ChrisT. Weary Blog 9

What stages of the project am I on and how is it progressing?

i finish the boss room and was really a work of art, the inspired me to think more clearly about the level and to find more way to creatively exploit the engine. Itwas all very exciting.

Right now I am tweaking some lights and getting ready to present this project.

Did I change my (project) milestone goals? If so, why?

Its far too late to do that.



How did I deal with the problems that came up?

Most of the we have found to be in the level has been ironed out.


 

Jordon's Post #9

We are at the final stage of our project. All that is left to do is mess around with the lighting and add some portals into the level. Our goals have not changed and we are moving forward as planned. One problem that did come up was that we had to turn the collision off on our big vine so that the player could climb it. To fix this we put a blocking volume around the vine. We also added small vines to the big one so that the player can see that you are able to climb it.
Right now everything is working normally and we are just tweaking a few things such as the lights and level optimization. I think we only have two more assets to add into the level and they are both just for extra flare.
Most of my time has been spent in Unreal messing with the lights. I also imported my ice spikes into the level and they are looking good. Chris was finally able to finish off the boss room for our level and I must say that he did any awesome job. It looks great and I can't wait for us to show it to the class.
Lionell (Leo) is doing a great job as usual adding in our assets in key areas. He has also been of great help advising me as I place the lights into the level. Chris showed up big this week by finishing off the boss room. He did a great job lighting and placing the models into his portion of the level. I am doing OK right now. I had to give up on a couple of my models because they were taking to long to keep exporting again and again because they would not work. I am doing a good job of adding the lights to the level in order to capture the feel of our game. My major problem was organization of the texture files. That is why my textures were not showing up on my models. It was just dumb mistakes on my part. As a whole however, our group is working very well together. I think our project will be in the top three in the class for sure!

L.Fisher Blog 9

o What stages of the (project) am I on and how is it progressing? How or what could I improve?

I thought we were pretty much done, but we still have lighting essues. Also we are trying to make things more appeling to the player.


o Did I change my (project) milestone goals? If so, why?


Yes, the boss room was soposed to by viewed from up above, but we could not get that to work. We did somthing else thats working just fine.


o How did I deal with the problems that came up?


since my job is done I was trying to get transparency working, I did it and now I have to put it into the level.


o What is working and what is not working in the planning and implementation of the (project)?


The lighting for the hole challenge is giving us a migrain. Hopefully Jordon can fix it over the
weekend.


o Briefly describe your time spent and any problems (within the team, with a computer, etc)


Most time spent was on the walls and lights. Problems will be delt with apon arrival.


o Evaluate the (project) as a whole including team members, if applicable


Going great can't wait to show everyone.

L.Fisher Blog 8

 o What stages of the (project) am I on and how is it progressing? How or what could I improve?

Final Stage. Is the final stretch, Putting the last totches on the level is going to be difficult.

o Did I change my (project) milestone goals? If so, why?

Every thing is still set. But it might change later on.

o How did I deal with the problems that came up?

Bust through it with sheer skill and preserverence.

o What is working and what is not working in the planning and implementation of the (project)?

The latter didn't work for a while, but we fixed it.

o Briefly describe your time spent and any problems (within the team, with a computer, etc)

Putting the walls in the level so it'll look like a cave.

o Evaluate the (project) as a whole including team members, if applicable

The team is working, but other classes is getting in the way of progression.

ChrisT. Weary Blog

What stages of the project am I on and how is it progressing?

This weekend i will be working on the Bosses Dome room in greater detail.  

How or what could I improve?

Ignoring most distraction, they are my greatest enemy.



Did I change my (project) milestone goals? If so, why?

none of the things decided has been through any major changes.



How did I deal with the problems that came up?

The rock wall was a major issue but it has been resolved, and it has been replaced with a much more reasonable obsticle.

Evaluate the (project) as a whole including team members, if applicable.

The project is going great and it will be the best in the class I am sure of it. Maximum Amazing is as the name would suggest we are as amazing humanly possible, we are getting our work done and destroying problem areas in our level with the guns of teamwork. 

