Watch Us Make A Game Using "Unreal Engine 3"

[videogamestashbox.com]

Dietrich92: Do U have an available beta version 4 us to play? Or is that restricted only for team development

Sure, do you have a copy of "Unreal tournament 3" for PS3 or PC?

Thanks for the reply

 

[rapbeats]

something tells me you guys should've made a low level version of the game in project spark. so then the vision is pretty much completely flushed out. Then you take to the unreal engine and blow it out.

 

[videogamestashbox.com]

Positions:


Group Leader(Jamie)
Responsibilities – Produce the Vision Statement the team will adhere to during production. Manage the idea pitch sessions to narrow down what will be made in line with the resources & time on hand. Produce the gameplay abstract that the conceptualist will use to create a premise. Meet all needed accommodations for team members(out sick, confused, training, new dev tools, conflict resolution, etc.) Oversee scheduling & production of the overarching Project. Assure a shared vision throughout all team members. Procure needed development resources & team members. etc. etc.

Conceptualist(group leader/everybody)
Responsibilities – Produce the Premise the Programming, Art, Writing, and Audio Teams will use to start their production pipelines. Define all the elements of the project. Break up elements into individual production slices and layers then define the order of production. Based off those elements create a moments list and write up a description of each moment along with any associated attributes.

Analyst (Nominate: Jamie)
Responsibilities – Analyze descriptions of the element moments and associated attributes to form a thorough understanding of the project. Provide formal models of the objects, features, and interactions needed to realize the perceived nature of the project.

Architect (Nominate: Lee)
Responsibilities – Translate each object and its’ features specified in the analyst models into formal classes and functions. Give general definitions for each class and function. Provide a high level layout(description) of the class interdependencies. Assure a proper separation of concerns.

Class designer (Nominate: Matt)
Responsibilities – Define all basic class variables and all function signatures. Based on the general definition given by the architect; provide a final description of the intended implementation of each given class, class variable, function, and function argument. Specify the algorithms and data structures to be implemented in each class / function.

Implementer (Nominate: Jamal)
Responsibilities – Decides platform, programming language, and programming environment implementation will take place on. Prepares a cohesive package(IDE, updates, library, compilers, etc.) that is compile and run tested prior to Implementation. Disseminates package to all development assistants so that they are code ready on day one of Implementation. Develop an understanding of each group members programming competency. Divide classes into appropriately separate concerns and manageable chunks. Assign classes to development assistants based on there competency.

Project Manager_Programming Team (Nominate: Jamie)
Responsibilities – Singularly focus on the completion of wherever the current iteration/state of development resides in the programming pipeline. Periodically make sure the Lead and co lead at any given stage in the iteration are making meaningful progress by comparing week to week progress. Assess any hold ups or slow downs in development. Communicate any un-clarity of purpose, or unforeseen needs for completion to the project leader.


Nominations are based on prior correspondences I’ve had with each person and work loads of the given positions.

Stages of development: Programming Team


1. System conception
Description – Define the project requirements and features.
Lead - Conceptualist
Co lead - Analyst
Development assistants - Everyone else

2. Analysis
Description – Analysis focuses on preparing models(UML) to provide a thorough understanding of the project requirements.
Lead - Analyst
Co lead - Architect
Development assistants - Everyone else

3. System design
Description – The Purpose of system design is to devise the high level architecture(skeleton) of the project. The Architect also establishes policies to guide the subsequent class design.
Lead - Architect
Co lead - Class designer
Development assistants - Everyone else

4. Class design
Description – Class design is where the architecture is readied for implementation. Class designers complete the definitions of the classes and associations and choose algorithms for operations.
Lead - Class designer
Co lead - Implementer
Development assistants - Everyone else

5. Implementation
Description – The architecture as defined by the class designer is written into code with adherence given to all associations and algorithms specified.
Lead - Implementer
Development assistants - Everyone else



Stages of development: ART Team
Note: I couldn't pull the details with images and diagrams from the PDF notes in a timely fashion so I've made the PDF available...

