Contribution to Game Development - Ahmed Bhutta

Al had provided the class with a timing script, which I applied to a game object I created in the world and linked it with a Gui text that would show on the screen. As the time is in seconds, for 3 minutes I had to input "180". Due to this, in regards to our design concept, the timer isn't exactly how we envisioned it to be, but we thought it added a sense of urgency for the player as the timer would be counting down in seconds.

Contributions to Game Development - Ahmed Bhutta

I had applied a pick up script that Al had provided to the class to create enemies that could take away lives form the player. This was done by creating a Data manager in the world so that it would record what was happening in the world. Then by creating a game object and applying the pick up script to that game object, linking it with a Gui text that would show on screen, I was able to create standstill enemies to represent what we would actually want in the real game.

I had inserted point lights in the beginning of the tunnel to shed some light on the actual game environment the player would be in. I had created a skybox with directional light just incase the tunnel wasn't going to be completely covered for the white box.

I created different cube sizes each with a box collider, to represent commuters that would be coming towards the player during the game. In the white box, the commuters are standstill as I could not apply a script to get them to move.

Initially when I had imported the bench asset, it had to collider on it which is not what we wanted. The bench was to act as a place of safety, if there are too many commuters to rush past, the player can stand behind the bench until it was safe to continue to progress. Unfortunately, whenever I applied a Mesh collider, it wouldn't work within the game, so I was forced to apply a box collider to each bench and have the collider resized to fit the size of the bench.

I created a box on the tracks to represent the battery pack we want the player to be able to pick up when their life or battery level is low. I applied a pick up script and linked it to the data manager and ticked the box "is health" so the data manager would be able to update the values on screen accordingly.

I also applied a box collider to the train Hamza had modelled, and resized it to fit the size of the train. Again, over here the mesh collider wouldn't work after many efforts in attempt to.

Contributions to Game Development - By Ahmed Bhutta

During the production of the white box game, I was heavily involved in production. I had struggled with applying scripts, which caused the game to not even open or run and only after troubleshooting and re applying scripts was i able to have the game run again. I was unable to change the Gui text from "Health" to "Battery Level". I think the Gui text which related to "Health" couldn't be found within the project. This is something I struggled with and could not resolve. Within the level, the maximum amount of battery level or health the player can collect is 4, as shown:

I included a time script to follow our game concept's idea of allowing 3 minutes running time for the player to complete the level. I would have liked to include a start screen and from there have the timer start running but unfortunately due to time on production and troubleshooting alone I felt I should focus more on the game play.

I altered the properties of the 3rd person game controller to suit our game and for it to be as realistic within that game world as possible. We wanted the player to be able to make the jumps that were at the intersections from platform to platform. In order to do that i had to almost double the jumping height to the moving speed of the controller. I played around for a bit to get different outcomes and decided the one shown in our white box is the right movement for our game.

The speed of the controller moves at is deliberate. Due to the survival nature of the game, we didn't want the game to be so slow that the player is able to exactly anticipate every moment of the game. That would make the game dull, so to make it exciting, I increased the speed at which the player moves to make the game seem like its moving a lot quicker. This also meant that the platform had to be increased so I increased the length of the platform at each turn to create 2.5 minutes of run time.

The amount of run time possible is also deliberate. We didn't want to make it impossibly difficult for the player, so I had deliberately only created this amount of run time in regards to the platform distance.

Contributions to Game Development - By Ahmed Bhutta

We wanted a simple and straight forward route for the player to be taking. I designed a game map that was gone ahead with.

It was time to take the game map into Unity, and so I created a terrain, inserted a skybox and directional light, and laid down the whole track. After laying down the track by following the game map I designed, I built walls and then to follow on, tunnels to be but from the walls. Afterwards, I had inserted point light to shed some light in the tunnel and to replicate an actual tunnel. As we wanted it to be symbolic of real life, I knew the player or character controller would have to be approximately 1.7/1.8 units for him to correlate to someone at 5'11 or 6ft. And so the tunnel and tracks are laid out and sized accordingly.

Contributions to the Development of TubeRunner - By Ahmed Bhutta

Working on the game development project, I had come up with some game play ideas, which were later on scrapped in order to stick to simplicity.

The idea of Tube Runner is to get out of an underground station as quickly as possible, dodging in-between commuters and trains in order to reach the end of the platform. Along with the objective of getting out the station within the time limit and with at least one life intact, I thought to include a pick up coins system which we later on scrapped. The idea would be; whilst dodging in between commuters to get out, to be collecting train passes and the objective would be to get out with the best time possible with the most train passes.

Due to time and other reasons which heavily impacted the production, the idea was scrapped. Below is a bird eye concept of what it may have looked like:

I also had an idea of a secret tunnel passage where for a short distance, if the player found the secret passage, then they could evade all commuters for a short period of time and obtain a battery pack. Again this idea was scrapped for the previous reasons mentioned. We thought that we didn't want the player to constantly be on the train tracks so that they could get an easy run, so I thought of an idea where the player was only allowed on the tracks for 3 seconds along with trains constantly passing to keep the player on the platform. The player would only be given time to get onto the platform when a battery pack would be approaching on the tracks.

