FJ_FMP

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FMP Moodboard

Here is a moodboard of my FMP project, including the main assets that i used for the game.

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Game Test Feedback

I have received the first piece of feedback from my game playtesting from Theo. This is feedback that i will take into consideration.

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Itch.io Page

I have made an Itch.io page for my project in order to make my game public and playable. It doesn't have much on it at the moment but I am planning on adding more in the future.

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Gameplay Video

I have made an edited gameplay video for my game and have uploaded it to youtube. This one I edited with subtitles throughout to substitute for voiceovers, and I added background music so that the video isn't completely silent

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Health Pickup

I have a health pickup working in my game. I made it a custom event and added a branch off of it. I added code to connect to the branch to check if the players current health is lower than the max health, which is set to 10. From the False pin I connected code that adds health to the player, but I also added a float clamp and connected the max health variable to the Max pin, essentially preventing the health pickup from healing the character above max health.

In the pickup actor, i made a begin overlap node for a box collision and cast to the third person character, which is where then custom event is stored. I then called the custom event and then put a Destroy Actor node on the end.

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Problem with Cursor Tracking

I had a problem with my cursor tracking where if my mouse cursor went out of bounds from the map, the red arrow would snap back to the middle of the map. Jake fixed this for me by putting a Get Mouse Position node and connected it to a Convert Screen Location to World Space node into the macro so that the game will always find where my cursor is on the screen rather than in the game

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Light tests

IUn tarraria the lights on the torches impact the environment. I decided to explore this to see the impact it would have on the design of my game.

My version.

The end result whilst effective isnt creating the right sort of light for me. The colours have to be bright and as such it loses the colour on the sprite and the output on the world is also not correct.

this is a flipbbok that outputs into Emissive colour. I used a mask to control what lights up and what doesnt.

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Decoration and Furniture Tileset

For the whole day I have been working on a tileset for the decorations and general furniture for my maps in order to make them look less empty and more lively. Here is the tileset so far

I chose this design since it matched the pixel size of everything else in my game, and the colour palette matches my game.

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Procedural Generation of Tile Maps

I got help from Jake and I was able to get system for procedurally generating my map in my game. It uses premade map tiles to create the level before the game launches.

To start with, we use Event Begin Play, since we want it to perform this action when the level launches, and we make a vector array variable with an Add Unique node to make sure multiple tiles are put on top of each other. Then a For Loop node is used to set how many rooms are spawned.

The following code here is to tell the system which direction to put the tiles in and adds it to the array.

This code actually adds the tile locations to the array and puts it in the Add Unique node.

The For Each Loop node is connected to the For Loop node in the first screenshot, but connected to the Completed pin. This code randomises which tiles are used in the procedural generation and spawns it in place.

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Changing my Style

I have decided to change the style of my game in terms of pixel art. I am going from 64x64 to 16x16, since it would simply take too long to make all of the assets myself. I have taken a load of assets from online and downloaded them for my game. Here is one of my playable characters now.

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Character Sprite

I have made my first character sprite, and I am planning on adding a few more, each of which being mostly reskins with a few added details so to save time. Here is the first character, The Cannon Fodder.

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Weapon Slash

I had designed a weapon slash to appear whenever I pressed left click to slash in my game, however it looked weird and I didn't want to use is, so I found an asset for one on the internet.

The one I made:

The one I found and used instead

I chose this weapon slash because it looked the coolest out of all the ones I could find, and it reminded me of weapon slashes from games like Dead Cells.

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Original Level

To begin with, my game was going to have one big level that the character would run through and potentially get lost in, but I instead decided to do a sort of Binding of Isaac style level design with procedurally generated tiles that connect directly to each other. Here was the original level.

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Assets for my Game

There will be a certain amount of assets that i will need for my game in order to make my dungeon look like a dungeon, or for my character to look like a character that would explore a dungeon, or for my enemies to look like enemies you'd find in a dungeon.

For my character, i will need a knight asset, with a working idle, walking and death animation. I will also need a weapon slash asset that plays whenever my character swings his sword. If i get the time, i could have other character with some parts of it being a different colour, acting as a sort of skin for the character.

For the enemy assets, i will need at least five different types, each with its own idle and walking animation. I will also need an animation for the ranged enemy shooting at me. They will all have the same death animation of them kind of exploding into dust in a sense, which i will also need another asset for.

For the dungeon assets themselves, i will need assets for walls and floors, along with dungeon decor such as wall-mounted torches, cobwebs, or maybe bones scattered around, along with furniture such as tables and chairs, carpets, etc.

All of these assets are going to have to be around the same pixel size ratio, as it would look wrong and weird if they all had different pixel sizes. It wouldn't look like they'd fit in the same world.

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What I Must and Should Have in my Game

What my game must have; a character with an attack that can be used to kill enemies with, enemies to be killed, a procedurally generated level that randomizes each time you play, a main menu and a death screen, a health bar that depletes when hit.

What my game should have; an objective such as a thing to find in the level, at least one ranged enemy, a shotgun or a ranged weapon that the character uses with a working ammunition counter, music and sound effects, some form of power up that provides either a temporary or permanent buff to the character, a form of currency that drops from killed enemies, a health pickup that has a chance to drop from killed enemies.

What my game could have; a character selection screen where each character has a different melee or ranged weapon, multiple levels that are accessible after the previous one is completed, a dash mechanic to avoid damage, different types of levels other than a dungeon (e.g. a forest or a village), a boss that the player has to fight on each level.]

What my game won't have; different abilities that the character gets a choice of at the start of a run or during a run, upgrades that the player receives after each run that can be equipped to make future runs easier, a central hub for the player to wander around in between runs.

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Knight Helmets

I am taking a look at some real life knight helmets to try and get some insight into what i want for my knight, since researching real knights didn't help in that department.

I first looked at a bucket helmet design, sort of like a great helm. It has a kind of rectangular shape with a gold line down the middle and slits for eye holes. This is particularly my favorite style of knight helmet and one that i will consider for my knight's helmet.

I also looked into knight helmets with feathered plumes on them, as i was interested in adding something else to the design.

I think knight helmets with a plume look very cool. I want to try and take the design of plume knight helmets and try and apply it to the bucket helmet design.

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Sir William Wallace

William Wallace was a Scottish knight and one of Scotland's greatest national heroes. He is also the inspiration for the Scottish resistance to the English king, Edward I. In December 1297, he was knighted and declared the guardian of the kingdom, and while under this title, fought for Scotland's freedom from English rule.

This is also not a knight that i'd like the knight in my game to look like. The helmet is not at all what i want for my knight. Something i do like about him is that his cape in pinned together on the front, making it look more like a sort of cloak than a cape.