For the past couple of weeks, I have been working on a 3D platform game. I just finished and submitted the game today. The plan for the class would be to playtest everyone's games once we all finished; however, we don’t have any time left to do so. We have playtested some games before, but I didn’t know what I was supposed to do. I’ve talked about running playtests before, but I haven’t talked about what to do when you're the playtester. The best way to learn is to research, so I went looking for articles on how to be a playtester. I found an article called How To Playtest - Part 1 "Set the Stage which gave four tips for what not to do when doing a playtest. The first tip was not to voice your opinions during the game. Tip two was to not make the designer have to defend aspects of the game while playing. Three was to not be distracting with side conversations. The last tip was don't voice your opinions about the physical look of the game. As a playtester, you are supposed to give valuable information about the game and the gameplay, not the look of the game. You're not there to criticize the game, and you shouldn't talk about other things to not be rude. By not doing those things, you are a better playtester. I looked for more information on what you should do and found an article called 10 Playtesting Principles - Advice on how to be a better playtester. The article had ten pieces of advice. I thought all of the pieces of advice where good; however, I feel that some were more important than others. The first piece of advice is to know other games to allow for comparing and contrasting. The second piece of advice is to be aware of the main idea of the game. The third piece of advice is to ask the maker what parts of the game they are looking for help improving. The fourth piece of advice is, to be honest, which is the most important. If I ever have a chance to be a playtester again, I will definitely remember these tips. Things to remember:
Works Cited
“10 Playtest Principles - Advice on How to Be a Good Playtester.” BoardGameGeek, boardgamegeek.com/thread/938100/10-playtest-principles-advice-how-be-good-playtest. “How to Playtest – Part 1 ‘Set the Stage.’” League of Gamemakers, www.leagueofgamemakers.com/how-to-playtest-part-1-set-the-stage/.
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Exams start next week and I am not prepared. I am currently exempt from my AGAD exam; however, I have other that I have to take. At my school, exams count for 20% of our final grade, which can make or break your grade. To make sure that I do well on my exams, I looked up how to prepare for exams.
I found an article about techniques to prepare for exams called 10 Quick Tips for Successful Exam Preparation. I am not going to mention all ten but will mention the ones that I thought were interesting. The first tip was actually one that I think I have been doing on my own all the time: explain your answer to others. The second tip was to practice old exams. Old exams give you an insight into the format and allow you to test your timing. I really like their seventh tip: take frequent breaks. The breaks allow you to regain focus and de-stress your brain. I don't usually follow tip eight and nine. Tip eight was to snack on healthy foods and nine was to drink lots of water. I don't drink water unless it's seltzer. Healthy food keeps your brain healthy and can help increase memory and attention. Drinking water can promote a positive mood. I looked for another article for more information and found one called 20 Study Strategies for Finals Week. The first strategy they mentioned was to create your own study guide. I haven't done that before, but I have made flashcards. An obvious answer is to ask questions about the concepts. Their third strategy was to attend the review session for that exam; however, I disagree. I have attended review sessions and they didn't help me. I did better in exams where I didn't go to the review. I really like strategy six, which was to study things that weren't on the study guide. I have had many tests where everything on the test wasn't on the exam. I think I will use some of these tips and strategies to prepare for my upcoming exams. Study Techniques:
Works Cited “10 Quick Tips for Successful Exam Preparation.” Humanitas University, 4 Feb. 2019, www.hunimed.eu/news/10-quick-tips-successful-exam-preparation/. “20 Study Strategies for Finals Week.” Fastweb, www.fastweb.com/student-life/articles/the-20-study-tips-for-finals. In honors of last night's tournament, I have decided to talk about two of the most popular 3D games: Fortnite and Apex Legends. As you may or not know, Fortnite and Apex Legends are currently the hottest games among teens. I personally don't know the games well enough to say which is better. Both games are very detailed and had a lot of thought put into them. I wanted to give a detailed comparison between the two, so I found two articles comparing the two games. Both Screenrant and Gamespot compare the games based on the aspects of the game: characters, buildings, etc. There are around ten aspects of the game that they compare; however, I'm not going to talk about all of them. The articles overlap a ton, so I'm not gonna mention them specifically. There are some very noticeable differences between the two games. Fortnite is third person and Apex and first person. Their is a big distinction between the characters; Apex has different characters with different abilities, unlike Fortnite which has different characters and the same abilities. Apex has an edge over Fortnite because of its weapons; however, Fortnite has a better building system. Fortnite has more generic weapons than Apex, but in Apex you can customize them. A cool aspect of Apex is that you can travel the world through zip lines. Both games involve teamwork, which may be a reason why they are so popular among the masses. The biggest advantage Fortnite has is that it implemented Infinity War into the game. It is good at staying caught up with pop culture. Both games are free but have in game purchases that a player can buy. Fortnite versus Apex Legends:
Works Cited
Carson, Alan. “Apex Legends Vs Fortnite: Which Is Better?” ScreenRant, Screen Rant, 13 Mar. 2019, screenrant.com/apex-legends-vs-fortnite-which-is-better/. Hornshaw, Phil. “Fortnite Vs. Apex Legends: Comparing Two Titans Of Battle Royale.” GameSpot, Gamespot, 5 Apr. 2019, www.gamespot.com/gallery/fortnite-vs-apex-legends-comparing-two-titans-of-b/2900-2569/. As you may or may not be able to tell, I am horrible at making digital art. So, I have decided that I need to learn how to make better digital art. Art has always been a weakness for me and being able to make good art can be very helpful when making a game. Every game needs good artwork. To learn how to improve my terrible skill, I looked up how to make better digital art.
