Menu Theme – Short, Repetitive, Memorable.
  • Fight Theme – Fast Paced, Hyper, Deadly.
  • Sub-Boss Theme – A more epic fight theme.
  • Credits Theme – Perhaps another reprise of another song?

Thursday, 18 November 2010

Dissertation

Heya all,
I'm gonna start keeping this blog up to date with the progress of my Dissertation.

So far I have had a meeting all three of three of my lecturers, and they have helped shape my question, which for the moment is this:


How Do Hidden and Visible Encounters Impact Exploration in JRPG’s? 

Research Context

  • Egenfeldt-Nielsen’s Exploration in computer games - a new starting point.
  • Looks at exploration. Exploration is important to people’s lives, helps them make constructs/theories about the world around them.
  • These constructs are the rules of everyone’s world. So exploration is key to people’s lives.
  • Personal Construct Psychology – George Kelly
  • This can also be applied to games.
  • Project will examine the exploration of the player, and the constructs they make about the world.
  • Leads into affect.
  • Feel It, Don’t Think: the Significance of Affect in the Study of Digital Games by Eugénie Shinkle.
  • These constructs talked of by E-N are what informs a person affective response.
  • Looking at affect will mention Teresa Brennan and Don Norman.
  • Tracy Fullerton, Game Design Workshop. 
  • Theory on information structures.


Methods

  • Tracy Fullerton. Playtesting very important.
  • Three Dungeons.
  • 1st and 2nd will have identical numbers of encounters and pretty much the same areas, just in different orders.
  • Starting these dungeons – chest at beginning, told there is a boss.
  • Chests will contain part of a set of armour. Reinforce the collection.
  • Start with the ‘cloth’ set and get an upgrade. i.e Iron.
  • 1st dungeon will be ice dungeon, enemies can be seen.
  • 2nd dungeon will be fire dungeon, enemies cannot be seen.=
  • These two themes will reinforce the difference between them.
  • Third dungeon, choice between fire or ice. Shall show which prefer.
  • In each one will be rooms/ paths coming off of the other type.
  • Will see players willingness to explore other once made choice.
  • Will be asked to think out loud, Fullerton.
  • Exploration percentage will be shown at the end.
  • Post-test questionnaire to see if data correlates. 
  • Questionnaire will include ‘pre-test’ questions.
  • Player type.
  • Game examples, what type of games they like.
  • Make own categories.
  • Will perhaps create another prototype dungeon based on the feedback.



Every time I do some major research or have a meeting with my tutors I shall post.

Sunday, 14 November 2010

Project Blend - Sight and Shout Range Prototype

So I was assigned to prototype the sight and shout ranges of enemies in the game. I apologise for the drawing.

This is a top down layout of what the player would be seeing on the screen.

The Rules
  • Logan is the blue circle.
  • Turning Enemies are red circles.
  • Patrolling enemies are red squares.
  • Obstacles donated by grey boxes.
  • Logan moves one space at a time.
  • Patrolling enemies move one space at a time, and take the time of one space to turn.
  • Turning enemies take the time of one space to turn, and they stare in a direction for the time of one space before turning again.
  • Movement is donated by dotted line.
  • Turning is denoted by the arrowed line.
  • Enemies can see in straight line anything on the screen.
  • If an enemy see’s Logan they shout, causing any enemy within three spaces to head to that position.
  • If Logan moves onto a space occupied by an enemy and they can’t see him, that enemy is killed.
  • If an enemy sees Logan and successfully shouts (the shout calls another enemy) then Logan is killed.
  • If Logan is seen by an enemy and they shout unsuccessfully (the shout fails to call another enemy) then the enemy moves to Logan’s space and is killed by Logan.
One thing that shall have to be discussed is how far the enemies can see in this straight line. I would think this would be limited by the screen. i.e enemies can not see you from off screen.

Wednesday, 10 November 2010

Project Blend - Level Breakdown


Level  1
Setting:  Good Kitchen
  • Good Kitchen is attacked by fruit from the Bad Kitchen.
  • They kidnap the Raspberries .
  • Master Dragonfruit is Killed by Horned Melon.
  • Horned Melon flees to Bad Kitchen.
  • Logan follows for revenge/ to save the raspberries.