Jordon's Post #8

We are really getting down to brass tacks with our project. We are at the stage where we have begun to pool all of our assets and bring them into the level. The level is starting to look more and more like we envisioned it every day.
Our goals have changed slightly in that we have decided to trim the fat. By that I mean that we will be cutting out some of our less valuable assets in order to focus on lighting and effects.
No real problems have occurred other than my models not exporting correctly. This happened because I put a PNGs on my models at first in order to test them when you really just need to put on a TGA. If Unreal notices the slightest hint of a PNG it won't work. I will have to go back and retexture my models.
Lionell is doing a great job of bringing in his wall textures and placing them in key positions in order to make our level look more like a cave. We also took out our jumping challenge and replaced it with a vine climbing obstacle instead. This is way easier for the player to navigate in a shooter style game. What is not working is my assets as I mentioned before. I will have to retexture them.
As I stated earlier, our group spent a lot of time this week working on the jumping challenge. We ended up getting rid of it and choosing to add a ladder volume to get up the wall instead. We also spent a lot of time making sure that vines and rocks where placed in the right spots along the walls.
I think our whole team is doing a great job with the exception of myself. I really screwed up with the textures on my models and that has set us back by a bit. I will have to come in on Monday and work on them until I am sure that they work. Lionell is doing the best out of all of us. His wall meshes look great, as do his vines. Hopefully I can get my models done so that I am pulling my own weight again.

ChrisT. Weary Blog 7

What stages of the project am I on and how is it progressing?

As of now i am working on the the textures of the some really sweet fat vines and what not. Also i would like to comment on the play test of the level, i would like to say that we had some pretty successful areas, but there were some areas that completely flopped.(Rock wall jumping challenge) 

How or what could I improve?

Rock wall jumping challenge needs a complete overhaul. It needs to be completely redesigned, but its being worked on at the moment.



Did I change my (project) milestone goals? If so, why?

Major changes have not been need yet. 



How did I deal with the problems that came up?

The play test has shown us our first mistake. This mistake is the RWJP(Rock Wall Jumping Challenge). no one liked it at all was a complete flop due to it difficulty. it is currently under reconstruction.

What is working and what is not working in the planning and implementation of the (project)?

The atmosphere was some thing that people really like about our game.So, when we start our fine tuning of our level i will make sure that we keep the atmosphere in the same tone.

Jordon's Post #7

At this stage in the project we are focusing on completing our assets so that we may bring them into the engine. We are going at a nice steady pace and I think we should be able to begin asset importing and placement next week.
Our goals have changed in that we are now trying to make sure our level is fun and layed out properly by the end of this week. This is so that we can begin to bring in all of our assets which will be the meat of our level.We may even conduct a few extracurricular playtests to get it right.
Some major problems came up this week that needed to be handled right away. First off, Chris' build of the level looked great at first, but when we went into the engine there we a lot of errors. The convex shapes that he put in just screwed everything up. We handled this problem by having both Chris and I try our hand at rebuilding the level. We both came in on Thursday with good builds, but we decided to stick with mine because I added the walkway challenge, jumping challenge, teleporter placeholders, and underground spring.
For the most part people liked the concept of our level as well as the teleporters, walkway, and pitfall challenge. What failed were the patchwork lighting job, the placeholder textures, and MY GOD the jumping challenge. Funny thing, I just remembered why not many shooters have jumping challenges. THEY SUCK!!! They are a total pain to make and plan out for the designer as well as a pain for the player to navigate. I will be getting rid of ours ASAP or making it way shorter using ladders or a mover.
All of Our problems had to do with the game engine so I worked hours on end on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday to fix them. Unreal is a great program, but she is a delicate flower that will crumble before your eyes at the first sign of a PNG or a convex shape.
Our project is going great at this point despite the challenges we faced this week. Our first build is done and now all we need to to this week is refine it. Once that is out of the way we can bring in all of our assets and make our level a thing of beauty. The people in our group who made mistakes (including myself) have owned up to them and we have moved on. I am on edge this week because we will all need to be passing the level around to add assets. I hope nothing goes wrong.

Lionell Fisher Blog 7

o What stages of the (project) am I on and how is it progressing? How or what could I improve?

The Final Stretch. We're sooo close to being finish I can taste it. So far its going better than expected. Hopefully we'll be done by Thursday of next week.


o Did I change my (project) milestone goals? If so, why?

