Free Unity Tutorial

Free Unity tutorials

Link to image :Here

For this week I decided to do a refresher and go over the following Jimmy Vegas videos on moodle so that I could make more progress on my project overall , as I have been finding the videos difficult to follow. This included the following videos that showed me the following topics.

Jimmy Vegas Video Tutorial 1 here: I found this one useful for 

• Controls
• Positioning
• Assets
• Hierarchy
• Unity's layout
• How to work unity for other platforms ( phones, Xbox, ps4)
• How to add objects
• How to scale objects
• How to add terrain

Jimmy Vegas Video Tutorial 2 Here: Was where we looked at

• Importing textures
• Importing Materials
• Creating Folders
• How to raise terrain (Build Mountains for map)
• How to change opacity
• How t change strokes

Jimmy Vegas Video Tutorial 3 here: For this video it looked at

Adding Details to terrain ( trees, grass)

• Adding a player to the game
• Where to add pre made objects to your game
• Adding code to your game
• How a colider works
• How t go to players view

Note: I do want to watch the part 4 video in the future to learn more on improving graphics.

New Video I looked at

The video I chose to focus on for this blog was "Character Controller with animations- walk and attack - UNITY 3D- Quick And Easy"here. I chose to go with this video mainly due to me needing to make a character and to get an idea of how to make their animations move in order to chase the antagonist of my game. The video was helpful in giving me an idea of how to make this possible on a newer version unlike Jimmy Vegas , as some items can be a bit dated. I have noticed tho however that when it comes to the necessities for Unity 3D his first few videos seem t be Ideal for making my Ideas possible. That is about all I have to say for this write-up for now and I do feel I am beginning to get a bit better in the unity write-up and am looking forward to showing off some of the structures I have created using the Jimmy Vegas tutorials alone in this weeks project blog.

Game Stories

Dillon Eagers Game stories Week 10

Link to image: here

For my week 10 reading I was tasked with reading through articles on the impact the stories of games have on the player and the game itself overall.

Link 1 
Into the woods: a practical guide to the hero's journey by Bob Bates link: Here

The first article I read on this was "Into the woods: a practical guide to the hero's journey by Bob Bates" . This article follows Bob bates a veteran designer who talks about  the following things.

• The History of archetypes
• The structure of Joseph Campbell's Hero,s Journey

At the 2005 Game developers Conference Bates describes how when making the game for several years ,he found that from what he was reading about the heroes journey from books was quite vague to him as there were all of these stages in which the character may or may not interact with or have to go through.What makes this confusing is that them being told that they may not have to interact to begin with makes it hard for the writer of the article to know what to make of it. 

what was helpful in reading from this article was that it provided the important question of " What practical use is the Hero's journey for us as storytellers and game writers". I personally believe this is a very important thing to consider when making many things in a game from the story of the game itself , to the impact in the story's characters/ side characters can make.

At the bottom of the page the writer also left the following link to similar things to this topic on the Gamasutra website. The following link to this is here.

Link 2:

What every game developer need to know about the story by John Sutherland link : Here

The second article I read was "What every game developer need to know about the story by John Sutherland ". In this article John Sutherland goes over how the story is and quote "a hot item in games, Partly this is because the quality bar is rising in this relatively young art form". The states that as games evolve more the people ( the players) want more depth . In this article the writer addressees the following things.

• Defining Gaming as a form of story and that games are indeed not movies
• Highlights two major types of misunderstandings in gaming such as Story is dialog and Story Doesn't matter.
• A starting place which Highlights how things such as conflict in a story must be planned from the beginning of the development cycle.
• How classical stories move. This highlights things such as the protagonist, A gap that opens up between a hero and orderly life, risks and challenges to overcome, a reversal which helps a character learn something they did not know, overcoming a second gap/ obstacle and finally  taking on the greatest risk in order to  get to that object of desire.
• Why Characters matter to games/ their significance
• The importance of reversals
• Story forms before games
• Types of conflict/ types of story
• Empathy and how it may relate to the flip the protagonist has
• Paces stretching , while dialog shrinks
• Looking At a game story that works
• All three acts of a game
• The games endings
• Story and the writer
• Story and the whole development team

Overall I found this the most helpful out of all the articles as I like how the writer broke down all these factors into different headings as well as used GTA vice city one of my favorite games of all time as an example for this article.