I found an article on DeviantArt called 10 Tips to Improve your Digital Art. Their first tip is one that I have yet to take advantage of. I haven't gotten my hand on a graphics tablet; however, I have used one before. Tablets make it a lot easier to draw because it's like you have a pencil in your hand. The tablet pens let you change the pressure by how hard you press. I found tip three and four very interesting. Tip three is to draw big; drawing big helps with getting proportions accurate. TIp four was all about lineart. I had never heard of lineart. According to the article, the line's weight is very important. I wanted to know more about what I can do, so I looked for some more articles. I found an article on CreativeBloq on how to improve digital drawing skills. I learned that working on drawing figures and portrait drawings can help with your art. I didn't know that composition was a big part of graphic art, but I did know that the rule of thirds is very important in photography. They also recommend sketching regularly, which makes sense. They always say practice makes perfect. Tips to improve digital drawing skills:
Works Cited “10 Tips to Improve Your Digital Art.” DeviantArt, www.deviantart.com/bernuviel/journal/10-Tips-to-Improve-your-Digital-Art-495386645. May, Tom. “5 Ways to Improve Your Digital Art Skills.” Creative Bloq, Creative Bloq ART AND DESIGN INSPIRATION, 24 Sept. 2018, www.creativebloq.com/advice/5-ways-to-improve-your-digital-art-skills. I have been using the Unity engine for a few years now. We have made a couple of 2D games, but this year we are focusing on 3D. There are many differences between 3D game development and 2D development in regards to the Unity game engine. In Unity 3D, you have a 3D plane instead of a 2D plane. I feel that it's easier to move around in 2D because there's not as much space to go. You can see the whole arena at once. A big difference in 2D is that the camera is orthographic. A cool thing about Unity is "You can swap between 2D or 3D mode at any time regardless of the mode you set when you created your project"(Unity Doc). In 2D mode, you have sprites and in 3D you have textures.
I've noticed some similarities between the modes. The layout of the interface is the same in both 2D and 3D mode. Both modes have the same components, but each has a specific type for the mode. For example, you have Physics2D specifically for 2D mode and Physics for 3D. I have had many ups and downs using the Unity engine. Lately, I have been following tutorials and I do everything as shown in the video and then it doesn’t work; however, it does in the tutorial. I think this problem is more to do with the version of the tutorial. It’s very hard to find tutorials with the most current version of unity which is 2018. I think that Unity is easy to use and that the more complex part of creating a game is the coding involved. I have a lot more to learn about Unity. I think that 2D games are easier to make. 2D versus 3D
Works Cited Technologies, Unity. “2D Or 3D Projects.” Unity, docs.unity3d.com/Manual/2Dor3D.html. ValiVali. “Unity 2D vs 3D Differences.” Stack Overflow, stackoverflow.com/questions/24228895/unity-2d-vs-3d-differences. For the past week or so, I have been following a tutorial to create a third-person platform game in Unity. The tutorial is pretty easy to follow; I think I could make something similar on my own. I really like this style of game, so I think I will make a platform game for my game project. Before I do that, I need to learn how to make a good game and a platform game. I tried to make a platform game last year but did not go well. This year, I aim to succeed; which is why I looked for articles about making better games or platform games. I found an article on Dev.Mag called 13 More Tips for Making a Fun Platformer. The article didn't specify if it was talking about 3D or 2D platformers, but I think that all the tips refer to both. Tip seven caught my eye immediately. It was to avoid inertia in a platform game because it would take the fun out of it. I learned that while leaps of faith can be fun, they shouldn't be used. Leaps of faith make the player feel like the game is unfair. Another way to