Click here https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/16829231/merged_document.pdf


1. Concept Artist
Given:
A general written, verbal, and(or) visual description of an environment and the events that will take
place within them.
Expected artifact:
A specific interpretation of those descriptions in the form of concept art.
Lead - Conceptualist
Co lead - Static Mesh Designer/Developer
Development assistants - Everyone else

2. Static Mesh Designer/Developer
Given:
A specific interpretation of an environment in the form of concept art.
Expected artifact:
Singular Computer generated models of environmental components derived from the concept art. These
can be used in the construction of a computer generated environment.
Lead - Static Mesh Designer/Developer
Co lead - Texture Artist
Development assistants - Everyone else

3. Texture Artist
Given:
A specific interpretation of an environment in the form of concept art. Singular Computer generated
models of environmental components derived from the concept art.
Expected artifact:
A material(texture + light map) that can be applied to a mesh in a fashion that makes it representative as
a component of the initial concept art.
Lead - Texture Artist
Co lead - Level Map Architect
Development assistants - Everyone else

4. Level Map Architect
Given:
A specific interpretation of an environment in the form of concept art. Along with Scenario notes from
game designers.
Expected artifact:
The base skeletal environment/structure that gives a representation of the concept art that's also scaled,
and laid out practical enough to allow for the desired gameplay.
Lead - Level Map Architect
Co lead - Level Map Artist
Development assistants - Everyone else

5. Level Map Artist
Given:
A specific interpretation of an environment in the form of concept art. The base skeletal
environment/structure that gives a representation of the concept art. Along with Scenario notes from
game designers.
Expected artifact:
Level Map with details filled in with static meshes.
Lead - Level Map Artist
Co lead - (none)
Development assistants - Everyone else



Stages of development: Writing Team


1. World outline
Given:
A general written, verbal, and(or) visual description of an environment and the events that will take
place within them. I.E the premise
Expected artifact:
A specific interpretation of those descriptions in the form of a detailed written / visual layout of all the objects, places, and events contained.
Lead - Conceptualist
Co lead - Experiences Timeline Designer
Development assistants - Everyone else

2. Experiences Timeline
Given:
A specific interpretation of those descriptions in the form of a detailed written / visual layout of all the objects, places, and events contained.
Expected artifact:
An ordered group of singular experiences, each detailing the contained(objects, places, and events) derived from the World(setting) outline. These can be used in the construction of a story suitable for the given world(setting).
Lead - Experiences Timeline Designer
Co lead - Experience Situations Designer
Development assistants - Everyone else

3. Experience Situations
Given:
An ordered group of singular experiences, each detailing the contained(objects, places, and events) derived from the World(setting) outline. These can be used in the construction of an experience suitable for the given world(setting).
Expected artifact:
An ordered group of situations applied to an experience with each one allowing for the change in how the experience unfolds.
Lead - Experience Situations Designer
Co lead - Situation Writer
Development assistants - Everyone else

4. Situation Writing
Given:
An ordered group of situations applied to an experience with each one allowing for the change in how the experience unfolds.
Expected artifact:
A specific interpretation of given situations in the form of a detailed written / visual layout of all the objects, places, and events contained along with how the experience is changed by their manipulation.
Lead - Situation Writer
Co lead - Dialogue Writer
Development assistants - Everyone else

5. Dialogue Writing
Given:
A specific interpretation of given situations in the form of a detailed written / visual layout of all the objects, places, and events contained along with how the experience is changed by their manipulation.
Expected artifact:
An ordered group of singular experiences, each with their corresponding situation details filled in with the dialogue that details the change that occurs in the contained(objects, places, and events) derived from the World(setting) outline.
Lead - Dialogue Writer
Co lead - (none)
Development assistants - Everyone else






The cut off part at the end --> "Once you define the situations inherent to some experience, the dialogue writer writes the script/dialogue for how each situation will play out."

 

[videogamestashbox.com]

That's it for today next update 1/25/2016

 

[videogamestashbox.com]

something tells me you guys should've made a low level version of the game in project spark. so then the vision is pretty much completely flushed out. Then you take to the unreal engine and blow it out.

Thanks for the suggestion. but there are 3 issues with that....

