Ryan - Games Design

This week has been slow going due to illness. I have been building the level blockout and will continue to do so once I am feeling healthier.

Success with the gravity! This week everything has been coming together. I have fixed the gravity plugin and figured out how to manipulate it being on or off. I have also installed visual cues to show the player if gravity is working or not. Now it is just a case of building the level based on the action block gameplay sections next week before the Christmas break. Following that it will be a lot of playtesting and iteration.

There have been some issues with the plugin controlling gravity. This has meant that I have had to alter how gameplay works - temporarily - while I remedy this. I have been creating quick gameplay moments using Action Blocks as with my first Games Proposal project so I shall continue to build this way. I am also working out ways to trigger different gravitational moments such as the artifical gravity malfunctioning and causing the player to float up. This should work properly early next week.

For this project I have decided to take on SPACE! I found a very good plugin that alters the gravity within engine to allow players to walk on walls and ceilings and I think this could create an interesting and slightly mind-bending level to play in. The initial idea is that the players are onboard a space station or ship that is under attack, players will need to escape the ship while taking on the enemies that are attacking. Gravity will fluctuate, disappearing, moving directions and getting stronger. Players will need to track this in order to progress through the level without floating off into space!

Disaster struck this week. For some unknown reason I have removed the walls and floor throughout this build which has rendered the project unplayable! Due to the amount of progress I have already made and what I have left to do, it has been agreed that I should move on to the next project and return to this once other work is passed. A breakdown of my upcoming project will be available next week!

The project is almost complete! I want to tidy up some of the folders and reduce the amount of "stuff" I have taking up space (this is also causing issues with packaging the project so doubly important!) I have also considered adding positive and negative audio feedback so the next week will focus on those and tidying the last few bits before moving on!

This week I have finalised the asset switchover and the project is looking a lot more interesting now. I still have some blueprints to tweak and finalise and I will need to take a few days next week to tackle those. I have done a few playtests this week and players seem to enjoy the project but there seems to be a sense of not really knowing what they are doing. So I shall figure out a way to clarify over the next few days. Next week will be continued playtests and iteration based on feedback as well as making the repairs to the blueprints.