make the game more fun is to keep the moving platforms easier to use. Players like when a game is easy and hard at the same time. I found another article that was more about games, not a specific genre. The article was called 10 tips for building a better game. I found it interesting that they suggested not having a ton of action. Action can apparently be boring; so it should be in short sequences. I learned that you should consider the players' lifestyle not just things like age and gender. I didn't know that games could cheat; that was very enlightening. I think that I learned a lot from these articles, and will think about these when I make my game. Making Games:
Works Cited
“13 More Tips for Making a Fun Platformer.” Dev.Mag, 27 Feb. 2013, devmag.org.za/2012/07/19/13-more-tips-for-making-a-fun-platformer/. Staff, Creative Bloq, and Netmag. “10 Tips for Building a Better Game.” Creative Bloq, Creative Bloq ART AND DESIGN INSPIRATION, 17 May 2012, www.creativebloq.com/inspiration/10-tips-building-better-game-5126304. We have finally moved away from 3d modeling and now are making 3d games in Unity. I have completed one tutorial called Roll-A-Ball, and am working on another to build a third-person platform. The one I’m currently working on has a lot of programming. I have been exposed to programming for many years, but still, struggle when I’m not following a tutorial. To prepare myself for our game project, I research how to get better at programming. I found an article called 8 Ways to Become a Better Coder. I learned that once you get the code to work, you shouldn't stop and move on. You should keep going and make it better. Something that I found interesting was that they suggested that you try and prove yourself wrong instead of right. I feel that I am guilty of just trying to prove myself right, so I miss all the errors. I should be looking for my mistakes instead of just moving on. I felt that this article had some good tips, but I needed more to fully understand how to improve. I found another article called Be a better programmer in 6 easy steps. It had some of the same ones as the other one but also had some interesting tips. One of the ones I found most interesting was step four. Step four was to write the code three times. They say it is like a novel and how you have a rough draft, revision, and the final draft. It seems obvious, but practicing can help improve your skill. One step that really caught my eye was the first step: use the Feynman Technique. I had never heard of that technique before or that there were techniques. They also mentioned not being afraid to mess things up. I feel that sometimes I am afraid to mess up because then I don't know how to fix it. I learned good information from both of the articles that will be put to use when making my game. How to be a better programmer:
Works Cited
Short, Eva. “Be a Better Programmer in 6 Easy Steps.” Silicon Republic, 31 Jan. 2018, www.siliconrepublic.com/advice/better-programmer-6-steps. Staff, Creative Bloq. “10 Tips for Better Photoshop Textures.” Creative Bloq, Creative Bloq ART AND DESIGN INSPIRATION, 28 Mar. 2013, www.creativebloq.com/10-tips-better-photoshop-textures-3133109. For the past few weeks, we have been using 3ds Max. 3ds Max is fairly easy to use the program, but it takes longer to open on our machines. We were using UVW maps to complete a few assignments. The first assignment had two parts, a tutorial, and a mastery demonstration. In the first part, we were supposed to make a low poly column using UVW, by following a tutorial. For the second part, we had to make an Aztec temple and texture it. I didn’t finish the low poly column but didn’t have to because we got rid of that assignment. We then moved onto an assignment that didn’t have anything to do with low poly modeling. In that assignment, we had to make two boxes. We used UVW and the Slate Material Editor for both. For the first box, we followed a tutorial. For the second, we had to sketch and take pictures of a box. We then modeled a box in 3ds and put the pictures on it. We had a third assignment that I didn’t get to, but I have a picture of the logo for the mastery demonstration that I would have used.