1. Project spark wasn't out when we started.
2. Maybe I haven't payed much attention to it but project spark looked more like a little big planet clone. If so that wouldn't allow us the room needed to really "practice our craft". We were a software eng / computer sci heavy team, one guy was a masters student. Using a drag & drop program would kill the point of the whole project. Essentially most everything past the gameplay concept phase would be hard coded into project spark with maybe some knobs for adjusting variables.

3. Unreal engine is already a multi-platform engine made with the understanding that other teams will licence it.
I.E everything needed for construction is in Unreal Engine itself short of assets ...which is why we used a game that was already made on the engine (access to assets)


If Project spark goes any deeper then little big planet then it's just another graphics engine. At that point the question is does it give me better stock assets(ingredients) to play(cook) with.




WAIT

something tells me you guys should've made a low level version of the game in project spark. so then the vision is pretty much completely flushed out. Then you take to the unreal engine and blow it out.

Did you edit it later?

Anyway in that case yes I'm looking to improve the way I make game play abstracts. right now I simply use....

Something like project spark may be a good way to build an abstract



We actually came across the idea of abstracts late. We were having a prob getting everyone on the same page. We were all taking about the same game but had different ideas of it in our heads. I couldn't stress enough the importance of getting a team on the same page.

 

[videogamestashbox.com]

Donkunxex: are u guyz really serious on diz thread cos most game creation on nairaland failed....I just hope diz workz

Well in terms of "Making the game" it's already "made"(in the sense that it's "playable" *provided you have a PC/PS3 copy of UT3*)

This thread is more of a case of me finding the time and enthusiasm to post the development process that we took. My hope is to help those people here on nairaland who want to make a game but don't know how. By the end of this they should have a process they can follow without having to learn it all on the fly.

To put it simply, I have video footage from around 35(?) meetings and I've only uploaded 3-4 to nairaland so far.

The more feed back & questions(however small) I get from people here the more enthusiastic I'll be about posting. That said I understand the idea of being wary of someone talking about making games when others have tried so I'll keep it moving until trust is built. I think people will really get a good idea of how much they "trust me" when I get to the videos of me programming, running/testing, and debugging code.

1. They will see the end result of design(so they understand all the charts I'm posting aren't useless babble)
2. They will have a clear top to bottom idea of a development pipeline.

 

[rapbeats]

Thanks for the suggestion. but there are 3 issues with that....

1. Project spark wasn't out when we started.
2. Maybe I haven't payed much attention to it but project spark looked more like a little big planet clone. If so that wouldn't allow us the room needed to really "practice our craft". We were a software eng / computer sci heavy team, one guy was a masters student. Using a drag & drop program would kill the point of the whole project. Essentially most everything past the gameplay concept phase would be hard coded into project spark with maybe some knobs for adjusting variables.

3. Unreal engine is already a multi-platform engine made with the understanding that other teams will licence it.
I.E everything needed for construction is in Unreal Engine itself short of assets ...which is why we used a game that was already made on the engine (access to assets)


If Project spark goes any deeper then little big planet then it's just another graphics engine. At that point the question is does it give me better stock assets(ingredients) to play(cook) with.




WAIT



Did you edit it later?

Anyway in that case yes I'm looking to improve the way I make game play abstracts. right now I simply use....

Something like project spark may be a good way to build an abstract



We actually came across the idea of abstracts late. We were having a prob getting everyone on the same page. We were all taking about the same game but had different ideas of it in our heads. I couldn't stress enough the importance of getting a team on the same page.

i may have made that edit last night. but i was skimming thru some of your vids. and i know you guys started this PRE project spark. so even though i said it iwas thinking "they probably couldnt because spark wasnt out yet." But just the way i like to work on things. and that means anything i call myself building. make a mini version first. you ever hear "a picture is worth a thousand words." well what do you think a low budget, bootleg version of your game would be? a few million words..lol.

In my mind it seems to help people with the logic and bringing the visionS together into one Vision. I wish i could find this article/video with this programming chick from overseas talking about how she believes drawing vs taking notes is actually better. even if you cant draw that well. Because pictures will work that other side of the brain.

I always tell people, i'm not a programmer. But i understand the basic logic behind it. Its always the same no matter how complicated it may become. because you first have to be able to explain what you are doing in regular english. then you put it into computer language.

i want the blue player to jump when i press the A button.