Level 2
Setting: Bad Kitchen – Kitchen Side
  • Enters Bad Kitchen.
  • Grapevine is introduced, they explain the situation the kitchen is in.
  • Stealth’s way through kitchen.
  • Blackberries are introduced.
  • Caught and thrown in bin.

Level 3
Setting: Bad Kitchen – Bin
  • Rotting Fruit – Fight Zomberries.
  • Meets traitor Blackberries.
  • Finds out that Logan is a Loganberry.
  • Meets Helon – she tells Logan that the Raspberries are in the Fridge.
  • Fight way out of Bin.

Level 4
Setting: Bad Kitchen – Fridge
  • Stealth way past prison guards. (Perhaps Blueberries?)
  • Fight Captain/Boss. (Cold Veg, perhaps Radish/ Florence Fennel?)
  • Logan saves the fruit trapped in the Fridge. The Raspberries are not there.
  • Open the Fridge door, see’s the Raspberries in the Blender.

Level 5
Setting: Bad Kitchen – Side
  • Stealth/Fight way across kitchen to Blender.

Level 6
Setting: Bad Kitchen – Side
  • Showdown with Blender.
  • Blender is defeated.
  • The Raspberries are blended.
  • It is revealed that The Grapevine are the real bad guys.
  • They possess the Blender, Final Boss Fight.
  • Grapes are defeated.

Epilogue
  • Logan returns to the Good Kitchen.
  • Harmony between Good and Bad Kitchens.
There could also be a level between levels 3 and 4 to show the transition between the Bin and the Fridge.

Wednesday, 3 November 2010

Drawing in Flash!

I really really love drawing in Flash, it makes all the lines look amazing!
I did the Otter Mascot you see up top in it ^^

Also....

Here is my face! xD


Woop Flash! ^^

Tuesday, 2 November 2010

Square Enix + Facebook

WHYYYYY!!

So yeah... Square Enix have released two Facebook games.

Knights of the Crystals
and

Chocobo's Crystal Tower


They take the addictive pet/mafia game elements and add Final Fantasy Dungeon Goodness!

Goodbye life D:

On another note, I wish I didn't get depressed so damn easily xD

Saturday, 30 October 2010

Soo... Comfy...

This... it looks soo amazing and comfy.



If someone buys me this, I will love you forever!

((Psst, you can get it here.))

Also Boooooppppp!

Friday, 29 October 2010

Project Blend - Narrative Arc

So here's my version of the Narrative Arc for the Story of our project. I actually did this a few days ago, just didn't post it. So now it looks like Daryl and K did this before me...


Also this layout is based on a narrative structure template by Hope Caton


Act 1


Start
Introduce the good kitchen, very white and clean. Introduce Logan and Master Dragonfruit. Combat Training. Introduce other Raspberries.

Inciting Incident
Fruit invade from the bad kitchen. Many of the good fruits are slaughtered. The Raspberries are kidnapped. Master Dragonfruit runs off to fight.

Second Half – Preparation
He follows Master Dragonfruit and fights through the bad fruit, to get to the entrance of the bad kitchen.

Hook
He kills a couple if blackberries that beg for his mercy, calling him brother.

Climax
Logan arrives just as Master Dragonfruit is killed by Master HornedMelon, the guardian to the bad kitchen. Logan goes crazy and fights the guardian, killing him.

Act 2

Start
Enters the bad kitchen, see’s the disorder and decay. Meets the grapevine, gossipy French grapes that are on vines around the kitchen.
They inform Logan that this is all the work of the blender. He sets out for revenge. Must stealth his way through kitchen.

Midpoint Reversal
After a few stealth encounters, Logan stealth’s through the Blender’s outer guard of fruit. He fights and kills Blackberries. It is then revealed to him that he is a Loganberry, i.e. half Blackberry.
Identity Crisis?

Second Half
Deals with crises and strengthens his vows to defeat the Blender. More stealth and fighting.

Climax
Fights a big boss fruit, wins, but is grievously injured. Questions whether or not to turn back.

Act 3

Start
Logan lies there, a blackberry heals him. Determination restored, he decides to keep fighting.

Climax
After bloody battle, gets to the Blender. Showdown.

Resurrection
The Blender blends all the raspberries inside him. Logan goes crazy and finishes him off.

Resolution
Back in the good kitchen, training by himself.

Also here are links to Daryl and K's versions.