The biggest struggle I experienced was trying to use UVW maps. UVW is complicated because there are a lot of things that you can do with it. In the 3ds, there are two different UVW modifiers: UVW Map and Unwrap UVW. I tried using both on my last assignment and didn’t do what I wanted it to do. I didn’t really see a difference in my render when I used UVW and when I didn’t. I liked that 3ds Max has a lot of options that you can choose from to model with. I liked the box assignment better than the column. 3DS Max:
A few weeks ago, I started working on a 3d modeling assignment. The assignment was to build a low poly column and make an Aztec temple. While working on the tutorial, I realized that I didn’t fully understand the reasoning behind wanting the lowest poly count. To learn more about low poly modeling, I researched how to create better low poly models. I found an article called The secrets to successful geometric low-poly art on 99designs. Even though this article isn’t specific to low poly modeling, I found it very interesting that you could make low poly art and I believe that it can still relate to low poly modeling. The article had six factors that you have to consider when making low poly art. The first factor was to figure out the source material that the design would be based on. The second factor is to figure out what shape you are going to use in your piece. Each shape will make your design different. I think that the third fator, symmetry, is the coolest. Symmetry can make your design really cool. The last three are very important. Figuring there or not your doing 2D or 3D is just as important as deciding on the context of your design and the details of it. I found an article specifically about low poly modeling on Professional Papervision3D Book called 12 Tips on Creating Low Polygon Models. The article had twelve tips to create low poly models. There were a few that I thought were the most informational. The first one was tip one, which was to simplify geometry to reduce the face count. Using images instead of trying to model the exact image will keep the poly count low. Another tip was to use signals faces. One thing that I learned to color small structures instead of using a texture. I found a really important tip which was about being careful about amount of details. The article said that you should be aware of where the viewer would be looking. If you know where the viewer is gonna look, you will know whether or not you actually have to detail it. They also pointed out to be aware of your poly count, which you can do in 3ds. So basically the easiest way to make low poly models is to keep it simple and not to go overboard. Things to remember
“12 Tips on Creating Low Polygon Models.” Professional Papervision3D Book, 1 Apr. 2009, professionalpapervision.wordpress.com/2009/04/01/12-tips-on-creating-low-polygon-models/.
Ellison, Kaitlyn. “The Secrets to Successful Geometric Low-Poly Art.” 99designs, 99designs, 5 Jan. 2016, 99designs.com/blog/tips/the-secrets-to-successful-geometric-low-poly-art/. For the past few weeks, we have been doing a little 3D modeling with textures. I didn’t really have time to add textures to my models, because I didn’t get to those assignments. However, I did design a logo for an assignment where we had to make a soda can. Since I am not good at drawing by hand, I looked up how to make textures using photoshop. I think that I am proficient enough in Photoshop to make a texture. I found an article on Creative Bloq called 10 tips for better Photoshop textures. As it states in the title, the article had ten tips. I’m not going to go through all of them, but will mention the ones that I found most interesting. The first that I thought was really interesting is that there is a High Pass filter. I have never even heard of that filter, but it apparently is used to create a base for bump maps. I thought that was really cool. I already know about using opacity and layer masks in general, but didn’t know that they could come in handy when making textures. Apparently, adjustment layers can be used to change colors and tones without actually applying the adjustment to the layer permanently. I learned that you can remove lighting by using masked adjustment layers. I haven’t really experimented with blends, so I didn’t know that there was an advanced blending feature. One of the tips the article said was to customize your brushes. I don’t really mess with the brushes besides size, so I didn’t know how much they can change the effect of the design. They also recommend using the Clone Stamp tool, but I have never figured out how to use it. I found another article with other ways to make textures called Five Ways to Create Textures Completely in Photoshop. The article had some really cool techniques and tools that you can use with written tutorials so you could see how to do replicate it. Some of the tools had really cool end results, like the liquify tool. I know that you can make textures using the brush tool, but I didn’t know about some of the settings you could use. I knew that there were different brushes, but I didn’t know that you could change the texture of the brush itself. I usually stick to the same brush, but seeing what else the brush can make has me thinking that I really need to start experimenting more and expanding my digital art skills. I’ve used patterns before but didn’t know you could make them. The liquify tool looks really cool. I’m not sure if I’ve used the wave filter before, but I've used something similar to make my ghost text. Photoshop has a lot of features that you can use to make textures. I really need to use some of the features instead of doing the same basic thing over and over. Texturing:
Works Cited Dani Jones, danidraws.com/blog/2007/12/17/five-ways-to-create-textures-completely-in-photoshop/. Staff, Creative Bloq. “10 Tips for Better Photoshop Textures.” Creative Bloq, Creative Bloq ART AND DESIGN INSPIRATION, 28 Mar. 2013, www.creativebloq.com/10-tips-better-photoshop-textures-3133109. |
AuthorI'm a student at Durham School of the Arts, and currently in the Game Art Design pathway. I like playing the Sims 4, playing with dogs, and riding horses. This blog will reflect my learning and discoveries. Archives
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