HND Project Week 12

HND Project Week 12
This week was Christmas and i spent time with my family. This meant that not a lot of time was spent on the project. However i sketched the design for the playable character without armour on. The drawing only has the torso and the head as they are the most important parts of the character.

This drawing is the base version of the playable character so this breastplate and headpiece are can be added onto in order to increase the toughness of the character. For example this would be the lightest and fastset moving armour set and pauldrons, arm guards and helmet armour can be added.

HND Project Week 11

HND Project Week 11

This week i have been doing some drawings of the design of the enemies. 

The image above is a rough sketch of either a standard enemy or the tutorial boss. The large red piece on the left of the drawing is a cape. I would like for the cape to have cloth physics so it moves as the character moves. After doing some research this is done in unreal 4 by using Nvidia's NVcloth tool as detailed on this website: https://docs.unrealengine.com/latest/INT/Engine/Physics/Cloth/Overview/.

The triangular shaped object is a shield design for the enemies. The drawing is not a completed drawing as the legs are missing however this is enough to begin modelling the enemy.

HND Project Week 10

HND Project Week 10

In my last blog last week i mentioned that i would like there to be weapons that can transform to allow different movsets for different occasions. For example a large damage, slow moving hammer to a  fast, weaker sword.

After opening my original hammer object in blender and removing certain parts i am left with the handle of the hammer. I think that the way i am going to do the non-transformed version if the hammer is to make the hammer part slide off and have the handle be a mace. I will work on this next week.

In a previous blog post, i said that my main character would liken Reinhardt form overwatch. However i have changed my mind and am going to make my main character a character with a helmet and large bulky armour. A feature that i would like to add to the armour is for it to have an effect on animation speed for example if the player decides to wear heavier armour, they will take less damage but will be slower.

HND Project Week 9

HND Project Week 9

Having played through Bloodborne i have analysed exactly what i like about it which i will detail in this post.
Bloodborne is set in a Gothic styled city with large spiked buildings. This means that a large part of the game is set in the dark. This is an aspect that i would like to implement into at least one of the levels where you would explore a large Victorian city fighting enemies as you progress.

Another aspect is the 'rally'. In bloodborne when you are attacked, you have several seconds to attack enemies to regain the health that was lost. This enables a fast paced, aggressive play style to be used and rewards those who play aggressively. I would like to  implement a feature similar to this in my game. This would add an extra layer into my game and make it a more enjoyable experience.

Fextralife Bloodborne Wiki - Rally

Another feature of Bloodborne that is probably my favourite, is trick weapons. Trick weapons are weapons that have multiple forms and can have different attacks. An example of this is the Beast Cutter from Bloodborne as shown below, there are two forms, a large whip or flail and a cleaver. To implement trick weapons into my game, i could make a similar model to the hammer that i have already made and make a transformed version. The standard form could be a lightweight axe and the transformed form could be the hammer form.

HND Project Week 8

HND Project Week 8

This week I did my presentation in front of the class. In the presentation i went over the initial ideas of my project and the the progress of my game so far.

HND Project Week 7

HND Project Week 7


This week mainly consisted of working in Unreal engine and adding more into the landscape of the tutorial map. I started adding placeholders for where the enemies are going to be in the level. I also started tweaking the water physics so that they have a little bit of drag in the water. I have also started to add the boss arena for the tutorial by adding in cylinders that are textured in large stone bricks.

The above picture shows the tutorial boss arena which is marked by the enemies guarding outside and the ruins. The ruins are also going to be placed throughout the map to make the whole place feel old and destroyed. I would also like to change the time of day for this map. This is so that it feels ominous and tense. However there will be light stances around which light the way.

I have also started doing some sketches for a shield for the main character. It is very similar to a kite shield in design. In the game, the shield will be used to block enemy attacks and to do shield bashes that can temporarily stun smaller enemies.

At some point I plan to play through Bloodborne in my spare time and write down some mechanics and features that i like and would work well in my game. 

HND Project Week 6

HND Project Week 6

This week i have started work on the actual project. I have been learning the basics of Unreal engine 4. One of the main tools that i have been using in Unreal Engine is the landscape sculpt tool which allows me to raise and lower the landscape to create craters and mountains. I have also started work on the 3D modelling of the protagonists weapons which is mentioned in last weeks post.

This is the progress i have made so far in the landscape for my game. This is the tutorial level and is quite linear. However the later levels will be more open and explorable.