Tuesday, 26 October 2010

Toon Shading Sanity Test

We had a meeting on Monday in which we decided on art style. It's really nice, as I actually feel like we're getting somewhere now.

A small difference in opinion was whether we should use toon shading on the playable character, i.e Sly Cooper Style.


It was argued that we would encounter too many problems doing this, and that it would be too time consuming to implement. 

I believe that it should be repetitively easy to do in Unity, and that it would look good.
To see whether it was feasible myself and Martin where assigned to sanity check it.

I did this using the level and character from Unity's 2D Gameplay Tutorial. 

I tried out three different types of shader. Applying them to both the character and the ship.

Bumped Specular
This shader is the default shader which gives a more realistic lighting effect.



Toon - Basic Outline
This shader gives the object an outline, and acts as if no light is shone on it.


Toon - Lighted Outline
This applies an outline to the model, as in the other Toon shader, but this shader recognises light, and is shaded in a tooney fashion. 


As the screenshots with the toon shaders show, this works perfectly well on a playable character.
I can also confirm that it worked fine when the character was animated.

I was also assigned to plot out the narrative ark of the game. This shall be done soon.

Layton Fever!

I've quite recently become a Layton fanboy. When the game first came out I have it a try, I loved the art style, but really disliked the type if puzzles. So I left the game alone.

This all changed when I saw a trailer for the latest game 'Professor Layton and the Lost Future'. It just captured me, loved the style, the voices and the plot behind it.



I mean Steampunk Time Machine for the win! (Also grown up Luke seems awesome.) ^^
I wanted to play this game. But I decided that to do this I would have to play through the first two.

So I dug out the 1st game and played it. Again I was caught by the style, the animated scenes and the voices, and again my brain died when it came to the puzzles. Although this time instead of giving up. I persevered.
I trawled through the games puzzles (many of which made little sense plot wise!) and after a while found myself starting to enjoy them. I'd complete 5-10 puzzles in a row now, without help, or failing many times. It gave me a very nice sense of accomplishment. There where still a few that practically reduced me to tears though.
Soon after I completed the game, and was rather happy with myself.
Good show Professor, your annoying puzzles and charming animation and characters have won me over.

Now to the second game!

Also this new Layton Fanboyness prompted me to buy the film, which I rather enjoyed. I got to enjoy the animation style and the characters without the puzzles!


It wasn't an amazing film though, as the plot is a little flimsy and goes a bit too Japanese xD
They implemented the few puzzles that where in it in quite an interesting way though.

Oh and last thing! There's gonna be a Phoenix Wright vs Professor Layton Game for the 3DS!
I hope to god it comes out here. Seems like it'll be an awesome crossover.



Very interesting style crossover too :D

Anywho that's me off. Have work to do Dx

Friday, 15 October 2010

Setting and Plot idea

This weeks meeting was interesting, we finally got the 'vision' of the game sorted. We then got split into groups to look at different things. Obviously being Story Co-ordinator I chose come up with ideas for setting and plot. Daryl and Chris will also be doing this, it'll be interesting to see how different our ideas all are.

Setting
My idea for the setting (well an idea I think someone else came up with, but I stole) is a very clean, simple kitchen. It would be spotless and look almost clinical. Here a few a pictures stolen from google that I like.






I see everything have a very straight, angled style. Sort of looking like Mirrors Edge.


I think having a style like this will make the fruit juices everywhere more satisfying.

Plot
Ok, now onto plot! My idea for the plot is that of gang wars. Each gang having the name, and containing the fruit and/or veg of a particular smoothie. The names being amusing or 'punny'. For example 'Banana Blitz' being a gang of hard-hitting Banana's,'Berry Blast' being a group a many different berries, or Strawberry Passion being full of seductive, sordid strawberries.
... I'm sure the group will come up with funnier names.

Anywho, the plot follows the main character... who as he doesn't have a name, shall be known henceforth as Logan. Logan the Raspberry.

Logan arrives with a batch of other raspberries in 'The Kitchen'. On his arrival they are attacked by the blackberries. He manages to get away, but the rest of his kin are slaughtered.
He ends up finding out that they where slaughtered as raspberry is the final ingredient needed by 'The Blender'. They wanted to stop that at any cost.

'The Blender' is master of the kitchen, who has many of the gangs of fruit under his control. He sends these gangs after Logan.