The jumping challenge was a flop. So Jordon's gonna change it up "I hope its good".


o How did I deal with the problems that came up?

So far the only problem we came across was the jumping platforms. We as a group came up with ways to fix this problem. And Jordon will choose the best option.

o What is working and what is not working in the planning and implementation of the (project)?

Now that we got some feedback from other people, we know that the lights need work, the flatness of the walls need to be fixed, and the platforms.

o Briefly describe your time spent and any problems (within the team, with a computer, etc)

My time spent was creating the assets for the level. And now I have to put them in the level.

o Evaluate the (project) as a whole including team members, if applicable

The members are great I wouldn't switch them for anyone.

ChrisT. Weary Blog 6

 What stages of the project am I on and how is it progressing? 

As of now i am tasked with completing the level block in, and for me this is pretty easy.  I should be done with it by Sunday depending on the level of distractions around me. 

How or what could I improve?

Ignoring most distraction would easily make my work  become completed faster, make it look nicer.

Did I change my (project) milestone goals? If so, why?

no none of the thing decided has had any major changes.

How did I deal with the problems that came up?

Considering the fact that block in is pretty straight forward it should not have issue, but the only problem i can for see is this one huge area in the map. But i am the greatest street fighter alive and i think i can deal with that!

  What is working and what is not working in the planning and implementation of the (project)?

I am really like the atmosphere in the level so far. All it need is some creepy sound off into the distance and echoing footsteps, but so far nothing is failing on us.

Jordon Davis' Blog #6

First of all its great to be back at work on our level after a week off. I hope everyone in the group got a lot of rest because we are about to come down to the final stretch of the class.
At this point our group is working on digging out the level in Unreal. Its hard work, but Chris and I have finished more than half of the dig so far. Chris is about to take the level home for the weekend and finish it. I could improve on getting my models and textures to Chris faster. I say this because we are already almost done digging out our level and Chris has only been supplied with two or three textures to choose from.
Our goals did change slightly because for some odd reason I thought this milestone was due on Tuesday. Now we can take more time and care in digging out our level which is great.
The only problem that came up this week was getting our assets to Chris so that he may work on the level over the weekend. Lionell and I solved this problem by working on half of the level on my computer and then pooling all of our assets, maps, and packages onto Lionell's flashdrive.
Our projects is going smoothly at the moment, but I will have to wait until Tuesday to see what Chris has done. Our team is doing a great job of finishing our assets ahead if time. This is really great for the person who is digging out the level because they can go full speed ahead without having to stop for any reason.
Our biggest problem has been getting all of our ideas to look and feel the way we had originally planed them. When first digging out a level in Unreal it is important to remember that everything will look bland and blockish until you add the models to it. I have finished all of my minor models in 3Ds Max, but I have one major one left. Once I have modeled the walkway for our large open room I will be done with modeling.
All team members are still performing at a high level in my opinion. Barring a few minor confusions our group all seems to be on the same page. I am pleased with the direction our group is headed and I can't wait until Tuesday to see what Chris has come up with.

Lionell Fisher Blog 6

o What stages of the (project) am I on and how is it progressing? How or what could I improve?

Creating the assets for the level. It is progressing quite well. I could improve by learning how to export moldels from max to unreal. To help my team.

o Did I change my (project) milestone goals? If so, why?

NO!! everything is still the same.

o How did I deal with the problems that came up?

For now all problems that came up was deal with sheer will power.

o What is working and what is not working in the planning and implementation of the (project)?

The level it self is not working, but Jordon and Chris if fixing it up as I type.

o Briefly describe your time spent and any problems (within the team, with a computer, etc)

My time spen consised of creating walls, vines, and textures "taking a break every now and again".

o Evaluate the (project) as a whole including team members, if applicable

We had some speed bumps but as a team we got through it and is pushing forward.

GREAT WORK!

95 out of 100 gentlemen!
Great work guys!
We have surpassed my expectations. Amanda really liked our art and design doc which I am very thankful for. We all worked very hard these past few weeks and it really paid off. Great Job!
Now the hard part begins. After seeing what we can do on the design doc I am confident we will do a fantastic job.

Happy 2010

Happy New Year Everybody!
Also, happy belated birthday to Chris. Sorry I forgot to post this on your birthday man.