#computer games design

Well that didn’t work. After succeeding with the Recursive Backtracker and noticing the speed of dungeon generation, I tried a more efficient “scan and place” methodology, but it didn’t go as I expected. The premise is simple: Place a room Find a random tile adjacent to a tile Place a corridor or room. Goto 2 Sounds simple but there are a couple of things that need to be considered with this.…

The Art of Fallout 4

Bethesda Game Studios, the award-winning creators of Fallout® 3 and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim®, welcome you to the world of Fallout® 4 – their most ambitious game ever, and the next generation of open-world gaming.

The Art of Fallout 4 is a must-have collectible for fans and an ultimate resource for every Wasteland wanderer. Featuring 368 oversize pages, never-before-seen designs, and concept…

One of the mechanics I needed to test for the horror survival game was an Inventory system. The system needed to be able to hold the keycards which the user picks up, to show the user what items they currently are holding and to be able to use these items to unlock doors.

The inventory system used 3 scripts; an inventory script, an item database script and an item class. The inventory script had a list of Items which would be used to hold the items the user has. The size of the inventory was 4 as the player will not be able to collect more than 4 items at once. The Inventory script held all of the methods such as AddItem, RemoveItem, UpdateUI, SearchInventory and GetName. The item database script held the list of all the possible items in the game and their values. When an item was added to the inventory its details are pulled from the item database script. Finally the Item class holds the details of the Items such as Name, ID, Code, Description and its type. The database list and inventory list are populated by objects of the Item class.

Setting up the inventory system took a while as there were lots of things that I had to learn and logic I had to get my head around. I followed a really handy YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D5WEwG4L5HQ) series which helped me a lot.

Recently in class we had a demo session where we all brought in what he had worked on so far, we could all play each others games and give them feedback about whats good, bad and what they could do to improve it.

Coming into the session I knew which areas of the game I wanted feedback on, I got feedback on other areas but I wasn’t all too worried about these as I already had plans to implement these at a later date. The main area I wanted feedback on was the tanks controls and how moving the tank felt, the other areas were the cameras position/rotation and the map design. 

Tanks controls                                                                                                     I asked the players whether they found the controls of the tank confusing and whether or not the tank felt realistic to control.

Most people said they found the controls of the tank confusing at first but once they had a bit of time to get used to them they were fine. As for the tank itself, some people had said that it felt fine and it moved slowly like an actual tank would but the turrets rotation was too slow. Others said it seemed to glide a little when turning.

Although I was generally happy with the feedback I got about the tanks movement and controls I personally wasn’t 100% happy with them. After speaking with my tutor he said it might be worth implementing the lever system actual tanks use to drive. In a tank there are 2 levers which control the 2 tracks, pushing the left lever forward will move the left track and same goes for the right lever and right track. If the tank wishes to turn it simply brakes with one track and goes forward with the other allowing the tank to turn on the spot. To implement this with my tank I would have to change the script to only allow forward and backward forces and then apply the script to the 2 tracks instead of the whole tank. 

Camera                                                                                                                 I asked the players whether they liked where to camera was positioned with the tank, and whether or not they think the camera should follow the tanks rotation or the turrets.

The cameras position was absolutely fine, if its any closer the player looses to much vision and any further away then they can see too much of the map. Everyone said they would rather the camera followed the turrets rotation, but with the new implementation of the tank it will be difficult to get the player to be able to turn the turret as well so I will keep the turret stationary on the tank.

Level design                                                                                                          Everyone I asked said they liked the design of the level and said that it was big enough that it allowed the players to choose their own root round the map, while being small enough that it wouldn’t take you too long to find the other player. Some of the corridors the players can go down will need to be widened but by how much will depend on how the new implementation handles corners.

I’ve encountered a problem, I can make the random rooms, and I can make corridors – they’re just a random room that is a single square wide – but I’ve tried to get them to join up and I cant.

At present, everything is spawned as a separate object… and I can’t get them to read their coordinates from each other properly. I could read the x and y world coordinates from the room object and get the…

Interactive Media Experimentation – 6DM06

Aim – to create a blueprint that procedurally generates a dungeon as a level for a game.

Procedurally generated content is created within the game engine at run time through the use of an algorithm rather than being designed by a level designer. In order to effect good game play from the level it is essential that the algorithm is tweaked to generate best effect for the game style that is…