Level Design

Due to the change of plan, the level had to be recreated from scratch. Part of the learning experience, I should say. Finally now we have a Deathmatch level on board.

It does need a bit of tweaking. The Level so far created is a the outline of a colony.

A bit of testing on the level and check for resource efficiency, I could work on the inner details

of the level.

1. The whole level is designed so as to give the player a complete free in and out movement.

2.The mission is to kill the queen, more than 2 approaches can be made by the player to reach the final third.

3. Again here, the level is made so as to give a typical up-down termite colonial structure.(so far it is good)

4.I have made 3 entry points for the player to enter the colony and after that it is all down way to find the queen.

yet to come:

1. create doorway and test the level

2. Replicate the same structure for the enemy colonial unit.

3.Once done with the testing, create a terrain so as to join both the colonies.

so, later...

Gameplay / UI Weekly Update - Custom Character Framework

This week I've been working with the creation of a custom character for the player. I did it and learned which parameters do I have to change in order to include a custom mesh, animation tree, materials and animation set.

I just changed this to the assets that the UDK comes with, since the inclusion of a custom mesh is easy, but it would only float around, because the rigs for the pre-defined animation sets are very specific about the mesh that they use, so when you try to add this to a custom mesh, it just doesn't work, or in some cases, crashes UDK. In order to prevent this when Craig is creating the rigs for the models, I sent him a tutorial with a guide of the different parameters that has to be considered.

The creation of the custom character included a function in the "Game" class, that would set the defined parameters for the mesh, and for all the custom meshes that we would have in the game, the corresponding function would have to be created. Doing a little bit more of research I came across the "FamilyInfo" class, which allow me to set parameters to a group of characters and even assign more specific ones, like assigning the team and team specific parameters. This would be really helpful in the gameplay programming.

Finally, this second way of doing it, will allow me to get rid of the function in the "Game" class, the only needed modification was to set our custom "FamilyClass" as a default property in the "PalyerReplicationInfo" class.

The goal for this week was to create a framework that would allow to include into the game the custom characters that we will have and it was successfully completed. This week, I'm working in a simple UI for the game.

AI

After installing November 2010 release of UDK and a couple changes my bots start to patrol and shoot like I expected. Also again because of UDK change my Navigation Mesh works now so that I added crowd to my level. They are doing nothing but running around. They have a problem with lighting. I am seeing them like a bunch of shadows but I guess this is because of their skelaton meshes which can be easily replaced with an another one. My plan is use them to simulate the ants that are going to food and returning to their cave afterwards.
Also, even tough my patrol bots are now working, they still need improvements. They shout you without stoping their patrols. That can be good for dodging attacks but still that behaviour makes their movements easily guessable.

Art render

Sound log 2

Character sound effect
A standard voice has been chosen for the main character (player), sounds like a teen but not too thick or too thin. The character sound effects will continue to have the same pitch throughout the game such as when the ant jumps, get hurt, fall form heights, gets shot by enemy ant etc.

other features tested are attenuation and ambient zone sounds.

a video will be uploaded shortly.

Level Design – Log III

So far the level which I have made is bigger than the first. The whole level is made, with the game play mechanism in my mind. I have created hideouts for the Non Playable Characters to spawn and have the element of surprise. I have made use of the Geometry mode available in UDK to give some sloppy surfaces. At certain part, the whole level has the ups and downs which give much more realism. As this is a termite colony, the level goes from top to bottom rather than on the same plane. Efficient usage of space is also considered while making the level. At the ending part of the present created level, rooms are deployed in between the inclined plane (staircase). With such a kind of level creation, it gives the player multiple options to move around.

As the level has to be tested, neither mesh nor texture has been added. A bug which has been found, is what I am working on.

Weekly Overview

Well, we've continued to make great progress over the last week or so. A third person camera has been implemented, a lot of scripting has been learned, and a prototype of a second level piece has been published. With this in mind, let's take a closer look.

