Vincent Slifer PPJ week 09 & Personal Post Mortem

This week was not the greatest, but not the worst week for me.  On a massive note, I got sick on Friday, which put me almost out of commission for Saturday and Sunday.  Other than getting sick, I was able to polish Popcorn Popper, Item Dodge, Ram the Planet, and Mechanized Warfare.  For Popcorn Popper, I added in the texture for the popcorn machine, increase the number of spawned popcorn to make it easier to fill the machine, as well as change the method that machine is simulated. In Item Dodge, I just change some colors to better fit the themes of the game and give the shooter a more recognizable model.  For Ram the Planet, I got rid of the power bar, as well as adding in assets to for the players to, more easily, recognize the speed that is supposed to be read.  For Mechanized Warfare, I changed the target selection so that the targets are now given a color overlay, rather than changing the material of the object itself.

New method for motion on Popcorn Popper

Ram the Planet

Positive Content

• Updated Popcorn Popper, Ram the Planet, Item Dodge, and Mechanized Warfare

Negative Content

• Was not able to get people to attend playtests
• Got sick

Work and Hours

Alterations (~2 hrs)
- Changed assets for Item Dodge to better read how the game plays
- Edited Ram the Planet so the sense of speed is better understood
- Made Popcorn Popper spawn more popcorn per button press for humans
- Edited Mechanized Warfare so textures show up before they are shot

Final Art Implementation (~1 hrs)
- Implemented final art for each game

Total Hours: 3 hrs

Personal Post Mortem
What went right
1. Iterative Design
A major part of the process for my games was the iterative design the games went through.  Planet Ram is the biggest example of this process.  Originally, the game allowed the players to move around in the space as they attempted to reach the goal.  This was found to be too difficult to both play and discern the goal of the game.  So, the game was changed so the players only had to just hold two buttons in order to win, reflecting on the original intent of the wacky nature the game was intended to have.

2. Influx of ideas
A major plus with a larger team was the new set of people that could provide in team feedback and ideas for the games.  For me, it was extremely helpful to have other members take an objective look at my own games, to provide concise feedback on what was originally envisioned versus what I had produced.

3. Cooperative Goals
A major element of successfully developing the game was that we were working together in each game.  What I mean is, each element of every game was designed to cohesively work together, to create a more consistent feel, rather than five different programmers designing separate games.

What went wrong
1. Playtesting
My own personal issue, I was not able to get people to playtest the game.  I was unable to get people to play the game on a local machine due to the fact I only have one controller, and I was unable to get people to go to the Drexel Ride in order to test it on the motion base.  This is more reflective on how I do not press people to go out of their way to do tasks that other people do not know if it would be fun or not.

2. Communication
This term, I was not as communicative as I previously was with others on the Slack.  I was more attentive of the slack, but I was more hesitant to actually communicate with others.  Again, this is more reflective of my hesitance to reach out to others and worrying about bothering others when they have their own work to do.  I did reach out to others when I absolutely needed someone else to complete a task, but otherwise, I tried to accomplish it myself to the best of my abilities.

3. Initial Team Growth
The start of the term was a little rocky, with the initial team growth.  We intended to continue with how we were operating from the previous term, but we quickly realized that with so many people, it was apparent that we would not be able to meet in person on Sunday.  There was also a major influx of catching people, from the other team, up to what and how team was doing things.  These issues, however, were not that troublesome because the teams, fairly quickly, assimilated into one.

Lessons Learned

• Work cooperatively
• Ideas and feedback from anyone is a must
• Take a critical look at everything
• Adjust to keep everything consistent

Vincent Slifer PPJ week 07

This week was not a good week for me in regards to the project.  I inadvertently became a little to busy with my CoOp and was not able to fully complete and implement my tasks.  While I was originally tasked with another assignment, another member was able to better implement the feature, so there was no real loss to the project from my schedule.

Positive Content

• Added in some sounds to Popcorn Popper and Ram the Planet
• Began creating a variant of Item Dodge

Negative Content

• Did not finish creating the variant of Item Dodge
• Did not test out the volume and timing of sounds

Work and Hours

Programming (~1 hrs)
- Added sound effects to Ram the Planet + Popcorn Popper
- Edited parts of Item Dodge to create a reversed variant

Variant Creation (~1 hrs)
- Created variant for Item Dodge

Total Hours: 2 hrs

Vincent Slifer PPJ week 06

This week was fairly unproductive for me, in my eyes.  My focus was adding instructions for the games Popcorn Popper, Item Dodge, and Ram the Planet.  Along with the simple task, I also created a method to visually show how much time the players have to complete each game.  The only difficulties I had was implementing the timer so it could universally be used in all of the games.

