Today we have 4 things in one blog post, so enjoy : ) Here are a couple of WIP (Work In Progress) images from our engine.

Image 1. Says it all. It’s an overview of what our codes look like.

As seen in image 2 we maximized the engine’s capacity, using enemies to see whether it would crash or not… It didn’t. It’s vital hence the amount of enemies we’ll use in the game. Not that many enemies as shown but still. Maybe the new Serious Sam on arcade :p

We also wanted to give you a glimpse of our AI pattern as shown in image 3. It’s a simplified view of the enemies’ movement in the game. Depending on your action and location, the AI will try to find different approaches to get you and hopefully the enemy won’t get stuck behind a tree.

Last but not least the 4th image shows you hit boxes. Blue circles show where the character/enemy can be hit, as the red circles show what parts that will deal damage… Poor piggy died by the hands of Kimo.

We had some requests about two week ago that people wanted to have a look at us working at our office. So here’s a video, though from our old office (we just moved), of us at work. This is how it looks like when things are running smoothly and everyone is in.

At first you’ll see Nixi working on some concept art, then a quick look at Jona texturing, over to Jakob coding, to Dwarf making level art, to Andreas play testing, back to Jakob, and then to Jona and Nixi again. The man with the camera is King Klepot aka Håkan.

So, time is starting to run out and the things to do starts to really pile up and in the middle of is half of the team is going to Nordic Games next week.

Code
- Sound & Music (Jakob)
- Change diffuse light (Baba)
- Calibrate particle effects (Baba)
- Optimize code (Jakob & Baba)
- Vertex shader (Baba)
- Game over screen (Jakob)
- Movement & camera (Nixi & Baba)

Animation
- Collision boxes (Tobbe & Jona)
- Frame on character that will detect damage (Tobbe & Jona & Nixi)

Level optimization
-Level 1 (Dwarf)
-Level 2 (Dwarf)

Trailer
- Content (Stoff)

Exhibition booth
- Get all measures & printing details (Stoff)

Other thing
- Gameplay test on Friday, demo done on Thursday

While coding the game play you always end up with unbelievable bugs, or is it a bug?

I have sometime built mini game upon bug I found, so all aren’t that evil. On behalf of that I now know decided to start a blog series with all off our bugs and feature there. You have to guess what it is, …. so now vote, is it a bug or a feature?

In this first video we tested the camera.

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So it’s time once again to let you know what we will be up to this week, by posting our “sprint of the week”, “project plane of the week”, “to-do list of the week” or just simple our focus area (work) this week. As last week this week will focus much on programming. On Wednesday we have a “game presentation” and we will show some gameplay of the game to some people in the industry. So there’s a lot of things that should be done before that.

Code
Make more AI patterns
Adjust player control (revive)
Enemy generator true triggers
Camera kontroll Concept (2d)
Menu & GUI (animation)
Particles

Level (2d)
Finalize level 1

3d
Make animations for foes

Narrative
Fraps animations for sound effects

Other things
Start to work on presentation
Sketch for trailer for GGA
GGA boot
Game play presentation

SGA (Sweden Game Awards) and GGA (Gotland Game Awards) starting to close up, so we have to focus on getting all system running and working together. So this next month we will be focusing on tuning things and not to implement new features.

Code
Make more AI patterns
Adjust player control
Get particle and light effects onto the characters
Get gem system to work
Enemy generator

Concept (2d)
Menu & GUI

Levels 2d
Continue working on levels

3D
Make more animations and get the to work smoothly

Narrative
List of sound effects
Start to work on presentation
Sketch for trailer for GGA
Test the story on regular people

Other things
Take screenshots
Move to new office
Start on the last sprint

Everyone has more than their hand full and on top of it Easter is coming this week. Which probably means that we’re losing some work days since some of us are going to visit our families. Also we might have to present last weeks canceled presentation. Well that’s life : )

This week sprint looks something like this:

Code:
Continue work on shaders
Implement other features

2d:
Concept art for bosses
Concept art for alternative enemies

3d:
Continue making enemies
Put textures on 3d models

Levels:
Continue making level

Narrative:
Explanations for all people and enemies in the game

Marketing:
Sleep and fishing : p

Now we’re in production phase (major sprint 4), most of the concepting is done, the major tools are done, the game is up and running on the white box and so on. No it’s mostly putting everything together and making a game.

This week sprint looks like this:

Code:
Collision and basic physics
Player control and basic game play
Also continue work on Shaders, GUI, interface, particle effects

2d:
New versions of some of the enemies
Level 1 done

3d:
Continue making enemies

Narrative:
Should be done by the end of the week
Story and patterns for every enemy

Other things:
Test normal maps
New ingame pictures
Game presentation for the “game panel”

Today we had one of the shortest weekly meetings in the history of Databox. It was about 45 minutes including the “ordinary” 15 minute delay.

Today we discussed next week “game panel” presentation and who is gonna make it and if we needed any new layout (or use the last one). We haven’t heard which people or from which game companies that will be present, so it might be the people from last presentation (better ask mr T).

Since we stated “major sprint 4″ this Tuesday we went though what went right and wrong in sprint 3. The coding is still a bit behind, but that’s mainly because Baba and Jakob have had programming classes the last 2 weeks. The 3d modeling is also speeding up and we’re on track there.

Sprint 4 is a pure production period, no more testing or concepting. The game is up and running, the level editor is stable and it’s just about putting content together and make a game.

The sprint last week was ok and we finished nearly all of our goals (two of our goals will be done in a few days). This was due to that our codes have had heavy lectures these past weeks. The good thing is that this course ended last week, so this week they will have 24h each day to code on PoH :p

This week sprint looks like this:

Code:
3D animations system
Physic and collision system
Implement basic character control

Level editor:
Continue to implement content
Write visual effects (shaders and so on)
Start to implement the trigger system for the scripting

2d graphics:
More enemies and models of them

3d graphics:
Fine tune the heroes
Skin 2 enemies and give them animations

Test:
3d characters with animation in the game engine (blending)

In the end of March we’ll be presenting a playable demo to our mentors for review, so it’s crunching time!

Because of lectures and misjudgments of our animations, we didn’t make last week sprint goals. We’ll make it up this week instead, which means working 10+ hours/day

This week sprint looks like this:

Code:
Physics and collision system
AI system

Graphic 3d
Animate all characters with textures
Model enemies for level 1-2Artists
Make list of all the enemies

Level
Sketch on level 5
Continue building levels
Make level shares list

Narrative
Continue as usual
Trailer
Suggestions for the next trailer

Level editor
Implement scripting according to schedule
2d menus

By the way, the spring seams to have arrived : )