If Button A = pressed(if its pressure-sensitive you change the height of the jump or animation of a jump), then blue player Jumps.

Thats always the basic logic. sure in order to do that you need to define a jump meaning a series of animations where blue player is starting from the floor and ending up 4 feet above the ground. how clean you want that jump to look will depend on how small the increments are in each mini animation from the moment your player crouches to jump(even if he does) to actually going upward to its peek). but all that is extras.

the basic line is the first line that everyone can understand. once you get the basics. we can go crazy with the specifics. thats what separates soso programmers from the best. but thats also what separates a producer/director of game design from soso to great status.


So when you have a chance to present something(a mini version of the real thing). do that. especially if you're locked into tight time constraints. think of it like this. movies use storyboarding do they not? what do you think that is? a mini of the real thing.

 

[videogamestashbox.com]

@rapbeats I'm going to reply to your post in a bit.

 

[videogamestashbox.com]

Note: Ok, I've had a heck of a time deciding on what order to go. As I said a lot of this material(charts, models, diagrams, etc) I'm posting now are things I noticed later on that we should have done first. Which means I have to look back through material for when we did those things ....(The things we should have done first). That way I can post them in a reasonable order.


Research and development team
Here I'm talking to the research and development team. I'm attempting to compensate for our lack of animators by using our software competence to procedurally extract animations from the core set of animations given in the game proper(Unreal Tournament 3). If we can extract them the idea is that we can expand the gameplay options by adding...

1. walk, Punch, kick, etc. animations that aren't native. So we can do more then simply run & jump around to shoot stuff.
2. A climb functionality utilizing the rag doll system and the native "Get up from fall" animation.

One of my core principles of production is to only "Produce" with assets on hand. Any attempt to expand the vision with assets not on hand has to have those assets acquired externally or developed internally before entering the production pipeline proper. The Point of the research and development team is to expand the possibilities of what the main production team has at their disposal by developing "rouge ideas" floating around the team into new assets. Only then can those rouge ideas enter the production pipeline proper.

Core set of animations: I'm showing the animation system and some of the core animations we have access to.



The climb functionality: I'm showing myself manually use the ragdoll system to climb and asking them to research doing to automatically by programming it into the game.






UScript animation functions: I'm showing the functions related to the animation system and places were we could hopefully find a "hook" to use in chopping up and utilizing specific animations not intended for gameplay.



Animation problem domain: Analyzing the "climbing" problem domain and assessing possible solutions






Art Team pipeline: Discussions of what the Art Team pipeline and the positions involved should consist of.(cont from 2nd half of part 6)
Click to follow alonghttps://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/16829231/merged_document.pdf




Discussing a possible gameplay notation to provide "scenario notes" to give to the Map Architect

 

[videogamestashbox.com]

That's it for today next update 1/27/2016

 

[videogamestashbox.com]

i may have made that edit last night. but i was skimming thru some of your vids. and i know you guys started this PRE project spark. so even though i said it iwas thinking "they probably couldnt because spark wasnt out yet." But just the way i like to work on things. and that means anything i call myself building. make a mini version first. you ever hear "a picture is worth a thousand words." well what do you think a low budget, bootleg version of your game would be? a few million words..lol.

Ok I thought I was bugging out for a moment. After I finished typing I looked back and thought "damn, did I not read the whole thing"? I don't want it to come across like I was in attack mode or something. All I remember seeing was why not do it in project spark. Which is essentially what I was replying to before I saw the rest..

That said, yes you are preaching to the choir. As mentioned above we decided on the idea of game play abstractions as mockups to meet that exact need. If you look in the Art pipeline we have mockups there as well so that the level architect knows how to appropriately scale the environment for navigation.
Art Team pipeline: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/16829231/merged_document.pdf

In my mind it seems to help people with the logic and bringing the visionS together into one Vision. I wish i could find this article/video with this programming chick from overseas talking about how she believes drawing vs taking notes is actually better. even if you cant draw that well. Because pictures will work that other side of the brain.