 'Blackberry Blasters', (name pending) are a resistance group who are fighting against 'The Blender'.

Logan spends the game fighting off the gangs sent after him by the blender, as well as chasing after 'Blackberry Blasters' to avenge his kin.

A plot twist at some point is that he is half Blackberry himself. He is a Loganberry.

Well those are my ideas, will be cool to what ideas the others have had, and how our ideas merge.

Monday, 11 October 2010

Omg... minecraft...

This is me posting at the end of a long day at uni... so tired Dx
Was playing minecraft with the house mates last night, till like 4 in the morning. Is crazy addictive. Really didn't think I'd like it as well xD

Evil, evil game.



Everyone go and play it now! xD

http://www.minecraft.net/

Sunday, 10 October 2010

Research - Stealth Gameplay

So we had our big team meeting Thursday, were we chose the game idea and such, but we also brainstormed loads of idea and themes to do with the game. We were then assigned to take one of these things each to research. I shall be researching stealth in games.

First up we have Metal Gear Solid, this has to one of the most famous stealth games out there.



It has an array of interesting mechanics used to distract and sneak up on your opponents . You also have to hide the bodies of some people you kill/ knock out, which is quite cool/annoying.

Linking on to this lets look at another game made by Hideo Kojima, Boktai.



These 26 seconds of bad quality video basically show the main stealth mechanic in the games. Knock on a wall, get behind them, and KILL!

Anywho, now onto another very popular stealth franchise Splinter Cell.




This is from the newest Splinter Cell game, so may be slightly different from the others, but this is defiantly very different from the other stealth games above. It looks quite interesting... I may have to give it a play sometime.

Next another famous game, with almost a 'cult game' status. Thief. The following video is for number 2.



This is quite interesting as it is third person, something that isn't regularly seen in stealth games. Another interesting thing is that sounds are apparently used to great affect in this. This could be quite interesting to research more and implement into the project.

Now to one of the most modern and famous stealth games. Assassins Creed.



These games have very interesting ways of being stealthy. Involving luring guards away, hiding, blending into crowds, as well as stealth kills.

Finally a game that at least I envision to be the closest of what our project shall be like, perhaps as  a 2D platformer, rather than a 3D one though. Sly Cooper.



I especially like the cartoony style and setting, something that I wouldn't have thought possible in stealth game, but evidently can be done.

Anyways, thanks for reading, now to go try this minecraft game everyones talking about...

Friday, 8 October 2010

Big Games Project - Voting and such

So yesterday we all pitched our ideas.
Mine and K's ideas drew! But unfortunately after a re-vote K's idea got chosen. Congrats to him though.
Was a bit saddening at first, just because I had been so close, and I usually don't have good ideas... but guess I just shouldn't have got my hopes up.

On a brighter note, I did land the job of Story Co-ordinator. Which is what I wanted. Dunno what to do with this idea story wise at the moment though. I guess I'll have to brainstorm with the rest of the group, and see what we want to do with it.

From now on I shall be posting weekly about my involvement in this project, should be pretty interesting.

Anywho, I shall leave you with this.

Wednesday, 6 October 2010

Games Pitch!

Ok so the High Concept of my game pitch for big team project is this:
Take over the world as an Alien Hat, who can read minds, shape shift, and control people.
  • It will be a single-player PC game, for the PC, created in Unity.
  • The style of the game shall be simple, containing everyday objects and low poly humanoids.
  •   The view shall be isometric, so that the player can see a large area of the game world. Similar to The Sims 3 ( Below. Fig 1.)
Fig 1. Sims 3

As stated in the High Concept above, the player is an Alien Hat that has come to take over the world. Obviously the Hat has certain abilities that will help it achieve this goal.
  •  The main one being mind control. If anyone wears the hat, it can control their actions.
  •    It can shape shift into different types of hat, to lure people to put it on.
  •    It can read the minds of people around it.
  •    It can hover/ teleport short distances, as long as it isn’t being looked at.

Each level will have a target; a head the hat must reach to complete the level. This will be done using the Hat’s abilities, and other people’s abilities to work up a chain and eventually reach the target. A few examples of this would be:
  •   Taking over a shop clerk allow the player to more easily take over and person in that shop.
  •      Taking over a clown/ entertainer would allow you to place the hat on a child’s head.
  •      Taking over a Sports Instructor would allow you to give the hat to anyone participating in the Sport. 
A passive ability of every person in the level is the ability to more easily take over anyone they have a relationship with.