Link 3:

Link to "Why do today's video games need narrative to stand out?" here

The third and final link I chose to use for this weeks reading was an article by Johnyorkestory.com on "Why do today's video games need narrative to stand out?". The reason I chose this particular article as my third choice is because I like how not only does it mention that as game designers our primary objective is to create a entertaining experience for the player which I truly believe is true as otherwise what possible appeal does the player have to these games. I also like how the writer f the article addresses the issue that 80% of games are abandoned by the players before they even reach the end, completing the game. It also mentions how narrative based games like heavy rain and life is strange, have a completion rate of  60-70% which amazes me considering the fact that the story would be the main incentive in my opinion to play these games.

My Conclusion

I found this reading overall quite interesting mainly due to link 2 and link 2 as not only did one relate address the issues by relating it t my one of my favorite games from when I was a kid, but also how in link 3 it showed percentages of players playing these certain types of game and how the percentage of people focused on story completion seems to be becoming a more frequent issue in the business.

Alpha

Dillon Eagers Project week 9

Link to image :here

Alpha

I unfortunately do not have a alpha stage for this assignment complete yet as I have been struggling extremely with the Unity program to make my game as I have stated in previous project blogs, However I do feel with the work I have done this week to correct this error below that I will honestly have much better progress with the Unity stage in the coming weeks up to deadline.

Whats working and what I am finding difficult

While working on this assignment I feel that the following things have been working for me quite well overall these include.

• Keeping up with the weekly blogs each week both with submitting them on time and assuring they have the content required in order to complete the task.
• I have been looking at ways t simplify my unity problem through YouTube tutorials n things such as environment design and character design as well as how to things on unity like manipulate shapes and sizes.
• Having finally sketched out concepts for things to make in unity such as the prototypes I have been struggling to produce the past few weeks.
• Keeping up on the feedback from the lecturer weekly through audio messages to see were I can improve overall.
• Looking at other medias for inspiration such as films/ game franchises and peoples opinions on the game design industry

However I do also feel there is things in which I need to improve on such as

• Making the environment in unity for my game or at least prototypes
• Making the characters for my game or at least prototypes
• Making buildings for my games village
• making a swan ( antagonist for the game)
• Making objects( such as lamp posts, ice cream cones for power ups etc) for the game or at least prototypes
• Trying to do the weekly extra credit stuff to get my marks up a little
• Doing mst of my blogs at the start of the week to have more free time to work on things later in the week( although I feel I am improving a lot on this one point.)

I have started focusing more on Unity and have even drawn up sketch concepts n what I am going to make for my game these include the following items.

1. The games map: I figure the best way for me to position everything was to make a map of how the layout could look with some planning from an overhead perspective. This sketch concept can be seen below.
   
2. Character design: This was the best way fr me to make my characters (police officer one, police officer 2 and the antagonist the swans) design using shapes to form their body features. This sketch can be seen below if you are curious how it looked.
   
3. Building designs:In order to make the village look like it has more variety when it comes to its architecture I added 6 concept for building designs using common shapes I can easily find and use on unity such as squares, triangles and circles. These images can be seen below.
   
   
   
   
4. Objects/ Possible obstacles: These sketches I did up were of things I could add to the map to add variety and to give the world more character. these included lamp posts, ice cream cone designs for power ups to match the cornetto joke from the movie and parking stops for cars to add more design to the empty sidewalks of the city. These concept sketches can be seen below.
   
5. Textures for items on map:The final thing that I considered was textures I could add to my games map such as the following

• Tarmac texture for roads
• Cobblestone texture for pathways and sidewalks
• Grass textures for parks, fields and gardens
• fence textures for walls, fences
• Water textures for ponds

All of these textures can be seen in the image below this text.

Meeting My Targets

I feel with making these concept sketches for how I can make realistic things in Unity in the time I still have left, that it has given me plenty of ideas to work with for the next few weeks and although I am nervous about continuing to use the Unity program I like that I have a more solid and realistic  game plan and can start working from what I have produced from this and to hopefully add more in from my previous blogs game ideas such as sound etc. 

Conclusion

I feel I have a lot of work in the coming weeks particularly in unity , but also feel if i stay up to date with my blogs , as well as start building my items in unity that it will pay off overall in the long run.