Positive Content

• Added Human and Alien Controls to the UI for Item Dodge, Popcorn Popper, & Ram the Planet
• Created method to visually show the time in the games

Negative Content

• Popcorn Popper & Item Dodge need more finalized art and textures

Work and Hours

Research (~2 hrs)
- Methods to move UI elements a set distance
- Method to easily set up the visual timer

UI + Aesthetics (~2 hrs)
- Added instructions for Popcorn Popper, Item Dodge, + Ram the Planet
- Added art to liven up games

Total Hours: 4 hrs

Vincent Slifer PPJ week 05

This week was, again, so-so for me.  I completed a new microgame, "Item Dodge," wherein players attempt to dodge an item shot at them within a very short amount of time.  Other than needing art, most of my games just need some fine tuning and testing to be fully complete in my mind.

Positive Content

• Finished the greybox for the micro game "Item Dodge"
• Implemented different control schemes to test
• Fine tuned other games

Negative Content

• Was not able to implement art

Work and Hours

Research (~1 hrs)
- How to create dampened sine waves and implementation with unity math

Programming (~3 hrs)
- Finished greybox for "Item Dodge"
- Finalized features for "Popcorn Popper"

Total Hours: 4 hrs

Vincent Slifer PPJ week 04

This week was so-so for me.  I was able to finish both of the micro games I had been working on, as well as some aesthetic details.  However, I now need the art assets to complete the games, but they are currently unavailable to me.  Overall, the week went well in further developing "Popcorn Popper" and "Ram the Planet."

Positive Content

• Finished the greybox for the micro game "Popcorn Popper"
• Found a way to give motion to players
• Edited old scripts to be better optimized

Negative Content

• Was not able to implement art

Work and Hours

Research (~2 hrs)
- Methods to handle raycasting to objects

Programming (~2 hrs)
- Finished greybox for "Popcorn Popper"
- Finalized features for "Ram the Planet"

Total Hours: 4 hrs

Vincent Slifer PPJ week 02

This week was a disappointment for my own work.  Due to certain circumstances, I felt that I delivered a subpar component to the project.  While I was able to develop a basic greybox, it barely has any of the functionality I initially envisioned it to have, nor any noticeable motion for the players to experience.

Positive Content

• Created a greybox for the micro game "Ram the Planet"
• Created basic method for player to accelerate towards the planet
• Created a script for an object to orbit another object

Negative Content

• Other classes had essays to write and documents to read
• Was not able to fully flesh out the entirety of the micro game
• Research into certain aspects of the micro game were scarce to non-existant

Work and Hours

Research (~2 hrs)
- Methods to get relative position objects and the camera
- Methods of creating realistic acceleration

Programming (~2 hrs)
- Created initial greybox for "Ram the Planet"

Total Hours: 4 hrs

Vincent Slifer PPJ week 01

This first week had pretty good integration of the two teams and scaling.  No visible conflicts arose and duties were split more evenly among the members' strengths.

Positive Content

• Teams integrated into one, at this point
• Caught everyone up on pipeline and processes for development

Negative Content

• Sleep schedule was messed up and was not able to keep myself awake at times
• Not as active in early stages of planning

Work and Hours

Team integration (~1 hrs)

Total Hours: 1 hrs

Vincent Slifer PPJ Post Mortem

What Went Right
1. Created Multiple Games for the Motion Base
The primary goal of the project was to successfully develop a game designed for use on the motion base, and I felt that this was accomplished fairly well.  Throughout the weeks, the team worked together in order to create and implement a diverse amount of games to experiment with the different motions of the simulator to create vastly different experiences for each game.

2. Created a Method to Integrate Games

A fairly important aspect of our game was that it was composed of mini games.  We needed a methodology to integrate everyone's games with a minimal interruption with anyone else's work.  We developed a fairly simple system of just creating our own sub folders to sort our games, but it was a good methodology to find assets needed in a quick manner.

3. Collaboration

A very important aspect in team projects.  I felt that everyone worked well together to make the project.  Everyone expressed their ideas to each other at meetings and brainstormed to create new ideas on how the mini games would be presented.

What Went Wrong

1. Version Control

Whether it was an issue with our system for hosting the builds or people updating the build at inopportune times,  there were a few issues with keeping the build updated.  From my experience, Perforce, itself, gave me a lot of trouble and headache.

2. Communication

While the team worked fairly well in collaborating together, there were some issues in communicating with each other.  Some members, including myself, did little to minimal communications on the group slack, and sometimes communicated in methods not fully available to the group.

3. Work Ethic

The team decisively separated members to fields that best suited their abilities, programmers program and artists create art, but the distribution of work seemed off.  From my experiences, I felt that I did not accomplish a lot.  I was able to program the mech game and had a little extra time to test an idea for another mini game, I felt that other members had taken up more of the responsibilities.  While I am grateful that they were willing to take on tasks, I feel that I should have had more work to accomplish.

