Dat 117: Naming and concept development

Came up with a bunch of names, today - narrowed my game title down to 'M.algamate'

I did some more work on interface design but realized my demon character needed a name so I came up with:

• tahutore
• tare
• tahore
• tautore
• tahutre
• tutore
• tahtore
• tahuti ore
• 
  
• nesmrtelnost
• nesmrtelný
• nesmetlyn
• lynesmet
• netmesl
• netsmel
• nesmetel
• 
  
• nesmiran
• ness
• nex
• nexam
• nexmirtany
• 
  
• nexx - nexa
• nesmiran or nes, or nez
• nezmiran
• nex, nexi or nexemillion

Then I did some more shirt designs - I'm liking this thick trim thing - it goes with the head head band

Day 116: Concept development and interface design

I've accumulated a whole bunch of feedback, which i've slowly been working through

• M. needs a thing
• Arkac needs to look less robot
• Arkac's body needs to be clearer
• demon needs to look less alien
• mystical/spiritual atributes

I did a little more research on straight jackets, to make arkac's body clearer - but i don't like how they look - i prefer having him all wrapped up like a mummy, but I tried some variations

I was told to change the box, because he looks too robotic - but I'm having troubles making the box less hi-tech, without making him look like a failed magician's act.

Tried adding something to M.'s design - their shirt jumper thing looked too plain - I don't really like any of these, but i'll keep trying

Then I started working on interface designs - I have a couple ideas for the health bar, since thats the only part of the extra-diegesis that wont hide away

I was stylizing it to fix more with the mood, and I was thinking maybe Arkac gives them the HUD at the begining of the game, saying "I wont be needing this, it's not MY game"

... oh by the way - Arkac breaks the fourth wall... that's kinda his gimmick

And here's a pause menu concept - mostly just listing things the different sections of it, and figuring out layout stuff

Spent the rest of the day coming up with a name for my game - but i hate all but two of them (*)

• skull prison
• M.
• BAS'C zero
• escape the skull
• A-B
• BAS'C [Minus]
• my demon friend
• deMon
• vs. consolidation
• amalga-mate
• demon friend
• under the hood
• what's in the crate
• the demon within
• demonic amalgamation*
• the kid with the demon friend
• demoni'consolidation
• grow-a-demon
• friend from the pentacle*

they're still pretty bad, though... I'm bad at naming things..

Day 115: Target audience research

I made my Design Document all nice and spiffy - using an edited version of my personal project's branding - then I wrote a crazy amount for the target audience research and did the moodboard for that - target audience is all done and dusted!!

also started fixing up my schedule a tad

Day 114: Story revisions and Concept art

It's only notes at this point - needs to be fleshed out more, but here's the story I've got

Didsome more concepts for the guardian angel and a few for their corrupted forms

then I did some prop mood boards and studied a bit of consumer behavior

Day 113: Mood board and concept art

Did yet another mood board, this time focusing on the enemies - didn't get quite far, but it shows some armor looks i'm going for with the guardian angel. the two at the bottom, there would be for the nightmares

did some more concepts with the guardian angels, refining them more.

M. is there for scale.

for the rest of the day, I focused on the demon's different forms - with help from my peers, I was able to narrow it down to this lot

(left to right) beginning form, M. (for scale, again) neutral final, evil final and nice final

from there I was able to make a big ol' evolution chart!! that was fun!!

Day 112: Concept art

Started the day off with some guardian angel concepts - not sure what direction I want to go with it, just yet, but at the moment i'm playing around with futuristic spins on medieval knight

all I know is that I want their halos to be really thick - maybe mechanical? and their colour schemes are white and gold

I also made another mood board - this time for the demon - i like the idea of the digimon's and tamagotchi's evolution chart, but i want something more subtle with lots of options, so instead of going from a cat creature immediately to a robot or jumping from a flower creature to a cactus creature all of a sudden, i wanted more of a growing type thing that changes gradually through the course of the game - something where you notice the change, but not when it changed

I did a layout for the evolution chart, but decided i needed to tackle the (this isn't set in stone) 3 forms at the end of the game

here's my concept art so far

lastly, I wrote some stuff about my game for the bridging assessment - I've just about sorted out what I want to do with the gameplay and here's M.'s backstory, prior to the game's begining:

M. is a very small, scruffy 7 year old kid, who got was picked on in school. A demon

see's this and promises M. invincibility powers, if they let him share M.'s body.