Exactly this does help with giving one vision, two examples.
1. We can all talk about the same gameplay mechanics (jumping, talking, shooting, fighting, exploring, etc) for 2 months; agree on what's included and everything. After 2 months you'd still have one person thinking of it as a 1st person shooter, another thinking over the shoulder, someone else thinking top down, etc.
2. Using food as an analogy if I say we are having a rice dish someone will say I don't want mexican. I.E some people break things farther down then others and some can't conceive of the rice on it's own terms as simply a component able to be mixed and matched with any number of meals. If I say the game will have status effects you'd have one person then conceive of the whole game as an rpg when all that was listed was status effects, not the form or context in which those come.

A solid gameplay abstract kills alot of that confusion and as I put in the previous post...

I couldn't stress enough the importance of getting a team on the same page.

In terms of the image in addition to the written.This goes back to Dr. Marimba Ani speaking on Plato pushing the literate modality at the expense of the symbolic.
Skip to video @2:31


Skip to video @2:05

I always tell people, i'm not a programmer. But i understand the basic logic behind it. Its always the same no matter how complicated it may become. because you first have to be able to explain what you are doing in regular english. then you put it into computer language.

i want the blue player to jump when i press the A button.

If Button A = pressed(if its pressure-sensitive you change the height of the jump or animation of a jump), then blue player Jumps.

Yes these are called use cases I will post those at a later time during the "Concept Analysis" phase(SEE chart below). Right now we are still in the top of the development pipline. I'm walking down the research & development team, art team, and writing team first then going to the programming team since that's the bulk of the content.

Thats always the basic logic. sure in order to do that you need to define a jump meaning a series of animations where blue player is starting from the floor and ending up 4 feet above the ground. how clean you want that jump to look will depend on how small the increments are in each mini animation from the moment your player crouches to jump(even if he does) to actually going upward to its peek). but all that is extras.

the basic line is the first line that everyone can understand. once you get the basics. we can go crazy with the specifics. thats what separates soso programmers from the best. but thats also what separates a producer/director of game design from soso to great status.

This is done around the game premise / game concept phase. It's after those specifics are fleshed out that use cases can be constructed as you mentioned above. It can get a bit tricky as well because certain things like jumping splits off down two pipelines(Programming Team and Art Team) What can happen is the programming team could make a jump variable that doesn't match the level scaling correctly or vice versa. The gameplay between character could be on point but traversing the environment could be broken because the character doesn't jump far enough. On the other hand the character could land the jumps perfectly but the gameplay between characters is off because you have people jumping clean over heads and attacks ect.

This is rectified both in handing off the same base elements to all pipelines at the "Game Premise" phase and also at the bottom of the pipeline where all pipelines merge on the "Testing" phase there is a "Next Iteration" loop. This reiterative loop goes back to the game premise phase where adjustments & corrections can be made in addition to possibly continuing on to the next slice of development.

So when you have a chance to present something(a mini version of the real thing). do that. especially if you're locked into tight time constraints. think of it like this. movies use storyboarding do they not? what do you think that is? a mini of the real thing.

Again, preaching to the choir. The only thing I'll change on is something like project Spark seems a bit too time consuming as a mock up. What kind of mockup I use depends on the audience.

Sketch V.S ....

Blue print V.S. ...

Model V.S....

Virtualization

...all come with different overheads and uses. All are good but I'm not sure going to far in when thoughing out the base concept can be a problem. Especialy given one base fact ....the game will change as you go through iterations. So to be overly detailed up front only does you so much good. Once you get into development proper the mockup will be the overall Gameplay concept and previous iteration. Those can vary wildly from the orignal abstract which simply services as the seed or common agreed upon & understood starting point. As put earlier the gameplay abstract serves as a heading not a goal.


CONCLUSION: (using both the symbolic and literate modalities )
From a production stand point, typically I like to pick the starting(seeding) point myself given the teams aspirations and competence
I.E the Seed

....married with resources on hand and what we can reasonably attain over the productions life span
I.E Soil quality

Afterwards let people go off in the various directions there imagination takes them with those resources.

Symbolically speaking like a tree

The Gameplay abstract is what packs everyone into the same seed. Otherwise we have 12 different kinds of tree growing... and that shyts frustrating
We were well into development before we learned that lesson. But that is the point of this whole thing. To learn those kind of lessons now as opposed to when money is on the line.
That said I am still thinking of better ways to write abstracts(pack seeds).

