During this last week we have all been working together on a variety of aspects (some of which outlined in the previous post) in order to make sure the level is finished to a good enough quality. Most of this has been focused on placing assets in areas that were otherwise empty or lacking, matinee animations within UDK, Kismet tweaks within UDK and fixing any texture and / or asset issues such as the interior of the mosque which needed a lot of tweaks to the rest of the scene and to look finished.
After all that, we've finished!
...But not for long, we are now thinking about our continuation of this project during the 3rd year. There are a lot of things that we have liked to have improved on in our current project as we have learnt a lot during the process. Since the start of this year we have gained much more knowledge of asset creation, level design, UDK workflow, texture workflow, modular pros and cons, and much more along those lines.
For next year we will be approaching the level in a much more planned way - we will get the majority of the story and mechanics locked off over summer and also hopefully a bunch of concept art so that once we come back in September we'll be able to jump straight in with more refined concepts, 3D mock ups and asset creation. I will also create the concept art with the textures in mind in order to help us further down the line.
This will be the last update on this blog, however if you are eager to see what we are up to, we've already set up our blog for next year! Which you can find here: http://intrigueproductions.wordpress.com/
Amongst many other things we have been able to get a final export of the game so far working properly.
This is the code that we needed to edit, found C:\UDK\UDKGame\Config\DefulatEngine.ini
This code tells the UDK front end exporter to default load our level 'intrigue.udk' using the simple game template rather than the Unreal tournament game template and settings.
As well as this one of the third years showed us that by replacing UDK's default bik movie file with ours it will play at the start. This solved a timing issue we had with the opening voice clip, there wasn't a lot of space for the player to walk before the next audio clip, causing bad overlapping. In haste however i extended the start section, it has worked out well enough.
The piled up section on the right was an idea to make the player have to climb around the gate check point, the way the character he is following would have passed through, it wasn't clear enough and i felt it distracted, the route is still possible though.
last week I re did the ambient track with more presence in mind after listening to some sound scape's. Used, birds, wind and cicada's and sand.
This is how the kismet looks at a final tidied up stage
Fixed a lighting error we had for a while, where the light ignored the wall on the left, it was to do with a issue with the greybox i believe, to fix all i did was put a plane with the same brick texture on in front of it.
Here are some updates for this week
The ending area
Put some text on the wall to help players understand the door at the end
Made a cinematic inside UDK for the credits and fly through ending.
Here is an area behind the temple
Inside the temple
A cafe area Jack put together, i made a table and chair mesh for it.
These are the final assets textured for the level (when the post is complete) which means i'll be able to get to work on placement with the rest of the team to ensure that the level is populate to a good extent ready for the deadline.
(still need to texture the new windows for the workshop, but the seacreature brief is calling!)
I've also noticed that the workshop had been placed a little bit too large within the scene so it looked odd. I intended the design to be smaller so i've shrunken the mesh to a more appropriate size which sits more comfortably within the scene now. It stands out enough for the player to realise this is perhaps a destination for them but it's not as over-the-top as before.
Today (3rd may) i've updated the models for the skyscrapers aswell as texturing them, and the same for outter city walls. I've also textured birds for the scene, using the UDK bird particle emitter.
I have found this tutorial, so basically i am going to try this and see if it will work.
Update;
I got it to work as well as including a counter. So when you have picked up all of the audio devices you will be able to press a button to get through a door at the end of the level.
I am now going to look at how to get a video to play at the end.
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-Alex edit
Now that Dani has figured out the kismet for this interactivity, we have all been discussing how a concept for this would tie into the current narrative concept.
The first obvious thought was 5 keys to unlock a door, or 5 buttons. This was hard to put real world sense to. Dani was then able to make it so once all 5 audio devices were collected only 1 button would need to be pressed. A concept i came up with then was to have some what of a portal door that the character Nesha made for her father to find. Split a plane into 5 sections and tie each piece to an audio device, which becomes unhidden once collected, once all are found players can progress to the next theoretical level.
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[Jack update]
Also following the feedback from the session on Monday here are this weeks task:
Jack: Finish texturing the fireplace, workshop and anything else needed. Continue to place assets at the end of the level around the workshop.
Dani: Continue to work out the interactivity (see above) for the level and model a door asset to end our level at.
Alex: Continue to place assets around the alleys and also place the rest of the audio devices.
It's been a few weeks since a blog update to the state of the level, but however we have all been completing our set tasks for each week, as is laid out below.
This is a general group edit
This is a section towards the end of the level jack put together this morning, with an edit from me, Alex. This shall be fleshed out this week.
This area also includes the workshop that was seen and described when we pitched the game. We have had to pull back our initial vision and instead of being able to enter and pass through the workshop you instead just see it from the outside, as a landmark and will also serve as a memory trigger for the protagonist and maybe also a means of transitioning to the next area that we will be working on in our 3rd year.