The story of the game shall be told through the thoughts of the people in each level, as well as the hat’s own thoughts. There will be plot, sub plots, and themes that carry throughout the game.
In this way the story shall be integrated into the game play, and won’t be a separate entity. 

Monday, 4 October 2010

Eurogamer

So I attended Eurogamer on friday. It was pretty damn awesome. My first experience of an actual gaming expo. It was really cool actually seeing upcoming games being played.
Games that are defiantly worth playing are Assassins Creed: Brotherhood. The multi player of that was pretty amazing, really looking forward for that coming out.  Little Big Planet 2 was pretty fun, especially with the the new game modes. Really looking forward to seeing what I can make in it's level editor when it comes out.

An indie game that was Freakin' Awesome was 'Swimming Under Clouds'.



You play as a ball of water containing a fish. It's quite a simple platformer, but the interesting thing is that the fish can fall out of the water, and you need to get it back before it dies. Very interesting mechanic, sorta reminds me the Yoshi games were when you get hurt, you have to get Baby Mario back before he's kidnapped.

One really cool thing that I really didn't expect was there was a Nintendo booth where The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. I got in the queue with my mate Josiah and was told we'd have to wait an hour. I was just about prepared for that, could chat and stuff while we waited. Then the Nintendo booth guy came and told us we'd have to wait two. So was like fudge this and left.

On another note I was pleasantly surprised by the Playstation move. Yes it was similar to the Wii, but was alot better. For one it's using the Playstation 3, which is 3 times as powerful than the Wii, also it's the Wii Motionplus or better, right out the box. Lastly they seem to be doing more interesting things with it, for example with the archery and gladiator stuff you can play using two Move controllers, which gave a better experience.
Don't get me wrong though, it doesn't look amazing, and I'm not saying it's THE NEXT BIG STEP! I'm just saying it seemed better than I thought, and it looks like there will be a few interesting games for it.
Also it looked alot better than Kinect, which kept breaking. Also playing Table Tennis without a controller in your hand... feels a bit odd to me.

The highlight of the expo though had to be the careers section, and the developer talks.
It was really nice getting leaflets from and chatting with some actual game developers. I defiantly need to work on my portfolio!
The only talk I actually went to was the Sucker Punch one, the guys who make inFamous. I really should have gone the the Fable and Deus Ex ones.
The Sucker Punch guys were pretty cool, was really nice seeing them explain the game, and parts of it's development. I do think they should have kept his new hair.
Not the best picture ever, but think he looks sooo much better on the right. Damn you Sucker Punch!

Friday, 1 October 2010

Big Games Project!

Woop! So today we had our first meeting for the Big Games Project! Am quite psyched.
We shall be be proposing our ideas next week. I have an ok one about a parasitic hat. But I may think of something better... something involving a Wii-mote could be interesting.
So! From now on I shall be trying my best to post weekly on what I'm doing in this project. This shall hopefully be stuff to do with story, as I am hoping to get Story co-ordinator.

On another note, I am currently writing a review of Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep, for this blog. I loved the game, but I should hopefully be giving an interesting and mostly impartial review.

Anywho, I shall leave you with a link to the song 'Black Sheep' from the Scott Pilgrim movie. It's originally by Metric, but I much prefer this version.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jMruFHTwrY

Thursday, 23 September 2010

Courage Otter presents...

OMG FIRST POST!!!
xD

*dies*

Heya people that could be reading this! Welcome to my bandwagon jumping Blog! *dances*

So yeah things have been pretty hectic this week, been thrust out of my lazy summer holiday into a Freshers Week Frenzy. It's pretty much been like a 9-5 job running the LGBT and Games Club stalls.
But has been pretty fun, and feel good to have helped actually give the uni an LGBT presence, something which it had been lacking ^^
Last day of stalls tomorrow, and then on Saturday we shall be having a society day out to Soho, which I'll probably post about on here as it promises to be... interesting xD

Finally I shall leave you with a rather humorous prank call, where the caller is pretending to be Sora, the main character from Kingdom Hearts.

Listen!

If for some reason you don't know what Kingdom Hearts is...

If you click this... you are not a friend of mine...