Self Reflection

When I look back on the progress I have made on my blog, I think now that a blog entry showing the videos of what my level looks like now would of been nice, however with the website not uploading them, that idea had to be scrapped.

Character Designs: Another thing that would of been handy would of been my character designs being completed rather than having James Shaden finished at stage 3, leaving Dilby and Rider at stage 2. The designs in appearance came in 3 stages, stage 1 was the rough pencil drawings, stage 2 was the refined, black pen drawings and stage 3 was a finished photoshop version. This would of been completed but unfortunately for me, I have a drawing tablet with a pen that doesn't want to move with me, so I had to try with a mouse, I had Nicholas Rider partially finished at stage 3, however it was still messy and I didn't want to throw it on to my blog in such a messy state.
Along with main character designs, I wanted to add images of what the N.P.C's would of looked like in the game, but due to time being a factor I didn't have, I had to make do with only 1 type of N.P.C. being designed, and that was the elite soldier (enemy N.P.C.) which conveniently I had done in my art assessment and was something to add to the blog. But with that character I did a 3-d model too, however, it would of been the only 3-d human model on the blog and I personally thought it would of been better if I still had the models for James Shaden and Nicholas Rider, but since they were on my lost hard drive, I couldn't use them, so I left out the Elite Soldier model. And looking back now, I think I should of added it to the blog.

Screenshots: I could of added the screenshots of my 3-d, untextured models of my level, however it had slipped my mind like a few other things. Along with 3-d models, I now think back and realise that I should of tried to add more props in to the design, even if they were insignificant and served no purpose, it would of added more of a story to the level, as the placing and textures of said objects would tell a story in themselves, such as what conditions are like there and what the effects are like on the objects.

For natural environmental things, I should of added more rocks to the wasteland, because even though a few optional missions may of required to go to a location out there, a few more rocks would of given the place more feeling rather than plain barren floor with nothing else.

Particle Effects: For other environmental add on 's, I would of included particle effects for dirt flying past in the wind and obscuring the players vision at some point, however I did not know how to make the particle effects go in a direction like it was being pushed by the wind, so I left it out, or else it would of made the level look very odd with a ball of dust floating just off the floor, and though it may of added more effect to the level, I didn't want to risk it. And speaking of particle effects, I should of had fire occurring in some places of man made section of the map, however since I was in a hurry with the temporary terrain, I didn't have time to decide where to add it.
Flare: And with 1 more to add to the visual effects of the map, I regret not adding a flare to the general location of where the sun was in my skybox, however, I had experimented with flares before and unfortunately they didn't not go well at all, so I thought my skybox without a flare would of been good enough, since it was a post apocalyptic looking level and the sky in that level was meant to be obscured and the sun was meant to be blocked off to a degree by the clouds, but a small flare would of increased visual effects just that little bit extra.

Textures: Too further add to the list, I see now that I should of added the textures and bitmaps that I had used in the level so I could show my use of texturing and my capabilities in it. However I wouldn't have added every texture I used as there would be too much room taken up. Also to add to textures, I should of tried to include bump maps to them to make the effects of the textures look even better, however I do not know how to do that, so I had to make do with what I already had.

Interfaces: I feel that in the interfaces section, I should of had more detail to the health and energy bar, and that I should have also included a menu when the player first plays the game, however I didn't add one because I couldn't think on what kind of background to have for it that would of been suitable for the style of gameplay. Along with that, I should of also shown what the interfaces would of been like for the "Mission Log", "Options" etc.

These are the things that I can think of at the moment that I feel should of been included in the blog, and I do regret not adding them, whether it was because I didn't feel it would of been right or if I couldn't.

Unity Screenshots- Manmade Environment

Man made/ Synthetic Environment





These Screenshots were taken of the Ruined town. A couple of low priority props were missing from this Environment such as 2- 3 light posts and a few destroyed telephone cable posts, even a destroyed car or 2.

Top Down View

Town Perspective

Building Screenshots

These are a couple of screenshots of a couple of buildings in the level.

Unity Screenshots- Organic Envrionment

Organic Environment

Because the natural environment is a wasteland (similar to the wasteland in the movie "The Book of Eli") there aren't any tree's or plant life that would survive in those conditions.

