Sprint 4/2

ACCOMPLISHED:
Oh so much.

I finished the Shadow Switch animation.  I also did a reverse version of it (Russel told me we need a reverse).

I did a sneak idle for Suni.  I know we probably won't use it, but it was the very last thing on our list of needed animations that we made at the beginning of the semester.  And I guess I'm a completionist.

I re-colored both Suni and the Guard so that they are shaded in more of a toony style.

That meant that I had to re-output all of their spritesheets again.

I also drew some art for the Box Art.

QUALITY:
Cristine totally loved the shadow switch animation

She didn't care for the box art so I'm getting my sister Valkyrie's help in making some more aesthetically pleasing art.  She's a graphic designer who has made logos and things professionally so she'll be a good help.

EXTRA:
I feel like everything I do is extra these days.  I helped Cristine with designing a Zen Tower for the village level.  And I did a bunch of other stuff I probably don't remember.

EXAMPLES:

 

The Original Placeholder Boxart I made

 The Boxart I drew

The Shadow Switch Animation. Some of the cool FX didn't translate too well to GIF format

NEXT:
Better box art.  Different shapes and sizes for the smoke effect (did I ever mention that?).  Fix some glitches with the sprite sheets.

Sprint 3/26

ACCOMPLISHED:
Suni's attack animation for stunning the guards.  I had to do a lot of tweaking on this animation to get it right.  I'm still not fully satisfied, but I've spent too much time on it already.  I've also heard rumor that we're going to end up taking the stunning out so I'd rather not spend too much time perfecting it.

I finished a very cool level design for the final boss.  But I don't think we'll be using it.  They're still working on the farm and city levels.  They haven't even started on the mountain or palace.  There's no way this final boss level is making it in.  Oh well.  Goodbye for good, Baghead.

QUALITY:
Like I said, the attack animation could be better.  I still think the palm strike I went with looks pretty cool though.  Cristine liked my ideas for the final boss level.

EXTRA:
I started work on making a short tutorial level, but I didn't finish that, and I don't think I'm going to be doing any more level designs.  So far people putting the levels together have completely disregarded my level designs.  It's not because they are hard to understand.  I created a numbering system and I uncluded documentation with each level so that all the puzzles would be clear.

Right now the levels are looking very awful.  I don't see anything from my original designs.  I mean they are using some of my puzzles, but they're also just putting things in random places.  Seriously, the levels they are making are nonsensical.  I have no idea why they put shadow monsters where they do.  I know they're working hard, but these levels are our entire game so they need to be put together in a way that makes sense.  I've voiced some of my concerns (don't worry, I did it in a nice way).  And Sarah said they'll keep trying to improve the levels.

Anyway, Cristine's got other stuff for me to help with, so for now, I think I'm off level design.  The reason I was on Level Design in the first place was so that I could make sure we keep the story I wrote progressing throughout the levels.  But Russell nixed having a story in the game weeks ago.  He says we'll put in a story if we have time (yeah right).  Even if we do have time, which we won't, a story isn't something that you can just throw in at the last second.

It's too bad cuz I literally have zero interest in games with no stories.  I don't play a game unless there's some kind of narrative driving me.  This is probly cuz I started gaming with games like Monkey Island and Zak McKraken. That's also the reason why I've never liked games like Tetris or story-lite games like Mario.

EXAMPLES:

NEXT:
We're getting close to release so all of Suni's animations need to be done.  The only one left to do is the Shadow Switch animation. I'm also in charge of box art.

Spring Break Sprint 3/12 and 3/19

ACCOMPLISHED:
I finished Suni's death animation.  Made it as creepy as possible.  I'd like to make some alternate deaths for when she lands on spikes or drowns, but I think Russell and Cristine need me to get other stuff done first.

I created a fairly cool level design for the Palace level.  I would really like to create one final boss level.  Something that brings everything together and puts the players skills to the final test. Hopefully we'll be able to put a cool final boss level in.