This is the first version of the hammer that i have made in Maya and imported to blender. This was created in around 2 hours.

HND Project Week 5

HND Project Week 5

Week 5 of the project mainly consisted of work on other assignments so that i could meet the deadline. However a small amount of progress was made towards the project. I did a small sketch of one of the weapons the main characters uses. It is supposed to be a large two handed hammer that i will later be importing into Unreal Engine 4 as a static object.

This will later be made into a 3D object using either Maya and Blender. Overall i am happy with the sketch and colours however i think it is a little bit too basic and i might add some extra details when it is being modelled

HND Project Week 4

HND Project Week 4

During week 4 i had a small demo in to how maya works on a computer from a class mate who had done games design before. From the demo i learned that i could sculpt objects from one shape into a completely different shape using vertices which is where different edges intersect. This meant that a sphere could be sculpted into a head for example. I was also putting some thought into the playable character. I would like to make the main character to be a battle hardened warrior who hunts demons. The main inspiration of this character is Reinhardt from overwatch in regards to the aesthetics of the character.

In regards to the gameplay i would like the game to focus on the boss fights and the gameplay. This is where the main inspiration will be from Dark souls and Bloodborne which in my opinion have excellent gameplay mechanics and tight easy to learn but hard to master controls.

HND Project Week 3

HND Project Week 3

Towards the end of week 2 i finally made a decision on what project i am finally going to take on. I am going to make a game using the unreal development kit. Some of my favourite games that i have played are third person action games such as Dark souls Bloodborne and Nier automata and i will be using these for inspiration in regard to the mechanics of the game and the theme. As mentioned in week 2's post, i was playing with the idea of moving away from the raspberry Pi and i have come to this decision as it would be very expensive to get all of the parts for any project that was in my initial ideas.

All three of these games are third person action RPGs and typically would take between 20 and 50 hours to complete on a first play through. My game will not be on the same scale as these games however i would like my game to be a non linear experience. This means that the game would have a rough direction to go in to complete it however different areas can be traveled to not in a specific order.

HND Project Week 2

HND Project Week 2

During week 2 i was putting more thought into what i could do for my project. I have purchased a Raspberry Pi 3 so that i could play around with it and try it out. While researching more into the Raspberry Pi, i discovered that a firewall could be made from it and that it could also function as a router. This could be a potential project that i could do with the raspberry pi because it would be much cheaper than having a hardware firewall.

However i have also put more thought into whether making a game would be more viable and i am currently leaning towards making a game with unreal development kit. This is mainly because most Raspberry Pi project involve a large cost. For instance the Raspberry Pi costs £45 and a project such as a smart mirror would involve having to buy an lcd monitor and several other items so that the project can be completed.

The first step that i will have to take to create a game would be to research games that i have played and liked and what i liked about them. This would allow me to decide what type of game i would want to make. I would also have to look into what is possible with the unreal development kit to get a better understanding of how it works. When researching different types games i would create a collection of images that i can use as inspiration.

HND Project Week 1

HND Project Week 1

Throughout the course Unit 4 project management will be taking place. To complete this unit it involves the creation of a project. I have decided to carry out a project involving a Raspberry Pi computer. I have decided to carry out a project on a Raspberry Pi because it is something i have never attempted before.

Initially i am having trouble trying find a suitable project that is both sufficient for the Unit and suitable for my skill level.  In order to get a better idea of what projects are possible i have been browsing a website called hackster.io.

One of the first projects i found is an automated indoor gardener that looks after plants automatically by producing artificial light and watering them. This project can be found at
https://www.hackster.io/hackerhouse/automated-indoor-gardener-a90907

The second project that i am considering is a portable media streaming server to stream media that stored on the device to other devices without the use of internet this can be found at
https://www.hackster.io/bilbo007/portable-media-server-and-access-point-00f272

The third project that i am considering is a security system that has a motion tracker built in and a camera which sends images to a smart phone. This can be found at
https://www.hackster.io/FutureSharks/raspberry-pi-security-system-with-motion-detection-camera-bed172

The fourth project that i am considering is a touchscreen Photo Booth that takes pictures and can upload them to a google drive account. This can be found at https://www.hackster.io/kevino/raspberry-pi-photo-booth-for-your-next-party-b8e76d

The fifth project that i could undertake is to add onto the game design unit later on in the course. Currently i have few ideas for the type of game that i could create as i have no experience with game design. This means that i must research several types of games if i am to create a more advanced game.