I hope you all enjoyed reading my project post week and am looking forward to receiving some more feedback overall.

week 9 progress

Dillon Eagers Week 9 progress

link to image: here

I chose this image as in the image it is a person doing the impossible which is swimming through a concrete road which makes no sense and overall has not been done before making history. I feel it relates to me in a sense where I personally feel and  many other people have felt doing certain things  are this is impossible, so i find this image quite inspiring as it is a literal person doing the impossible/ conquering a challenge and overall feel it has motivates me to keep pushing ahead and keeps me working towards an overall end goal in the end.

Looking Back 

I am overall quite happy with my progress so far as I feel I have been doing quite well with my blog comments as I have been submitting each one every week since the beginning, except the occasional Unity blog as I have been finding its mechanics quite challenging to get use to overall. One other thing I wish I had been taking advantage of from the start were the optional extra credits , as I feel them extra few marks honestly could have gone a long way in the long run in getting the marks for my grading up. The class assignment that I have been enjoying the most are the comment blogs each week as it has allowed me to connect more with other people in my module both online and offline , as well as gave me more things in common to talk to them about and to help me understand overall that I am not the only person struggling with certain situations throughout the module which has been quite comforting to me.

Looking Forward

The changes that I wish to make for the second semester are mainly the following things 

• I wish to get more of an understanding of Unity and how it works.
• I wish to make some more concepts and prototypes for Items in unity to help with the visual elements for my game in the blog posts particularly in the project blogs.
• I wish to do some sketches as visual aid for my game such as map layout ,buildings, characters and objects such as power up items
• I wish to try t attempt more of the extra credit Items from the weekly lists to help me get my marks up for my final grading.
• To try and get my blogs uploaded more ahead of time to work on other I tems I wish to work on for this Module and others.

Other than that I feel I am making good progress and feel this has really shown me the parts I really need to start focusing on more. Thats about all I have for this blog .I Hope you all enjoyed reading it and I will see you all in the next one.

review week comments and feedback

review week comments and feedback

Feedback in

Overall I am quite enjoying reading through the comments people are leaving on my blogs the last few weeks as it has helped me mainly in two types of ways. One of which was in reaching out and making an effort for people in my class/ module in beginning to communicate with each other ,as I really feel that I am really starting to connect more with my year from what we were like in the first year. Possibly due to me finding more things in common with them as the weeks have past such as similar interests and similar experiences in our course that we have all been mentioning in our blogs. The other reason I have been enjoying the reading is because it has allowed me to gain useful feedback on my game design in my project blogs in particular, as I have been progressing the past few weeks. This has helped in things such as considering level/character design, as well as in how I could tackle certain challenges such as me getting use to the unity program ,as they have gave me some great videos to follow on YouTube for certain sections of Unity I seem to be struggling with. I would say I am overall gaining positive feedback on my blogs throughout the weeks especially in my idea as a lot of people seemed to like it. I also have found it quite relieving that I am not the only person struggling with certain things and that we are all struggling and being understanding in the process.

Feedback out

When writing feedback for other students I feel I have been doing pretty good . Not only have I not missed a single week of uploads but I have also made sure to leave at least two points on how people can improve on their game idea in the coming weeks by using the WWW (wow, I wonder, what if) strategy and TAG (tell, ask, give) strategy I learned on the moodle notes. I found this one of the most helpful things I learned when doing blogs as it gave me so many other ways to contribute to blogs which was a giant help. I find from reading other peoples writings it has helped me in looking at certain write ups in different ways such as in the prototype write ups it has motivated me from reading others to not only work on little things in Unity to improve on such as environment layout and buildings, but to also help me in ways such as possibly making up sketch prototypes for a visual perspective.

Blog Comments

I definitely feel by commenting and reading comments from other people in my class that we are really starting to connect more as a group, especially when you see certain users frequently comment on your blogs which to me makes me more inclined to visit their pages and read and comment more on their blogs. I also feel by discussing our blogs online has made at least me and  I feel most of our class more inclined to talk to each other in person as we are growing alot closer than we were during first year.

Looking Forward

The only main issue I feel i need to focus on out of everything I the unity blogs/ comments as it has been my only main concern just keeping up with it. Besides that I have keeping up with all my other weekly blogs since the beginning and feel that the only thing I could improve on is maybe my grammar and focusing on other ways to explain stuff in my blogs in the future as the famous phrase goes "its the little things in life that matter the most".

Week 9 reading and writing

Reading and writing week 9

The Reason I chose this Image is because this was taken during a culture night we were assigned to attend at the start of the term. It was to help inspire us and at least for me it honestly did .I loved looking at the Bauhaus section, as well as the pop art section and feel it honestly inspired me in a lot of my work throughout the year and hopefully in the future years to come!!

