Unfortunately I haven't posted in a little while due to vacation immediately being followed up with the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. Being back now from GDC, there is such a mix of emotions. On one hand, I'm exhausted. This is both in body and mind. Spending an entire week surrounded by thousands of people is a draining experience for an introvert like me. On the other hand though, I'm completely energized by the experience. Being at GDC helped remind and motivate me toward my true passion of games and development for them. It was such an amazing experience. I connected with so many people, both recruiters and developers, and learned about their own experiences, company cultures and such. Many of them gave me advise about honing my application to succeed there. I'm so grateful to all of them, and to Daphne, one of Champlain College's career advisers, for setting up meetings and such. She was a great help.
Taking a step back from GDC, I should talk about the current state of 'Tales from the Blasterverse.' The alpha due date for projects was right before spring break (2 weeks ago). Unfortunately, we didn't succeed in hitting all the requirements for alpha. We were close, but there was a couple aspects that didn't quite hit the mark. The two largest issues were UI and level design.
With the UI, there simply was a lack of communication to the player about what they were using/collecting for weapons. The specs of each weapon should be easily readable both when the player is standing over a weapon, and when the player is looking at that weapon in their inventory. All we had was the appearance of the weapon, which isn't enough when the parts don't make it obvious in how they change the weapon's functions. This was/is being addressed for the next sprint (though I haven't had a chance to look at the new changes at this time). I talked to my programming lead and asked that he prioritize getting this UI framework in place over building an 'end state' to the game, even if it wasn't pretty.
The other aspect, level design, is a bit trickier to deal with. I chatted with our professor one on one about this and he said that it simply didn't feel like the designers were utilizing what they had learned about building levels effectively. The current levels simply felt like following an objective arrow to the next point, and shooting some enemies, without any real work in terms of narrative or interesting structuring. Ouch! What's sad is that I completely agree with him but haven't called this out before. Talking to my professor has opened my eyes to the fact that I need to be more involved in the design process - something I have distanced myself from because I was afraid of stepping on their toes. I love design work, which is why I've been afraid of getting too involved and breeding resentment toward me from that team. I want them to succeed and do their jobs, but they clearly need a bit of help.
Our professor did provide encouragement and said that he has seen much worse off projects get their act together and show really well for the senior show. Now it's up to me to help make that our project's reality. The fact, and this is also something the professor noted, is that my team is probably the oddest selection of developers put together for our year. We're sort of this group of misfits that have been put together and asked to do something really difficult - create a game. This is something we all love to do and have a passion for, but the specializations, skills, and personalities of this group of members is all over the place. This put me in the strange and challenging position of trying to make all these pieces fit together into a team. Not just a group of workers, but a coherent team of developers.
Admittedly, I feel as though I'm failing badly at this but I'm going to keep trying just the same. The fact is that I care about this team. I care about this project. Even beyond my grade, I believe that this project is worth developing and can be great. I just need to find my way, and by doing so, help my team find their way.