M. agrees but the demon takes over and runs away causing mayhem and destruction,

until he got worn out. M. finds the experience fun and keeps the destruction going,

while the demon catches his breath.

The two form a strong bond until a group of 88 hooded characters capture them and

take them back to their base, where the two are split apart.

The player gets to decide what M.'s personality would become as they play through the

game.

Day 111: deity academy is done for good - no more work on that is necessary - leave me alone!!

also I did some demon concept designs, I guess

Day 110: Character Concepts

I started the day by doing that one shot that nobody wanted to do - and i fixed up some stuff in the credits - all i need now, is to animate horrace better and add a ticking noise to this clock

Then I did HEAPS of different designs - everybody kept telling me to combine certain things - but these first 3 are the ones i started off with - the 4th one was a WIP

Day 109: Character concepts and fleshing out game play

Today I did the sound syncing for Deity Academy, and then moved onto concept art - I think Arkac could use a few tweeks here and there, but I think he's pretty sorted, now.

Also worked on M.'s design - I like a few of these hair designs, but i'm not sure about the fashion, just yet

With help from my tutor and classmate, I was able to change the gameplay a bit and have a theme, finally!

here's my notes on that:

as the demon grows, their interactions would change? - you are still presented with the same options of 'nice' 'neutral' and 'mean'

theme - personality growing

M.'s mind set changes with the demon - show M.'s personality growth through stance and attitude

keeping their relationship consistent - no matter how mean they are, they wont grow apart

buddy system puzzles?

demon guides M. through the dangerous parts with the side scrolling levels

Day 108: I FINALLY FIXED DEITY ACADEMY!!!!!

YYUUUSSSSS - Syncing problem is no more!! I did it!!! It was a total fluke, but it's done!! Yay!!

Didn't do any work on my individual project, but scenes 1, 2, 4 and 5 are all done - just need to do some fix ups on the credits, sync up the sound (because i know how to do that, now) on scene 3 as well as a  couple touch-ups on the visuals of that scene - and add one establishing shot in between scenes 3 and 4, for better transition. then I can finally send it off to Finn, to do the music!!

Day 107: Concept Art

I drew up a diagram to describe how the demon would grow - you would start with a blob and as the game progresses, that blob will grow and evolve - really subtly and really gradually.

The light grey line shows that you the possible path you could choose - there are parts in between those pictures, so you can have one that's in between the neutral and mean poses.

I also did some concept art - had to research quite a bit for Arkac's crate head

not sure how to proceed from there, so I decided to draw some possible designs for M.

Day 106: Story revision

Today I tried fleshing out my story a little more - I think it can still do with some improvements, though - I mostly worked on Deity Academy and attended lectures

Day 105: Bibliography, Schedule and Gameplay

Today I started noting down the sources of where I got those reference images from - for my bibliography - much more time consuming than I expected - I also elaborated on my schedule, to show what I was planning on doing for each day of the assessments.

I think I have a better idea of what I want for the demon's gameplay - an almost virtual pet type deal, where it learns from you and will fight the enemies depending on how you treat arkac

Day 104: Schedule and Research

I started the day by making a schedule - this is just for due dates and such - I am yet to add my personal goals for each week

I also wrote a bunch about the gameplay:

At the begining of the game, Arkac will act as the guide, he’ll teaches you the        basic controls of a platforming-esque game play (minus the platforms) and leads you through the hallways, to safe spots (the top-down gameplay) before M. gets split up from the demon, you are overpowered and can defeat enimies left and right, the gameplay changes after M. and the demon become 2 separate entities.

2D side scroller levels:

You play as M. with the demon friend following close behind. you can run left and right, jump, climb certain surfaces - the basic stuff that’ll move you from point A to B

M. cannot attack, however, you will use the demon as your means of combat, which is often best to avoid, given M.’s valnurable situation.

Top down levels:

there are safe spots, where Arkac will wait for you at - you can save your progress here and talk to him. Arkac will give you options of what to say to him - depending on what you choose to say, will effect your demon’s apearence slightly - for example, if you choose to be agressive towards Arkac, your demon might start growing some spikes. As you further through the game, your demon will grow and mutate - these changes will also alter the combat parts of the side-scrolling levels.

These safe spot levels have a top-down RPG influenced gameplay, where you can move freely throughout the room.