Note: this was taken at the national gallery in town on Merrion square.

Looking Back

Overall looking back over the last 8 weeks of work from my blog comments to my Project write ups and readings. I feel I have gained a lot of useful tips from these items over the weeks such as the following things.

• From reading other peoples blogs I learned about all the different types of games Unity can make from stealth games to simple football games.
• I also learned from reading other peoples blogs and commenting/ communicating that I am not the only person struggling with things such as college workloads, balancing work between modules, and trying to get use to and adapt to new programs such as for example Unity and Illustrator.
• Connecting more with people in my class as not only because we are gonna be working together for the next  few years, but it was also nice getting to know them through their blog posts , as it showed their personalities off in a unique ways. It also made it easier connecting with them in person, as with commenting and communicating through blogger it made it much easier connecting with them in person and meeting some great people,
• I feel this module in particular has made me more organised , particularly in planning ahead on other modules as i needed to organise my time more to get other things finished.
• I feel I have been good on keeping up on the blogs overall ,but feel I could have perhaps focused more on the weekly Unity blogs , as I found it quite difficult completing some.
• One of the biggest surprises I had was learning how vast the industry of game development and that there is not a lot of definitive ways to look at things.

Looking Forward

With the weeks going by so fast I am almost at the end of my first semester of second year and I feel good about it there has definitely been some challenges in the passing weeks but I overall feel that I am getting better use to them and will continue to do so in the common weeks. I do want to focus the next few weeks on making things in unity so that I can at least make some items such as prototypes  and also keep up with the write ups and readings , as I go along the way.

Conclusion

Overall I feel I have came a long way since the beginning and looking at both what i need to improve on as well as what I have accomplished is quite satisfying and I feel that this write up was extremely helpful in helping me progress on this course and I hope that you all enjoyed reading.

prototype "first playable "

Dillon Eagers: Project week 8

So for my progress on my project in week 8 , I am focusing on rewatching videos from the first few Jimmy Vegas tutorial videos so That I can make the following things in unity in the coming weeks. These include the following.

(1) Jimmy Vegas tutorial one here will be to focus on things such as  

• To learn controls better on unity (move around, zoom etc)
• How to  use Play button  to try game .
• How to use inspector panels
• Object settings such as making shapes to build buildings in my game.
• The use of assets
• Positioning
• How to scale objets for different sizes.
• Use of box collider

(2) Jimmy Vegas tutorial two here will focus on

• How to add textures/ assets
• How to raise terrain for mountains and dips for lakes
• How to paint textures
• How to change opacity and smooth height

(3) Jimmy Vegas tutorial three here will focus on 

• Adding items to terrain such as trees and grass (will be beneficial in making countryside aspect of my map)
• How to change opacity/ shade of colour on sections and items
• Player addition
• First look at script

I have also been watching videos by this youtuber called Aaron Hibberd as he shows how to make a character from scratch using only basic shapes such as spheres and cylinders. This may prove beneficial in making not only the swan for my game but also the two cop characters. He also has videos on how to as moving mechanics to the character you design which may prove beneficial in my coming weeks.

Link to image from video here

I have also recently began looking back over other peoples videos on unity that were recently uploaded on wakelet which is linked here . 

I feel that the list of actions below is my best approach for the coming weeks in trying to progress on unity and I feel that I need to start working on this as soon as possible. i am hoping t have the following items at least started next monday and hopefully work from there on progressing it in the coming weeks.

1. Making the map layout for the game
2. Making items to create the village such as shapes to look like buildings such as squares and rectangles.
3. To add textures such as colour, lighting , trees, roads and objects to look like lamposts. 
4. I also need to look over how to add certain textures such as grass or cobblestone walk paths for example.
5. The final thing I need to start working on is the 3 characters, the two police officers and the swan.(Note: I can worry about hopefully adding random pedestrian npcs later to make the village look more detailed)

I do realise also that I will probably have to scrap certain levels maybe focus on just one or two at most at the moment as it give me a realistic project to make in the time I am given to make it in the coming weeks.

Overall as I have been discussing each week the technical making aspect on unity 3D game engine has been my biggest challenge during this game development process and I feel that I need to just focus on producing a little bit more each week from Unity to get my Game back on track overall. I feel I have been doing ok on the research aspect of the game ,as well I have been keeping up with my blog comments each week.