This week was the final full week we got to code and add mechanics to the game. We worked mainly on bugfixing, mechanics, UI and marketing materials. Lewis has added the final mechanic to the game before PGF and we are now working on streamlining the gameplay experience with a wave system, bugfixing and finalising the marketing material for PGF.

A short summary of what each team member did this week:

Kris (Producer & Marketing)

For the sixth week of production, my concentration was on making visual UI for the newly introduced game mechanic – special body preparation. This included making vector UI for the mini-game and the pop-up UI for the boat where the body needs to be put on. Prior to this, last week I have given my team several placement and design suggestions to choose from, this week concentrating on finalizing the chosen designs. On the second part of the week, my job was based around marketing. I created the illustration and designs for the post-card, basing them on a medieval painting to create a historical link. This illustration was done in Photoshop and has varying designs for front and back. This design will be going into printing early next week for preparation of PGF.

Nathan (Design Lead)

This week was spent again implementing the UI elements provided to me by Kris. I went about setting up the UI for both the body scrubbing minigame, the boat man requests, as well as the tutorial instructions which appear at the start of the round. I had the challenge of lining up the UI canvasses with the 3D assets on screen which was especially hard for the boatman since it has particular animations it plays. For this week leading up to PGF i am going to polish the existing UI with animations and reformatting some screens to Lewis’ request

Evie (Art Lead & Marketing)

This week I made some additional basemap textures for our dead body models to line up with the cleaning the body on the prep table mechanic. I created ‘dirty’ versions of each model by opening the texture then adding a layer where I painted some dirt onto them. This is so that the bodies can change state when they go from dirty to clean while using the prep table. I also created and textured a bucket prop to go with this mechanic, to give players an idea of what they’re supposed to do at the prep table.

Lewis (Tech Lead)

This week I implemented the code for the minigame, so special bodies can be cleaned with a progress bar that fills up when the player mashes the B button. I also coded a spawning system for the coffin boat, so that it intelligently spawns and moves into position when a body is placed on the prep table. Finally, I designed a complex corpse randomization system for the delivery cart, so that there are variations in the combination and number of each body type that gets delivered. Over the next few days, I will be implementing a wave system so that new corpse deliveries are triggered when there are only two bodies remaining, as well as fixing as many bugs as possible before making a final build for PGF on Saturday.

Teresa (Test Lead)

The rigging and animation for the boatman is probably one of the most difficult thing I have worked on so far. I had a lot of issues figuring out the proper way to constrain the oar to the boatman’s hands without breaking the model. The boatman model had to be completely reworked with extra polycount to account for the rowing motion. The animation was an interesting challenge due to the fact that it needs to be synced to the boat animation done in unity. I had to set up a reference version of the boat in maya, constrain the boatman onto the boat to “match” the boat’s idle and moving animation with his “rowing” motions. Once the animations were done, it was reimported into unity for a rig and animation check. At where it currently stands. I’m happy that the rig function as intended with minimal errors. But a revision on the animations is needed to fix the transition erros. I’ll be busy handling playtesting with the team before the PGF on the 11th. Then I will be back to figure out how I can sync the boatman/boat animations at the same time.