Art

We have yet to get our first character model finished, they take a lot of work! However, we have some nice texture concepts to show off.

This first one is for a cave drawing the ants have made within their tunnels.

And now, our first look at the outside world in our final concept stage!

As you might surmise, we're going in a fantasy direction with the outside world. We've already suspended reality by having ants that shoots guns which real ants never do, as far as us humble humans know, and so decided to carry a bit of that feeling into the look of the world. Also, if you think about it, the real world might look incredibly boring from an ant's point of view. We would end up with large green grass pieces everywhere and you might not be able to discern what a given object is supposed to be. Could you identify a tire if you saw it from a very small perspective?

Gameplay and AI

Both of these areas have made good progress this week. The AI has run into a bit of a wall with a possible set of bugs in the release we're using. More research will be done to see if we will have to update our version of UDK. Over in gameplay, a lot of scripting work has been done to thoroughly understand what is possible. A lot more details about gameplay progress can be found in this week's gameplay post.

Level Design

As I mentioned before, a prototype of the next section of the first level has been created. It is much larger than the first piece, which consisted of only three rooms. This piece has many more, and is much more diverse in terms of possible directions for the player to take, hiding locations, and has multiple floors. Unfortunately, it is currently untextured making it rather hard to look at. We'll have more pictures for you next week. In running through the level, I discovered a rather amusing bug. It seems that the geometry of the level is not quite aligned with the grid, meaning the current AI cannot successfully pathfind. The ultimate result of this is that the AI continually suicides, making for a rather large pile of bodies.

Just for kicks, I added a second bot. The result was somewhat predictable.

Obviously, we'll get this fixed for next week. Oh well, just goes to show that no one gets it quite right the first time.

AI

This week I tried to add patrol behaviour to the bots so that they can spawn at a specific point and patrol between two points. They are attacking when they see the player but there is still a problem in their movement. As far as I looked in the forums, most of the people are saying there are lots of bugs in December 2010 release of UDK, especially in NavMesh system which seems to be the my problem too. They say the examples that were running in the earlier releases are not running in the December 2010 release. I will look into that.

Gameplay / UI Weekly Update - Level Events Scripting (Kismet) and Third Person Camera

For this week new scripted events were created using Kismet in my test level, like material animation, on-screen messages, player's health modification and a "mover" (elevator). Stored events and named variables were used in these scripts. Also, since the size of the scripts is bigger now they have been organized into groups.

Visual Studio 2008 was setup to work with UnrealScript, using the nFringe Plug-in. A 3rd person perspective has been implemented with these tools. Classes like the UTPawn and UTPlayerController had to be modified in order to create the new perspective. Validations about the camera not going into the walls or the floor when the player dies, have been done. Also, the new class considers that the camera does not goes into the player model when trying to avoid a wall or other obstructions; if this is the case, changes to first person view, by making the character model "not visible".

Also in the GameType class (in this case extending the UTDeathmatch class for demonstrative purposes) default values for the UTPawn and UTPlayerController classes are declared.

Sounds - BGM

Background music is added to the level (escape sequence). Since the player escapes into the outer world, the level progresses with some sound effects which repeats over and over with minor delay. The "Sound Actor" positions will be locked in all levels.

Level Designing log - II

After with much a look alike of an ant colony, this week was working on bring in more elements to the environment and making rooms less cubical. Spreading out elements included all the static meshes available in the library and pretty much of the brushes. I also had to limit the usage of static meshes as I thought of reusing them as much as possible. Apart from that, I had a problem in starting the player at the end of the tunnel. Hence I created a cubical at the far end of the tunnel. I have also added some bots on the second room.

TOP View

AI

I added sliding door and opening and closing lights to my basic and bad looking level ( without textures) by using kismet. I can add some AI bots to the level but sometimes they act like bots but sometimes they dont do anything at all before you show yourself to them and afterwards they try to shoot you without moving. I have solve that problem. Probably it is because of path nodes, but we'll see.