 

[videogamestashbox.com]

CODE-EATER:
Is that the team?...or another team

That's the System designer(short guy) and a general programmer(tall guy). I chose them because...
1. This early in the process they had nothing to do because they were to far down the development pipeline

2. The System designer was a grad student at the time and I felt he was most capable of dealing with the automation of climbing with little assistance.

3. The General programmer only had to look through the already given source code functions to see if we could use the animations
(Idea was also for him to gain solid experience with the source code so when it was time to start programming he could hit the ground running)


This in a nut shell was the "Research & Development" team. Though to be fair after awhile everybody had their pet "research project".

Thanks for the question

 

[videogamestashbox.com]

@rapbeats ....forgot to add this..

So when you have a chance to present something(a mini version of the real thing). do that. especially if you're locked into tight time constraints. think of it like this. movies use storyboarding do they not? what do you think that is? a mini of the real thing.

Watch Us Make A Game Using "Unreal Engine 3" (ps3/pc) AND Watch Us Make A Game Using "Unreal Engine 3" (ps3/pc)

 

[videogamestashbox.com]

Chuksxy: Woah, Amazing stuff you guys got going on here. I tried making a game myself in 2012. That's what even got me into the whole 3d thing. I was completely clueless lol. I didn't even know how to start, what to learn e.t.c. Eventually I learnt of some game engine like that. I think A8 or something. The engine looked outdated so I kept on searching. I eventually found UDK and I was so excited because it was like "THE ENGINE". The same engine used to make block busters like GOW and Unreal. But finding a game engine wasn't going to be enough. I was interested in the art pipeline back then. So I learnt how to model, how to texture, I studied materials and Shaders, I learnt how to rig, I learnt how to bring my models into Udk. After Seeing that old school lowpoly models aren't in anymore, I tried to raise the bar. I learnt how to sculpt, retopolize and bake. I'm still learning how to animate.

But it wasn't enough. I didn't have any programming experience. I was trying to learn so much at once. Heck I tried to even learn Unreal script. That was what finally broke me. I love the idea of programming and all but I just couldn't settle down to learn it. 3d game programming was just like rocket science to me. Too much stuff man ugh. Classes blablabla, ughh. I almost gave up on game development at that point. I tried to collaborate with others on a project after my battle with Unreal Script. My modelling skills and animation skills still sucked but that didn't stop me. So I snooped around the Udk forums looking for stuff to work on. Eventually, someone found my old wip thread and asked me to help out on a 3d side scroller he was working on. He did the coding while I made, rigged and animated the 3d models.

Back then I was really into the anime; 'Soul eater' and was fascinated by the whole Reaper thing. I pitched the idea and he loved it as well. We came up with a story that revolved around two recently deceased teenagers who became reapers blablabla lol. It was pretty nice since most peeps we showed liked it. From a game play perspective, you could play as both characters but from different starting points. Eventually their stories would overlap e.t.c.
Me being African and he being American, we decided to make the cast racially diverse. So we had Tobi which was the black dude and Nick the white guy lol and a supporting cast of characters with different nationalities.

Anyway, things became tough down the road. We had fewer Skype meetings, less time to work on the game e.t.c and no concept artist. So we binned the project since he got a full time job lol.
quick game play video (it's pretty crude lol)





I haven't given up on game development though. I've decided to just switch from 3d to 2d. So after playing tons of flash games and watching videos of 2d games I decided to give 2d a shot. After all, most people find it easier to make than 3d. But 3d in general has spoilt me. I'm a pretty decent artist and all but 3d made life so much easier. Heck I wanted to make a rectangle in Photoshop a while ago but didn't know how. After fooling around for like 15 mins I just went straight to blender, modeled the thing and made a quick render. Then I went back to Photoshop and placed the thing there.

Even when I try to make 2d animations. I'm just so used to posing models that I find it tedious to draw my characters in different poses every frame since in 3d the computer just fills in the blanks for me.

I've been playing dark souls online alot recently and I just love the lore and the world so much. I love medieval fantasy: Knights, Lords, kings, Dragons, Castles e.t.c. I love Gothic and renaissance architecture as well. And that game just combines all of that in the best possible way. Besides I love invading other player worlds and making their lives a living hell

. And so I wanted to make something similar to that but in 2d but on a much, much smaller scale.