Below are some sketches Jack created for the workshop with input from Dani and me, Alex - and the model created by Dani, which shall be textured by Jack this week.
Dani also created an interior for the mosque building as Alex had an idea to use this interior room as the place where the daughter killed her family member before leaving the message for her father, hints of a fight will be shown here
We are still working on the lighting and Jack is still texturing the fireplace and walls, Dani created the fire for the fireplace.
Entrance side door to the mosque
For this room i did a very rough concept for dani to model various objects from, which Jack has then textured - this area still needs to be fleshed out in more detail using other props from around the level.
Drawing from jack and I's artwork we put together some mock graffiti, some work better than others. This may not be perminant as it is only an easter egg to have fun with and may not work as well as expected.
The lighting is not build here, so these decals do not blend in as well yet
Alex organized the Kismet that manages the audio triggers, ambient sound at the top, male voice clips right, music clips middle, and female clips in game so far.
This kismet sequence manages how all of the female clips will function. Once inside hit box player can press 'e'. Upon pressing 'e' mesh audio device mesh will become hidden and voice message will play.
Dani made it obvious that you had to hit E by creating a little message
Jack has also been working on making sure every static mesh in the scene has a unique lighting channel for the lightmaps, that they all cast shadows correctly and also that the resolution are the right size for each object - this helps to manage the build time and also the overall quality of the final result.
Dani has successfully designed, created and programmed a functioning main menu for the game (using flash and kismet) that is the first thing to load. When you press play the initial custcene (from our pitch) plays and then the player can start playing the game. This should hopefully fix out exporting issues which we shall test soon.
The graphics aren't final and will likely change.
[Edit by Jack] Here are some more textures that i have done during last week, in UDK, models by Dani:
-Dani ~Although it doesn't look like we talk much, we speak alot on facebook and in person and this is how most of our ideas come across.
-Alex
Took the Heat ripples material Dani made earlier, applied it to a plane, then attached the plane to the players camera at a set distance. The screens below demonstrate, however the effect is supposed to be subtle so is hard to represent through screen shots.
This is the second daughter voice recording to be found
At the moment there are 3 audio devices hooked up to disapear and play on button press.
Another demonstration of the subtle heat ripples at the far market stalls
Collisions where added to most core meshes today, so now it is possible to climb desired vantage points.
It is also possible to reach undesired vantage points, so either we need to lock them off or cover more bases in terms of holes in the map that the player can see. There is not many holes like this so that should be fairly quick and easy.
Jack ran into some issues reimporting the textured interior, but once this is sorted that area can be almost locked off too.
[Jack Edit] I've managed to fix the interior - it was a complete pain but it's working with the rest of Alex's file now. It's mostly finished apart from the fireplace. The fire is missing from the screenshot and the ceiling hangings look odd without lighting, once i have built the lighting the scene should look much better.
I (Alex), have added the opening voice clip to the intro cinematic, so that is ready to hook up. Also i have begun to have another look at the ambient sounds. this should be done next week.
Interactivity picking up and playing dani's audio on button press movement speed decrease more detailed audio placement
textures still to do - Fireplace - Fences (3 variations) - Room Under (Inside of the large building) - Workshop exterior - Anything that is yet to be modelled
intro cutscene
making udk play cinematic on start
or a main menu
possibly revamp intro
Audio take another look at a 'sound-scape' town ambience.
Misc more dense world placement
put demo together for some testing movmentspeed fixed, audio placed collisions background city scape
Over the half term we were working on our essays so we haven't got very much done.
For this week;
Dani
Model the final few objects - fence etc and continue placing and if time work out how to do the final few vfx parts
Jack
Continue to texture.
Alex
Decide on what art work we are putting in to the picture frames (probably 10)
Find some work that would work as graffiti for decals
All audio placed and fixed etc.
By April 29th have everything placed and final models modelled.
This update is a little late from me, had a few lazy days of the holiday and didnt get as much done as i should have but here is some of what i've been doing.
wanted to do a proper design of Nesha's journals as they are going to be one of the key story drivers.
some sketches i did a while ago
I felt these where at the extremes of either a bit too crazy and not sleek enough or too boring. so i had a look at current Dictaphone designs and drew up my own version.
after watching some modeling tutorials i have been trying to work on topology and polyflow. Not sure i got it right as the tutorial i was watching he made a high poly model, then a low poly model, but as my model was not very high not not very low i tried to find a happy medium.
Here is what it looks like untextured in UDK. I auto unwrapped it just to see it in the world. I have made it a little bigger than life size to make it a bit easier to see. To go with this it will have some VFX highlighting it.
Working on re applying the music currently with the voice clips in game and adding effects to Nesha's voice recordings.
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