Storytelling & Gaming

For my story I need to add interactive elements using buttons or mouse clicks.

è Clicks forward.

è Tap functions.

è UI buttons in Unity

I firstly need to write ideas and use some scripts.

Also, I would need flow chart diagrams for the story.

Initially to create these I need to produce sketches and scripts.

-afterwards, I should research and experiment with how I can implement sound or background music.

Some important questions I should ask myself are:

-how I want my user to interact with my work?

-What perspective does the user obtain, are they a third person observer or are they the main character.

Research

(Intro to Narrative Design,The Last Beacon.youtube.2018)

-Game play should not be only focused on the story of the game since that will be limiting and result in a mediocre game.

-The player needs to have a reason to be curious so they should be able to explore the game environment and it should have many moments uncovering mysteries.

-The actions of the player should lead the story uncovering it bit by bit slowly instead of revealing the entire narrative at once.

 Experimental film research

Recently I have been looking at experimental film artists from the 20th and 21st century. I looked at John smiths 'Girl chewing gum' and 'Black Tower'. Additionally, from the two I preferred 'Black Tower', the use of the metaphorical and abstract narrative created very strong mystery as I was aware there was a black tower but Smith only gave hints as to what it may represent instead of being direct.

Another artist was John Aconfrah; I looked at his movie 'purple' which was different as he used multiple screens to show multiple aspects of his abstract topic. Each screen told the same story but in briefly different ways. 

I looked at Merie Menken and her video 'Glimpse Of The Garden' Which was an intresting video exploring elements of a garden, zooming into different coloured plants, water ,plant pots and with strong bird sounds.

Afterwards, I watched 'Stellar' and 'The Wonder Ring' by Stan Brakhage, Overall I favoured 'Stellar' more. This is probably because it intrigued my own interest with space and stars.  

 Independent project (blog 1)

This is a project about your own personal development where we will have the ability to use software in order to make ideas and concepts and learn how to problem solve more vividly. During the first assessment we will discover what areas we specialize in through ‘ideation and definition’ I will be able to decide and conceptualize ideas:

-these ideas will include things I am interested in 

-topics

-any other possibilities

I can also look at the experimental work for inspiration, examples are ‘narrative film’, ‘experimental moving images’ and other digital art forms.

 I will have to produce deliverables some of them will include:

-The product and assets (file format etc)

-Date of completion (deadlines)

-Means of delivery

I have also been recommended to use Gantt chart to test my planning time, also during the ideation process I should aim to produce some storyboards. These should include:

-Narrative storyboard (shows the ‘on screen’ story)

-Walkthrough storyboard (shows the audience’s experience of the story)

For my documentation I intend to blog weekly with:

-ideas

-reflections

-evaluation

-planning

 

I will also read more books to further extend contextual knowledge. 

More info on experimental films:(cinefix 2020)

-they do not follow general narrative structure

-Stronger emphasis on visual aspects

-Do not consider the audience experience highly

-Jump-cuts in scenes

-Blurred focus

-Scratched or painted frames

-mostly not logical

(CineFix 2020.Experimental Film is More Mainstream Than You Think,youtube)

https://youtu.be/Ew79z6GxJ30

 Below is the first Gantt chart I have created.

Above is another more detailed chart that includes the plans for the second part of the project.

This is a storyboard type of sketch of how I intent to present my installation and what I want the room to look like.

 The way we mostly stayed in communication/peer review

Overall, we used 'we transfer',email, GitHub and our WhatsApp group chat and skype

We originally begun with only using WhatsApp and skype since at the beginning of the game we were only contributing ideas and assigning roles. Skype was useful since everyone could be present at the same given time, so ideas were more in real time. Although, WhatsApp overall was more ideal even though information could not always be received quickly the app in general was used more frequently than skype so long-term it was better.

Eventually when we begun creating, we started to share our ideas onto GitHub which was easy to use and to place our ideas onto unity. Through this method I learnt how to add ,clone and update repository's using the online appropriate url's, which I struggled with at first but I got better with practice. The more scripts and levels and assets were added into the game, the bigger the file became and eventually it was more efficient for team members to send the rest of the work through 'we transfer'. Overall, there were a lot of digital resources for us to share different types of files. 

Although, because of the pandemic communicating to another was possible but not in the greatest possible way, in the future it would be better to communicate both in person and individually so everyone has a more similar sense of understanding of the work.

Team name and logo

 I designed the team name, inspired by the double v's in our first game 'vampire viped' 

I used the colours red blue and white space as they are simplistic but majestic.

I made sure the lettering was also clear yet formal  but not too childlike

I was able to email these to some of my team mates.

 (Super Mario Maker.2015)

DESIGN MOOD IDEAS

For the saltmine level, I was not sure how to design the background, so I compiled together various different designs that I liked from the internet. I thought to possibly create a maze design like 'pac-man' and another issue was if I
should make the background more 2d or 3d.

In the end I decided since the village design was created in a 2d format i should create a 2d background as well.

This a this using illustrator, I used dark colours throughout to mimic the mood but I think the scale and balance need a lot of improvement as the more you look at the design the more uneven it appears.

USING GIT HUB

We were taught and instructed on how to use Github to bring our individual contributions to the game in a more simple and resolved way.

Initially I used the github website before downloading github desktop, I could see what everyone has added as the screen shot reveals.

Also I added my own assets that I created then formed them as png's. Unfortunately my unity app eventually stopped corresponding with my github there was an internal issue that began in my laptop which made unity stop working efficiently and opening.

So I was unable to add these assets myself, but I sent them to my team members and told them about my situation.

For the 'game won screen'

Below are some previews of the growth of the game, with screenshots of the first two levels,

These are brief examples of how the game looked halfway,