That aside, I also recently developed an interest in African (Nigerian) mythology. Though It has been extremely difficult gathering information related to this since most Nigerians consider them to be evil or something lol. I was caught in the middle of the two.

Should I make a game based on my love for European fantasy despite being African or should I make a game that revolves around Nigerian mythology despite the fact that I knew little to nothing about it and just for the sake that I'm Nigerian. After giving this much thought I decided that I should make what I want to make (it's fantasy after all). It's not like much people would play it or care after all lol. So I decided to combine the two. A game that combines both European fantasy and African mythology, a game with racial diversity. In this world that I created, both exist side by side and I think that's what makes it unique. Instead of fighting off the impression western civilization has had on me (all the shows and games I've played have left a mark on me) I've decided to embrace it.

Sorry for the rant by the way, I got carried away lol. I hope you guys keep posting your progress because I plan to use this thread as a guide when I begin development of my game. I just hope all of the stuff here can be applied to 2d game development as well. For now I'll just continue making game mock ups and refining my workflow (I'm using blender to make my 2d assets and animations and Photoshop to refine them and to make them look 2dish lol)

Here's a quick rough mock up if you'r curious

I want to upload the game to a portal and I'm still trying to decide what engine or IDE I should use. my choices are Unity 3d (they now support full 2d development and I have little c# knowledge) or flash (quite popular I also have little experience with Action Script) or do you have better alternatives?

Nice write up ...and no it wasn't to long. That's actually one of the things I was hoping for; a bit of back and forth between myself and the people. I see people are looking but not as many replies ...so thanks for the detailed reply.

I'm on the move a bit now but I will definitely make a detailed reply to your post.

thanks again

 

[videogamestashbox.com]

...I tried making a game myself in 2012. That's what even got me into the whole 3d thing. I was completely clueless lol. I didn't even know how to start, what to learn e.t.c. Eventually I learnt of some game engine like that...

...But it wasn't enough. I didn't have any programming experience. I was trying to learn so much at once. Heck I tried to even learn Unreal script. That was what finally broke me. I love the idea of programming and all but I just couldn't settle down to learn it. 3d game programming was just like rocket science to me. Too much stuff man ugh. Classes blablabla, ughh. I almost gave up on game development at that point...

Yeah I started out making maps in strategy games like age of empires but I could never get anyone to play on the maps I made. Eventually I went on to tinkering around with two Unreal tournament game mods other guys had given up on. They stopped development and gave away all their code & models to the public to play with. One guy showed how to compile his source code which allowed me to tinker then recompile it to see what the changes did. Eventually using my native programming knowledge as a base I learned how to code in unreal script by using that method.

...Back then I was really into the anime; 'Soul eater' and was fascinated by the whole Reaper thing. I pitched the idea and he loved it as well. We came up with a story that revolved around two recently deceased teenagers who became reapers blablabla lol...

Same here I grew up on anime. I like stuff like cowboy bebop, ghost in a shell, boogiepop phantom, samurai champloo, vampire hunter D, etc.
That said I've become really self conscious of where my influences come from and try to keep them in check. After working with other people I've noticed that people have a tendency to draw heavily from what they already know and normalize it as though there isn't anything else. I've made a conscious decision to look at lots of traditional games and art styles throughout the "African World"

There is a rich visual aesthetic history to draw from and I've been big into drawing as much in as possible. Ernie Barnes is my favorite right now because it's so distinct. When you see anime you know what it is because it's visually so distinct and Ernie Barnes art work is distinct as well.

Anyway, things became tough down the road. We had fewer Skype meetings, less time to work on the game e.t.c and no concept artist. So we binned the project since he got a full time job lol.
quick game play video (it's pretty crude lol)

Hey welcome to the world man I had the same issues my team members started graduating on me. One guy was working for a military sub contractor so when he got busy ...yeah that was done LOL. That said the game looked stable to me. the moves collisions attacks all looked consistent with no bugs etc. I'd have like to see a better visual back drop but for a game in progress it was tight good job man

haven't given up on game development though. I've decided to just switch from 3d to 2d. So after playing tons of flash games and watching videos of 2d games I decided to give 2d a shot. After all, most people find it easier to make than 3d. But 3d in general has spoilt me.