Moving Forward

Essentially, the group needed a definitive leadership role to keep track of tasks and group focus.  The group needed someone dedicated to assigning tasks for each game, and figuring what needs to be done on a less loose schedule of just one week to complete your task.  The leader role would also aid in keeping members in touch, ensuring people were in open communication or could easily get a hold of them no matter what.  In the end, someone dedicated to being in a leadership role would vastly improve the effectiveness of cooperating with each other and keeping track of individual assignments.

Lessons Learned

- Communicate everything with members

- Ensure lines of communication are open

- Learn how to use the hosting service(s)

- Do not work on projects in the early AM

Vincent Slifer Week 10/11 PPJ

These weeks were fairly simple.  I mostly had the job of implementing the art assets for the Mech game.  Beyond that, I trouble shot some errors that occurred from saving the game to perforce.

Positive Content

• Implemented Mech Game Art (partial)
• Debugged issues that came up with overall game implementation

Negative Content

• Essays halted productiveness
• Other classes

Work and Hours
Programming (2 hrs)

• Implemented Art assets
• when available
• Attempted to work out linking errors

Total Work Time:  2 hrs

Vincent Slifer Week 8 PPJ

This week was fairly unproductive, on my end.  I tweaked some features of the Mech Game, as well as implement some of the art that was finished.  Beyond that, I tinkered, for a bit, with an idea of another mini-game.

Positive Content

• Implemented Mech Game Art (partial)
• Tweaked Mech Game components
• Debugged issues that came up with overall game implementation

Negative Content

• Did not flesh out mini-game idea
• Essays halted productiveness

Work and Hours
Programming (2 hrs)

• Implemented Art assets
• when available
• Debugged issues that came up
• Reworked older code to singularize processes
• Tested mini-game concept

Research (2 hrs)

• Methods to simulate boat physics
• Methods to calculate buyoancy
• Scripts to create realistic boat movement
• Movement tests on Drexel Ride

Total Work Time:  4 hrs

Vincent Slifer Week 7 PPJ

This week was fairly productive, on my end.  I added new features to the Mech Game, to make it more fleshed out in regards to player interaction.  The features now give something for the "Alien" players to do while the riders are in the mini-game.

Positive Content

• Created interactive features for Alien players
• Target Switching
• Projectile Spread
• Camera Shake
• Implemented circular visual cooldown timers

Negative Content

• Some miscommunications with Perforce
• The same art assets are still being used

Work and Hours
Programming (3 hrs)

• Implemented new Mech Game features
• Gave aliens interaction in game - they can :
• Shake the players
• Switch the color of the targets
• Increase the spread of the player's projectiles
• Gave alien actions radial Cooldown timer
• Altered older scripts to better accommodate new features
• Altered some inputs for testing in the Unity editor without joysticks

Research (1 hrs)

• Methods for circular UI Sliders in unity
• Methods for cooldown on timed effects
• Methods for altering an objects material in script
• Methods for altering an objects tag dynamically in script

Total Work Time:  4 hrs

Vincent Slifer Week 6 PPJ

This week was spent solely on troubleshooting conflicting and "missing" assets with the build on perforce.  Using perforce this week was a major hassle.  Assets would become unlinked at times, and old files created conflicting files that "delinked" with assets in the scene.  Beyond the problems with figuring out perforce, the actual project itself was somewhat simple this week.  I scripted simple methods to have a timer for mini-games, automatically display that time, and troubleshot issues that came up from integrating the mech game on perforce.

Positive Content

• Integrated Mech Game into the main game
• Built timer
• Added placeholder music

Negative Content

• Spent too much time on perforce
• Relinked asset files
• Troubleshot Mech Game files on perforce

Work and Hours
Perforce Troubleshooting (2 hrs)

• Relinked files
• Deleted conflicting files

Programming (2 hrs)

• Relinked files
• Fixed conflicting files
• Built timer code
• Created Unity package solely for asset integration
• Fixed minor problems

Total Work Time: 4 hrs

Vincent Slifer Week 5 PPJ

Most of my time this week was spent trying to figure out how to configure the control scheme for the mech game.  So far, I have a basic set up that allows me to switch between keyboard and joystick controls, although I have not done a lot of testing.  Beyond the controls, I worked on a basic player health system and reworked the basic parts of the Mech game build.

Positive Content

• Joystick functionality attempt added
• needs to be tested
• Global player health added
• Locked and hid the mouse cursor

Negative Content

• Spent too much time on research
• Midterms & Essays are the greatest

Work and Hours
Programming Research (2 hrs)

• Researched methods to use the joystick controllers and 2 player inputs
• Researched how to use the input manager (needs more work)
• Relearned some old methods to make basic systems
• Researched Static variables as global variables

Programming (2 hrs)

• Troubleshot some errors from previous builds
• Implemented mouse lock system
• Implemented joystick to keyboard functionality for testing purposes
• Added global health system
• Coded basic health bar with UI slider
• Reworked old code to be more flexible
• Created script to delete bullets after falling specific distance

Total Work Time: 4 hrs