Then I expand my level a bit and also start to look to the crowd control which will not attack to the player or other bots but go one place to another place. My plan is to use them to create the illusion of the ants constantly going for food and bringing that food to their nest. Likewise, I need to solve their path nodes problem too.

Concept Art

Some Concept art and Illustrations. The Gray scale technical drawings of ants are being taken to 3D.

Gameplay / UI Weekly Update - Creation of Test Level

This week I added lights to the level and also used kistmet to animate the opening door. It makes sounds when its opening and closing. A photo of the kismet window is attached, wiith all the different elements needed.

Also there was some test done with the post processing volumes by creating a heat effect on the machine room. Here are some pictures and videos of the level running.

Getting Started

Hello all and welcome to our blog. Here, we'll be making progress reports on how our game project is coming along. We've only just started, but we've already got plenty to share with you.

Administrative

Probably the least interesting portion to talk about, but without a doubt one of the most important. Roles have been assigned to everyone, a full task schedule has been made, we settled on the December release of Unreal Development Kit, and work has begun. Roles were chosen last semester, but now it has become official as everyone begins to work on their given area. A master task list and schedule has been made which everyone can edit to add tasks that they've forgotten or the update completed ones. Unlike the simple Milestone Calendar we has before, this one covers every task a person has. This allows us to keep a good eye on both our own jobs, but also on the jobs our work is dependant on. It also gives us a quick glance at the project as a whole. Finally, we also have an online file repository set up with sub version control. This will allow us all to work on the same files simultaneously, merge changes, and track editors.

Sound

Sound is difficult to show off by its nature. We can't really show you screenshots of what's been done in this area. However, good progress has been made. Sounds have been added in, faded in, faded out, and numerous other effects have been tested. Now that our sound designer is confident in use of UDK, he is beginning to select sound effects and music to use in the game. Hopefully, we will have sound clips to share with you soon!

AI and Gameplay Programming

Most of the work here has been preparation work. There has been a lot of research going on into the guts of UDK. Despite this, a nice pair of playable rooms has been created as the team tries to learn as much as they can. Let's take a look at them!

This was without any texture added. Then, we added some of the default textures that came within UDK.

Many of the techniques used here can be used to build the outside world later. Next, we will work on adding scripted events to the map to get good with Kismet. Light sources are another area to work on.

Level Design

This area has also made great progress in this short time. We already have our first piece of the actual levels from the game up and running! That's right, the first piece of the colony has been put together by our level designer already. It is only in its first prototype look, without final art, but it already looks great!

This is one of the three rooms currently running. Here are some other shots!

This is for the underground colony portion of the game. Obviously, the outside world would be much more open and have more plant life. But for now, we begin underground as all ants do. The player's starting position is in a dark passage off the side of one of the rooms.

The player will have to head toward the light to squeeze out of there. Finally, there is a small side room off the first room which the player can get to by breaking a weak spot in the wall.

The level created so far is the threshold for the game. Once they slide down, the player gets to know the look and feel of the world. Stones, leaves, roots, and pebbles are all around the place in addition to the usual muddy and murky ant colony. Initially the player will posses only a melee weapon with which they use to destroy the fractured mesh which is at his left. That room would be a weapons/food cache. The third room is where they place themselves before the Non Player Character for the first time. Within these three rooms, the player gets the weapons,food(if needed) and learns to fire with the available weapons. When the player is done with these three rooms, they enter the bigger world which is the main colony.  The texture file is created with clay mud in mind and some grass patches.

Things to work on:

1. Cubical rooms have to altered to get the feel of a colony. As brushes in UDK are all planar I have to use static meshes. Or try something clever enough with the brushes itself.
2. Fractured mesh needs to be altered, in such a way that it is destroyed in 2 or 3 hits.
3. Rooms has to be populated with more relevant elements.


Feedback about these rooms is sought from all team members.



So there you have it, our starting point. Looking forward to writing to you all later!