Time for finals!  This project is all about the client.  Professor Jose has been connecting us with professionals all quarter and it all comes down to this.  The client I was set with is Michael Trzecieski from Reality Robotics.  My classmate and good friend, Mariel Thompson, was able to be my partner for this assignment.  We didn’t think our professor would allow it, but once we had Michael on our side, he couldn’t say no!  We worked great together!  She was the “art director” and I was the “lead programmer” essentially.   We get along great and made a fantastic team so I hope I can do future projects together with her.

Check out Michael’s robot toy, BERO (short for “Be the Robot”), at:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdfP_u3m7as

and/or:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UQjlHgEtJQ

It is a really cool toy robot, and I’m not just saying that.  Anyways, Michael asked us to make a game demo for him in a couple of weeks – so we did.  We used Gamesalad, a new program to us, so that we could publish it when finished.  Although it is not published yet, we plan to complete it enough so we can publish it to the Android/Apple app stores.  We got started right away.

We spent about a week solidifying our concept.  The most challenging part of this was narrowing our scope to something feasible to complete in a couple weeks, especially with our other final projects happening.  We practically nailed it.  We had just enough time to complete what we wanted.  There are still more things to add, but most of it is eye candy and nonessential to completing a game.  Once we finished conceptualizing, it was time for programming.

Learning a new program can be rough.  This is at least the fourth program I have learned this quarter (I’ve learned many things, it depends on what you consider a “program”).  I believe this will be one of the most important programs however because it allows me to publish games to app stores.  So I started off small.  YouTube videos of the basic interface and simple commands were helpful.  Also, Gamesalad provides basic templates that you can use for free!  We used the cross-platform controller template with a built-in touch-controlled joystick along with an A and B button.  The template didn’t want to support flipping the image of Bero (with my limited knowledge of Gamesalad at least) when it would change direction.  After that main issue, most of the issues were fairly small other than just time and running into a million little issues.

I’ll try not to get into too much detail, but it’s a game about the BERO robot trying to find his purpose.  He hears a sound and subconsciously dances for the first time.  He loves the feeling so he follows the sound so he can always dance and be a happy little robot.  Check out this short game play video and leave comments to let me know what you think!  It should be published this holiday season!

TapDance

^^^^^^^ click this link to download my game design document for “Tap Dance”!

A brief back story: I have a group of friends that frequently comes over to my apartment for game nights.  Typically, we chat, eat, and scream while playing Mario Party 1, 2, or 3 on the Wii64 (N64 emulator on the Wii).  A few nights ago, as we were reading the instructions for a minigame, Bri (the friend I mentioned in my post of my journey here, my first friend!) misread the directions as saying “tap A to dance.”  For some reason, it hit me.  “Tap A to dance!” I stated. “Tap A to dance!!!” I exclaimed.  I stood up and started dancing around while singing “Tap A to dance, tap A to dance!”  As I humiliated myself, my friends literally ROFLed (and I never use that term) at me.  Everything hit me at once.  A mobile game where you tap the screen to dance.  I explained to my friends the concept of the game.  They wanted me to call it “Tap to Dance.”  But similarly to Justin Timberlake saying in movie “The Social Network” about dropping the “the” from “the Facebook”, I decided to drop the “to” (or as I was quickly singing it, the “tuh”).  Thus, “Tap Dance” was born.

I researched some existing dance games, and while doing so, I stumbled upon some research saying that dance games can improve concentration skills and academic performance.  I liked this idea a lot because more often than not, people assume gamers are lazy, stupid bums.  I consider myself a gamer, but I definitely don’t consider myself stupid.  In fact, games have expanded my vocabulary, taught me invaluable problem solving skills, and helped me develop a social life and not be (too) socially awkward.

I want Tap Dance to be a game that improves concentration skills without the player knowing the benefits of this seemingly “just for fun” game.

I hope to develop this idea further and publish a version of the game.  Hopefully see you all on the app store soon!

JustAnotherDay

^^^ click this link to download my game design document for “Just Another Day”

Professor Rueda asked the class to conceptualize games that would make the players’ reactions be one of the following:

“Games are truly art!”

“The best art game ever!”

or

“Wow the art is awesome!”

I wanted my players’ reactions to be “Games are truly art.”  To summarize, “just Another Day” is a game about an average day not being so average.  It helps the player realize the importance of everyday decisions and how even what appears to be an insignificant choice, may lead to a life changing affect.  With the use of color and plot changes, “Just Another Day” visually demonstrates how a simple decision can change one’s life drastically.