Top Down View

Perspective View

Crater/ Giant Sinkhole (that destroyed most of the town)

**Note** These Screenshots were taken from the makeshift Unity level due to complications with the original.

Videos- Man made/ Synthetic Environment

This video shows the man made/ synthetic environment of the level, it is considerably smaller than the surrounding natural environment, but that is because they contrast each other, showing that there is not much hope for anybody to survive in the wasteland rather than the town. This video was not recorded in the First Person Shooter assessment map as there were complications and the original level had corrupted so I reimported and did what I could, though it is missing a couple of props.





Below is the Link to Vimeo that shows Walkthrough Video 1: Manmade/ Synthetic Environment

http://vimeo.com/16761634




Below is the Link to Vimeo that shows Walkthrough Video 2: Natural/ Organic Environment

http://vimeo.com/16772652

Refined Map Design

REFINED DESIGNS

After compiling a series of sketches for the design of the level I had come to the conclusion that my original idea was too large and would have been too difficult to complete as there were streets that were considered to be irrelevant to the main game play. So after rethinking the approach to the design of the level, I decided to make it considerably smaller which would ensure that the player didn’t get lost like in the original idea.


Path Layout- Basic
The Layout of the accessible Pathways for which the player can take are shown below in the birds eye perspective.

Path Layout- Refined 1
The image below shows the pathway mentioned above but is more refined and shows the basic width of each road and pavements. And a couple of pathways were added to the scene to make it a little bigger.

Town Layout
The image below shows the slightly more refined version of the pathway but also included the buildings and the [///] boxes show which sections in the buildings have been destroyed and therefore gives rubble and debris blocking sections of the pathways.

First Person Perspectives
- Entrance
Compared to the original design, not much had been changed at a first glance. Originally when the player first enters the gate they have to take a left turn into an alley way as the road is blocked by debris, but with the redesign, the debris moved from the road to the area where the alley way is as there is a semi collapsed building replacing the path. The other change made to the entrance of the town is the bridge, as originally it was designed to be a bridge over what used to be water flow, but it is now replaced by a extremely large plummet to the floor as the area next to the town and under the bridge imploded underground causing the giant craters and destroying a majority of the town in the process, and also leaving a large drop under the bridge. For this reason I had not added a new one to remove the debris on the road as

Town Pathway Idea

Thumbnails
The thumbnails below show only the key areas inside the town, as everything else is irrelevant and is ruined so little design needs to be put into them apart from
- Gate, bridges and buildings

Path Layout
The town will be winding and splitting, and leading to alleyways and dead ends as shown by the top down path plan shown below. But before I could go into further detail, I realised that the level was far too big and I had to drastically reduce its size to make it more suitable for a first level. But this was the original design

Entrance
The design below is that of the perspective of a man who is walking through the front gates and immediately the idea is given that the town is torn by the aftermath of the war, from the ruined outer wall which has blast marks and bullet holes, and the scenery within the gates may be low detail, but it is clear that the inside is in ruins too as buildings have holes in them, roads blocked by debris from fallen buildings and holes in the ground from explosive shells or some other explosive means.

Main Street
The design of the main street is that all of the buildings have a battle worn look to them since the town was purged. The buildings that survived have been converted into either business areas (such as trading salvaged items for goods and/ or services) or refugee areas. The building shown to be the most popular is the Strip Club since it is the area for which the player will get their main missions from and where people (who can afford it) can get services from the women there.

Sounds

The sounds I was thinking of using would vary, depending where the player was in the map, if they were out in the wasteland, there would be constant wind noises as the wasteland sands would be constantly shifting and out in the wasteland there is no wind resistance.
However within the town ruins, there would be a great deal more noises to be heard, even in the back alleys, where rats and occasional sounds of items falling can be heard.

Organic Environmental Sounds
(In the wasteland)
- Howling Winds.

Man made Environmental Sounds
(In the side streets)
- small wind noises
- sounds of scampering rats
- occasional sound of an object being knocked over by an unseen person.

(In the main street)
- sound of bustling activity
- people sounding distraught
- babies crying
- dogs barking

(In the repair shop)
- occasional sound of bell chimes
- occasional sound of coughing from store owner
- sound of items being tinkered with.
- faint sound of rats.

(In the Burlesque House)
- drunk men laughing
- small conversations
- women complimenting to try and seduce.
- talks between the "mayor" and his associates

(In the Rebel Base)
- Loud talking of action
- Equipment being tinkered with
- Equipment being moved around
- faint sound of a firing range