An Idea
Welcome to the blog containing all the development for my final major project. The final major project, would be the final task we set ourselves for our course, and is the pinacle of our work. I say we set it ourselves, because the project can be anything at all, as long as it's interactive, and related to the course in some way.
Examples of projects could be:
- A 2D Game
- A 3D Game
- A text based game
- A Virtual Board game
- A digital Comic book with some form of interaction
- An interactive Video
- An interactive animation
- A 3D art gallery
- A Media creation interface
- An interactive device
And more that I may not have mentioned. Anything interactive that links to the course! My idea, starts as a concept. I'm not entirely sure what the final thing will look like, but somehow I want to include mixing media. My idea is to make a basic text based game, then for every command, a video plays, showing the result of your command. I plan to expand this idea with more and more additions to perfect it, so this is most certainly not my final idea.
Influences, starting points and contextual references:
Influences, starting points and contextual references:
I used to read a variety of books when I was younger, but some of my favourites were the interactive ones. The books that said “Turn to this page to make this choice.” In fact, I enjoyed them so much, I made my own; submitting it as homework for a school project and getting an award for it, along with having it published in the school library.
These sorts of text games have intrigued me for a while, and when I discovered the text-based games on the computer, I loved them. With the ability to type anything you wanted. Even though you could see nothing happening in the game, your character just felt that much more flexible in respect to what he could do. If you wanted to use the scissors on the door, you can have a go, if you see something, you can investigate it, and learn more about it, try to figure out what it is just with a description.
These are not the only kind of multiple-choice games, however. A company known as Telltale has made many games, in which you, the player, controls what happens in the overall story. You make choices as one character that affect the rest of the world around you.
These are games I’d like to take inspiration from as well, in their multiple-choice aspect. This would be regarded more as a point and click game, whereas the project I plan on working on would be based around typing in commands, just like a text based game, only you get a live action clip for every command you type that works.
Early ideas research and sources: (What are your sources for contextual and personal research?)
But, the environment will have to be based loosely on real locations. With video editing I can make sure doors lead to other areas and twist the environment to fit the game. But the rooms themselves, and/or areas outside, need to be described as they are. The same goes for objects. Text-based games tend to have a particular style they tell their story, and as a sort of parody of that, I need to look at other text based games.
I can find these all over the Internet as it is, and even record my experience with them to react as I go along and see what sorts of reactions different things get out of people, to see how I can incorporate this into my own game. Another good source is the multiple-choice games that so many people seem to love. Including me. As mentioned earlier, Telltale games have a very good library of games to use as examples of this. Various games such as: “The Walking Dead” and “Tales From The Borderlands”. I’ll be using these as research sources, finding particularly choice heavy areas of the games to demonstrate how they can affect a story.
Another game I could use, doing the same thing with could be more gameplay-focused games. Such as the Mass Effect series, by Bioware. This utilizes a choice system as well, but fits it around gameplay. I can see here how other things can happen around making choices.
There are also, the more basic sources. The roots of choice-based games: Books. I can use various extracts from these books to show how each scene can turn into a choice. While also using my own hand-made book containing branching paths to show how I did similar things when I was younger.
Another important aspect I'll need to find out more about is coding and websites, the kinds of websites that host one particular game or interactive story. I'll need to find out more about how to code text-based games into them, and how to place recorded videos as queues after certain commands. I struggled particularly with coding and web design in a previous unit, so I'll have to work on this a lot.
Intended techniques, non digital and digital processes:
I plan to base the entire project on a website, coded by me. I plan to place the text-based game in this website, and add videos above, as a website created purely for playing the game. This will be achieved through coding, something I’m not all that advanced in, but something I’ll have to get to grips with to progress with this unit.
I will also need to edit together any clips used for the video commands using the program Sony Vegas pro 13. This will mean I can add in basic effects and cut together various camera angles for a more cinematic feel. Actually getting these videos on the website will be another matter and I may need to upload them to youtube or another website in order to embed it into the site.
I will also need to be able to gather the shots I need for each clip, getting the lighting right and sound on point. I will be adding in sound during post-production, but actual voices may be used, and sound effects can be made on location that I may prefer to use. This means I'll need to use a much better camera than I have in the past, and get people who can act in the story.
Timescales: (Please insert a week by week timetable of each activity)
Week 1:
- Finish Proposal
- Do research towards one of the sections
Week 2:
- Try finishing the section of research from previous week
- Start research on Text-based games
- Record and post gameplay research on multiple-choice games
- Start planning the game story idea
Week 3:
- Start research on web design and figure out how to put a game on a website
- Record a video of a text based game and finish off more research
- Screenshots and a video of games based on websites
- Plan more of the story and start putting together a storyboard, using real locations
Week 4:
- More research on websites, start developing my own page
- Finish off story plan and storyboard
- Start research on multiple choice books
- Make list of commands player will be able to type in
Week 5:
- Post videos and further research of multiple choice books
- Refine the web page, try implementing basic text-based game elements
- Begin filming, using the list of commands as a source
- Post any extra research that needs doing, maybe a new video
Week 6:
- Finish all research outstanding
- Continue filming
- Refine website and try implementing text commands
Week 7:
- Continue filming any more scenes needed
- Start implementing a few scenes into the game website
- Refine website further
Week 8:
- Start the first few tests with other participants
- Continue filming
- Keep refining the website and adding more scenes
Week 9:
- Continue filming
- Upload test videos to the blog
- Keep coding the text-based game, implementing videos with each command
Week 10:
- Continue filming any commands needed
- Code the text-based game further
Week 11:
- Finish up any more scenes that need filming
- Finish up coding the game
Week 12:
- Finish polishing up the game, filming any extra commands not yet finished
- Have a few people test it with filmed reaction
- Evaluation of final project
Proposed methods of evaluation: (How will you document your final major project evaluation?)
When it comes to documenting the process of developing the final major project, I can choose from a variety of different ways. I may choose to make a daily video log, though I feel like this may be too time consuming and may take away from developing the project itself. A better idea may be, a video log for one day each week. This means I can get any tasks done that need doing that week, and then summarize it in a short video.
Then again, the weekly video update may also be impractical, taking the focus away and adding more work on top of everything I'm doing. I've decided on a simple blog post each day as documentation once I begin creating the final major project. This will mean I can just type up the progress for that day and then maybe, make a quick week summary at the end of the week. I will be taking screenshots however for the post, so it won't just be a wall of text to read through.
When it comes to evaluating the final product, this will be mainly a series of screenshots, peer criticism and a few video reactions and feedback. I will post all of this on the blog, along with mechanics being demonstrated and players reacting to various events and cutscenes.