Yeah, After you get used to one paradigm that happens. I'm strongly thinking about an HTML5/PHP(so anyone around the world can play it) 2D game that's based in Africa and I'm thinking "man how am I going to build that from the ground up". I'm just so used to 3D now. I'm thinking about building the environments in 3D using Unreal engine then making 2sec gifs out of the environments to use in the back drop with static 2D images as an overlay for characters and to signify their actions

I've been playing dark souls online alot recently and I just love the lore and the world so much. I love medieval fantasy: Knights, Lords, kings, Dragons, Castles e.t.c. I love Gothic and renaissance architecture as well.

That aside, I also recently developed an interest in African (Nigerian) mythology. Though It has been extremely difficult gathering information related to this since most Nigerians consider them to be evil or something lol. I was caught in the middle of the two.

Should I make a game based on my love for European fantasy despite being African or should I make a game that revolves around Nigerian mythology despite the fact that I knew little to nothing about it and just for the sake that I'm Nigerian.

I've only played demons souls so far and I love love love that game. The fact that they made dark souls more of a open like world intrigued me but I never got around to playing the game. I'm a big fan of the studio all around actually; I've been a big fan of their armored core games since ps1 days along with kings field which is where the demon/dark souls games come from. If you check the last pitch in the 1st idea pitch session I also had an 2D game idea set in that kind of European setting. You should check it out...
Watch Us Make A Game Using "Unreal Engine 3" (ps3/pc)
(more complete version with pictures)
Dropbox - pitches.pdf

luckily for me my desire to work artistically in Africa came from my knowledge of Africa so I never had to make that choice. It was my reading of history, folklore, Nigerian village movies, etc that made me realize how different it was to a lot of the themes in western media. You had the same elements(we're all human) but they were used different ...especially not as much violence for the sake of violence. Most of the stories have to do with society and community with action used more as a utility that moves the society one way or the other. It's a means to an end instead of an end unto itself I.E drama & violence merely for the sake of entertainment.

Instead of fighting off the impression western civilization has had on me ( all the shows and games I've played have left a mark on me) I've decided to embrace it.

I respect the fact that you can see that those things have had an impact on you. A lot of people think their idea's are just something they thought of out of thin air; like they haven't been influenced by their life's experiences (which are often "Eurocentric" in nature) That said I'm a bit saddened that you were placed(by no fault of your own) in a position to embrace it not so much purely out of genuine interest but also because you didn't have adequate access to your own heritage(which was/is caused by those same Europeans). But that's a whole nother topic so...

I hope you guys keep posting your progress because I plan to use this thread as a guide when I begin development of my game. I just hope all of the stuff here can be applied to 2d game development as well. For now I'll just continue making game mock ups and refining my workflow (I'm using blender to make my 2d assets and animations and Photoshop to refine them and to make them look 2dish lol)

I'll keep plugging away at the post. I'm glad they are of use and I have no doubt that this is useful to a 2D game. If anything Someone building a game from scratch might find it a harder fit because the model I'm using assumes the engine is already in place(note there is no dev slices for more fundamental things like controls, camera, etc)

I want to upload the game to a portal and I'm still trying to decide what engine or IDE I should use. my choices are Unity 3d (they now support full 2d development and I have little c# knowledge) or flash (quite popular I also have little experience with Action Script) or do you have better alternatives?

1st off I like the aesthetic. While it does remind me of some art styles I've seen before in games the execution of the style is Distinct, Simple, and very "clean" looking. I like!

I'd say either of those environments are great for 2D development and well supported to boot. HTML5 has a lot of native 2D(some3D) functionalities embedded in it now also. If you get the time please check out and support a Kenyan programmer who makes Chasys draw it's a great free tool. I use it instead of photoshop. Notepad++ is another great free tool I use also.

**Tiddly wiki(documenting) / Blender(modeling) / Chasys Draw(2D editing) / notepad++(DE) / HTML5-PHP-SQL(Coding) / Wamp(testing)**
Is a good free package for 2D game design & development.

Sorry for the rant by the way, I got carried away lol.

Same here