I created a design for a special chasing guard (who I would re-use as the final boss). I was very clear to ask Sarah if we could have a chaser.  I even specifically asked her if it would be too hard because of the chekpoints and how the game has to reset when you die.  I know they'd had problems with resetting states before, so I wanted to make sure that we could include this guy before I did the work for him.  She told me that we could have him in.

But unfortunately, after I did the work, she tells me that we can't have him.  She says that it's just to hard to have a constant chaser because of how their checkpoints and resetting states after you die works.  So we're not having this guy as a constant chaser.  This was a little frustrating to me because I had specifically asked her if that exact thing would be an issue and she said no.  Oh well, hopefully we can still use him as a final boss.

QUALITY:
The death animation is my favorite of all the animations we've done so far.  Cristine absolutely loved Baghead's character design (the constant chaser and the final boss).

EXTRA:
I didn't get the chance to do much extra this sprint.  I spent most of Spring Break catching up on all my other classes that I've been neglecting because of this game.  But I guess you could count Baghead as extra since we're not using him (unless we end up having a final boss level).

EXAMPLES:

NEXT:
Suni's attack animation (for stunning the guards).  A level design for the final boss level.

Sprint 3/5

ACCOMPLISHED
Revised Pushing. I decided the original pushing didn't look good enough so I re-did it.

Pulling.  I got the pulling animation done.  The problem with this animation is that she pulls things of different shapes and sizes, so it's hard to tell where she should grab on. Also apparently her hands will appear behind the object, and we can't change that, so it doesn't matter too much how her hands look. I tried to make the pulling as generic as possible so I can change it if the programmers have any ideas of how to make her be able to realistically look like she's grabbing things when the objects she pulls are different shapes and sizes.

I also made a design for the Mountain level.

QUALITY:
Good. I re-did the push to make it better quality.  Cristine was pleased.  I hope to keep the quality as good as possible for the animations.  Cristine really liked my design for the mountain level.  It should be a very cool level.

EXTRA:
The push animation revise was technically extra. No one told me to make it better, but I like it a lot better now.

EXAMPLES:

NEXT:
The death animation got bumped to next sprint. I will also work on a level design for the palace level. And do some art for the final boss.

Sprint 2/27

ACCOMPLISHED:
I did a stun animation for the guard. I made pushing animation for Suni, but I will probably have to change that.  We're not 100% sure how pushing and pulling is gonna work with the animations, so I'll have to keep working on those.

I also designed the mountain level.

Quality.
Good.  Except we will have to try again on the pushing and pulling. Just because of the restraints of our game.

EXTRA:
I did a kick animation for Suni. I also did a quick and easy idle animation for the guard, cuz I thought he needed it.

EXAMPLES

NEXT SPRINT:
Refine the pushing and pulling animations.  Do a death animation for Suni.  Design a final showdown level.

Sprint for 2/21

ACCOMPLISHED:
I made fixed the guard's alert animation and I refined the sprint animation.  I also designed the imperial palace level.

QUALITY:
Good. As usual. Sarah was pleased with the level and Cristine liked my new guard animations.

EXTRA?
I technically wasn't assigned to refine the guard's sprint animation.  I just didn't like it, so I fixed it.  So that was extra work.

EXAMPLES:

NEXT SPRINT:
Do a stun animation for the guard and a pushing animation for Suni.  Also, design the Mountain level.

Sprint 02/14

ACCOMPLISHED:
I created a design for the city level and I started on the storyboard for some cutscenes.  I ended up including an old man in the level design, so I had to draw, trace and animate him so that he could be put into the level.

QUALITY:
Cristine really liked the level design and the old man animation.  The quality was good.

EXAMPLE:

EXTRA:
Technically, the old man was all extra work.

NEXT SPRINT:
I'm supposed to fix some animation that are making the guard not work correctly and I'm supposed to get in some more Suni animations.