GAME DEVELOPMENT PRT 1

FROM THIS POINT ONWARDS, POSTS WILL BE REGARDING GAME DEVELOPMENT MODULE PART 1

Animations from Animation Masterclass - Ahmed Bhutta

Assett Sheets - By Ahmed Bhutta

These are my final productions:

Research - Assett sketches and photographs - By Ahmed Bhutta

Being a person who likes to look around with a lense, I took various photographs specifically for the assetts I was going to make. I firstly went on to visit Seven sisters tube station and took photos of benches, the railway tracks, the small billboard frames, the staircases and escalators. I took pictures and collected material that my group could possibly use and share as textures which did happen between me and Hamza. Some of the textures on Hamza's train which I also used for my staircase are shared.

Here are just some examples of the things I took photos of:

I managed to grab textures from the same underground station as to provide authenticity in my models. Below is a texture sheet used for my Bench.

I sketched whilst at the tube station so get a better understanding of how I was going to go about modelling my assets.

I also headed to Hendon Central station at its nearby university, and had a look at the kind of benches they had there. The bench i saw in seven sisters was sort of just a wooden plank sticking out of the wall and I wanted to make something that look at least a little bit more impressive. This is what I found and what i actually used for referencing when I was modelling my bench. 

I also made a sketch of the outdoor stairs leading up to the Hendon Central station platform which helped me in how I wanted to shape my actual step. The rounded edges in my model are influenced by what I have seen and reiterrated as a sketch below:

I had trouble interpretting the train tracks but I came around and thought of a design, thats shown below:

Whenever I was thinking of my designs, I always kept in mind that the poly count needed to be relatively low to be able to survive within the game engine. Hence the designs are simple, but enhanced with the textures.

Research and Concept Art - By Ahmed Bhutta

So there had been a breakdown in communication within our group which led to Klaudia and Sabina leaving the group. The rest of us had come up with the idea of "Tube Runner" where inevitably, you're stuck underground in rush hour and you have to escape the underground without allowing anyone holding you back.

These are the few concept design sketches I did with annotations of what we want our game to look like or similar to.

Since we had decided, we had sat down together and written an Assett list to decide who was creating what for the tube station. Jason had picked the tunnel and platform, Hamza picked creating the carriages for the trains and I decided on modular pieces that were going to make up the environment for our game.

Three Animation videos on Norman for Sydney Padua

Norman Fight Stance Neo Reference ...

 

Norman World Controller, Basic walk movement ...

Norman Walk Cycle Forward ... 

By Hamza El Mesfioui

norman by dason

Train asset by Hamza El Mesfioui

Final Developed Train with final textures on. By Hamza El Mesfioui

Draft Train that I previously made. By Hamza El Mesfioui

Two images above identifies different viewpoint of looking at it. (Final) by Hamza El Mesfioui

Drafted Out front view train. By Hamza El Mesfioui

Textured Train, Underground Sign, and Inside of the train.

Train Outside Textured by Hamza El Mesfioui

Underground Train sign by Hamza El Mesfioui

Underground Train sign 2 by Hamza El Mesfioui

Inside of the train by Hamza El Mesfioui

HUD Gameplay Sketch and Controller Sketch

By Hamza El Mesfioui 

Our HUD Gameplay sketched out.  

By Hamza El Mesfioui

Our Controller Display to show how to play the game. 

Train model for our Game!

By Hamza El Mesfioui

Game Idea - By Ahmed Bhutta

From my observations of everyday life around me, I had an idea of a game that almost combines all my research into one taking bits and pieces from each observation. When I began to research, I was surrounded by traffic and public transport. As my research progressed, I observed and sketched other life forms, which made me think of a very memorable story of Noah’s Ark. When sketching buses and travelling on the train, it made me think about when I had to run for the bus almost everyday just to get to school on time. This led me to the following game idea:

The game begins as the playable character, (a chosen animal) is on his way to work and a bus, or overground train passes them. The game is now playable switching from a “story telling screen” to a “playable one” Each individual character has their own ability level. Ability level is measured by three bars, Agility, Speed and acceleration. The amount each character has affects how that playable character performs. These stats can’t be increased or decreased.

Whilst in game play, a playable character will have a health bar. The health bar is increased by eating food by passing shops whilst attempting to catch the mode of public transport, and is gradually decreased by a continuous sprint. If the health bar empties out, the playable character’s screen shakes and the playable character then faints. The level will be failed.

This is a concept design of the selection stage when choosing a character.

The objective of the game is to get from where the game begins, to the busstop without bumping into anyone or anything. This has to be done for several characters, and each character will have different stats and each run will get harder and more difficult. Obstacles will include elders with trollies, parents and children, school children, cars turning into roads. The next level begins when the playable character has reached the bus.

Each playable character will start off with the same budget of 10 coins. With each successful run, the player is awarded with a set amount of coins dependent on the difficulty of the level. This also depends on how many obstacles were avoided and the time limit in which the run was completed. Coins can be used to skip a level. The harder the level, the more it will cost. If a level is failed, coins are deducted – less than what is awarded though. Coins can also be used to purchase snacks from the passing shops whilst on the run, but stocking up at the start of the run might be a good idea to avoid missing the bus/train.

Each level will have a different setting and a different character; no two runs are completed by the same playable character. The game ends when all the characters have gotten onto the bus or train.

By Ahmed Bhutta