And the Winners Are...

On Thursday we had a pizza party and the professors annouced the two winning games. It was no surprise to see Heroes of Hat up there since we were told that they had by far the most votes of any game in the first round. They said the second place winner was tough to decide though because the votes were tied between two games and even the judges had been torn. The professors made the deciding vote and the second place winner was... Shadow Theif!

I knew that our game was good but was still surprised because we had six other games to compete with. It's exciting to know that I'll be able to see my idea made into a fully functional game. Not to mention that it will be park of the University of Utah's legacy of games.

After that we split into two groups to discuss our games. I'm excited to work with all of the people on my team and I know this is going to be an exellent final project!

Presentation

On Tuesday, our class presented our prototypes in front of the class and a panel fo four judges from the professional gaming industry. There were some technical problems with my laptop, but luckily we were able to borrow a working laptop from a classmate at the last minute. Our presentation went smoothly and we were able to show all of the short video clips I made and the prototype. I was impressed with how professionally Ben and Garret handled the presentation. I did my share of speaking too, of course. We answered questions from the judges at the end and stumbled over a couple of hard questions, but overall things went well.

Though it was hard to concentrate on the other teams after getting the after-presentation jitters, I noticed that  our class presented some nice looking prototypes. The Rag Princess team had an awesome example of how to sew together one of the evil stuffed animals in the game to tear them apart (it sounds violent but it really wasn't that bad. There was no blood after all). The Heroes of Hat team used 3d platforms for their 2d side scroller and it worked nicely.

Now to vote and find out the two winning games!

Prototype Madness

My group worked super hard on creating a prototype to present to the class. We were down to eight game ideas, with mine still in the running. I was very impressed with what my teamates Ben and Garret managed to create. We finished our two (short) levels to show for the prototype the night before we were scheduled to present. It looked great with the 3d look we created in the background but using three different layers from a single japanese ink painting. We even had the music and sound in place! All of my worries about not getting it done in time were gone. Find out how it went int the next post!

Art Style

To get ideas for the style of my game, I have been looking at both traditional Japanese ink style paintings and a video game called Okami. I really like the look of ink paintings and believe it would give a unique look to my game. Okami  has successfully incorporated a look that is similar to what I want to achieve into its graphics and serves as a model for my game. I really like the way the characters have a rough black outline that makes them appear to have been painted in ink as well as the use of water colors and paper textures.

Ninja Girl

This week has been fun for the Ninja Theif group. We have been brainstorming ideas for puzzles and figuring out how the shadow-switching dynamic will work. What can a shadow do? Stealthily sneak past guards, be weightless, and walk on shadow platforms. Figuring out ways to incorporate this into the game has been a fun challenge.

Great News!

Guess what? My game was chosen to go on! I pitched a game about a ninja who can change into her shadow. Out of 26 students who pitched games, mine was one of eight chosen. In two weeks we will choose the top 2-3 games and those will move on to be made by the class for our senior project! I will let you know what happens.

Indie Game Exploration

What have I been doing to prepare myself for game design? Playing loads of Indie games on Xbox live in hopes of getting inspired, of course. I have come up with my top three favorite games, and I'd like to post about them here.



#3 Pixel Cat

Despite the simplistic, pure pixel graphics, the cat animations were adorable! This game made me laugh and the music was enjoyable too.

#2 Along came a Spider

Who would have thought being a spider could be so much fun? This is a must play game for its creative design. You'll find yourself Bungee jumping from platforms with your webs (which rocks!) and crawling upside down on platforms. You'll never look at spiders the same way again.

#1. I MAED A GAM3 W1TH Z0MB1ES!!!1

Surprisingly, this shoot-em-up zombie game turned out to be addictive and my top favorite, which was weird because I don't usually like zombie games. What made this one different? Personally, I think it was the zany song that set the playful mood of the game. Also, the simplistic gameplay was actually highly competitive, and made want to keep playing. Super fun, and highly recommended.