Day 103: MoodBoard

I wrote a bunch of stuff for my game description

This project will be a single player comedic mystery adventure - a sort of platformer rpg hyrbrid, set inside a giant skull that was turned into a building by a group of 88 hooded characters. The avatar, simply known as ‘M.‘, is a young person who shares their body with a demon - they were both kidnapped along with several thousand other demon/human hybrids, for unknown reasons. M. and their demon have one goal - to escape!

accompanying them is another kid, Arkac, who has strange powers that nobody else seems to comprehend, he is limited, however, by the straight-jacket and crate locked on his head. The crate disables him from speaking, so he uses dialogue boxes to communicate.

the 88 hooded characters who run this dodgy looking skull building, see’s M. as an annoyance, rather than a threat - and are more interested in going after Arkac.

There are 2 types of enimies for M. and their demon to fight - gaurdian angels, who are essentially a demon’s mortal enimy, and nightmares, little pest creatures that the hooded characters are trying to stop at the source.

The main plot will be a branching narrative, with Arkac acting as all of the decision points - giving the player an illusion of choice. Unlike in most other games, that do this, the story nodes DO effect the gameplay - you demon will grow and mutate, changing apearence based on the choices you make with arkac - this slightly changes the demon’s gameplay.

This game is mostly going to be world building, using the lore I’ve prewritten, it’ll use micronarratives in the background, and character interactions to show who arkac was in a past life, who’s skull these 88 characters turned into their base and the history of demons and gaurdian angels.

I did another mood board for character designs, this time

Also drew Arkac and some nightmares

Day 102: Image Researching and Mood Boards

Did some image research for my new project - started with a mood board of a bunch of different games that I like, and that I could potentially use as Brynspiration

Afterwards, I decided to tackle some visual themes for the levels - my game will be set in a giant skull, that was turned into a building - the skull is mostly underwater, and I'm going for a sort of laboratory/prison-esque feel to it

Also doodled the building and one of the characters, that i'm hoping to put into the game, somehow

Day 101: A New Project

In the weekend, I noticed a lot of issues with Deity Academy - it was ready to be handed in, but not quite ready as a short film - so I wrote some changes that need to be done, before I feel confident in sending it to the musician for the final music edit.

list of changes:
scene1_______/
scene2_______Nezha's rambling shot is way too out of synch (also Bryn needs to fix the freeze frame drawing)
re-export centeotl's effects for "MY POWERS LET ME SUMMON" without drop shadow
"CORN!!" sounds effects need fixing
"alright class settle down and take you se-" add a pause before Horrace wakes up to fix the pacing from the last shotand fade the sound effect in
also add more of a pause for when ares is letting aphrodite sit down and maybe at the end of that shot, too
scene 3_______first shot is out of synch - "planets" should happen when the eye half closes
lion roar noise is out of synch - simple edit
squeaky toy sound is too late
scene 3 last shot is out of synch - he rolls his eye at "your"
better transition from scene 3 - 4 (maybe add a fade or something?)
scene 4_______re-export centeotl's special effects, when he summons corn into Ares's mouth, so it doesnt have a drop shadow
scene 5_______electrocution sound effect is out of synch
fade to black with "corny ending, huh?" ending card, to transition to credits, better

We were also given our new brief, today - I came up with the basic set up for my story, and I did some research for a mood board, which I will finish tomorrow

Days 98, 99 + 100!!!: COMPLETING THE DAMN THING

THE REST OF THIS WEEK WAS CRAZY BUT HOT DIGGITY DAMN IT'S ALL DONE!!!!! EVERYTHING!!!! THE SOUNDS THE AFTER EFFECTS IT'S ALL DONE

YYYYYYYUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Day 97: Clean-Up and Backgrounds

Finished another shot - we're running out of work, and we'll need to sort out the composting, soon

I also started tweeking the freeze frames, to make them look nice and spiffy - but my computer shut down out of nowhere before i could finish

Day 96: Background Touch-Ups

more touch-ups - getting these backgrounds done, to make it more on model - I swapped shots with Cheyenne, because I couldn't get that pavilion right.

Days 93, 94 + 95: Touch-ups

For these past couple of days, I have been tweeking all the little line inconsistencies and making backgrounds all on model - every tiny little pedantic details in each frame of each shot - this is tedious, and a picture wont really represent it all too well