Dimension 67 was an Adventure style, jump scare, survival style mix game that Followed the same art style of Proteus, pixelated 2D based game set in a 3D environment. Featuring an environmental cycling system where the game would shift from bright and colourful to grayscale and spooky and was really fun concept to play around with.
Post-Morty!
Its that time once again, after wrapping up work on production on Dimension 67! its time to reflect on how well the process went and reflect upon the good the bad and the ugly/things to remember for future.
The Good
Good source of Idea's and References
At the beginning of Dimension 67! there was a lot of ideas on how the game would function despite the restrictions that were put down, No Text/RTS genre/RPG genre. This helped gain ground in starting the project and everyone on team Wolverine had a solid idea of how the game was going to look.
Flexibility
Although taking on board to many ideas can lead to things blowing up out of scope, much of the ideas we had were either easily implemented or didn't require much configuration from the original idea.
This was evident when we shifted from Don't Starve/Pokemon game style to more Proteus First Person, everyone already had experience in what happens with large shifts to a project, and so choosing proteus as the game to reference from resulted in little change to mechanics or art assets.
FeedBack
While working with the team and from past experience consistent update dailey always helped to ensure that what I was doing, whether be sound integration, art creation or putting a level and post it to the team to gain feedback on whether i was on track and to ensure everyone had a say on how the game looked and felt.
Time Management
With Dimension 67! there was a lot giving in creating the game and this helped in experimenting with different concepts and ideas when it came to asset creation, one example being the environment where I started with billboard style planes, this however didn't seem to fit what we were after so I instead used 3DS Max and created trees/rocks/bushes and all sorts of environmental assets using a mixture of planes and 3D objects to give it a more proteus like feel.
Time also allowed for more features to be added within the game, and with the games flexibility helped to have them implemented and working with time to spare.
At the beginning of Dimension 67! there was a lot of ideas on how the game would function despite the restrictions that were put down, No Text/RTS genre/RPG genre. This helped gain ground in starting the project and everyone on team Wolverine had a solid idea of how the game was going to look.
Flexibility
Although taking on board to many ideas can lead to things blowing up out of scope, much of the ideas we had were either easily implemented or didn't require much configuration from the original idea.
This was evident when we shifted from Don't Starve/Pokemon game style to more Proteus First Person, everyone already had experience in what happens with large shifts to a project, and so choosing proteus as the game to reference from resulted in little change to mechanics or art assets.
FeedBack
While working with the team and from past experience consistent update dailey always helped to ensure that what I was doing, whether be sound integration, art creation or putting a level and post it to the team to gain feedback on whether i was on track and to ensure everyone had a say on how the game looked and felt.
Time Management
With Dimension 67! there was a lot giving in creating the game and this helped in experimenting with different concepts and ideas when it came to asset creation, one example being the environment where I started with billboard style planes, this however didn't seem to fit what we were after so I instead used 3DS Max and created trees/rocks/bushes and all sorts of environmental assets using a mixture of planes and 3D objects to give it a more proteus like feel.
Time also allowed for more features to be added within the game, and with the games flexibility helped to have them implemented and working with time to spare.
The not so good
Although the large amount of time and good source of ideas helped D-67 at the beginning, there was no real task allocation within the team, we all had a good idea of where we were doing, but smaller tasks were left to whoever was able to get to them first, leading to large shifts task loads on who was doing what.
Layout Management
This Goes along the same lines as the task management where there was no clear idea as to who was doing what, where some tasks were left undone or others left done till the very end. This gap between tasks created smaller integration based issues such as animation with movement or how the layout would look after it was implemented (Static effect's within D-67)
Things to take on Board
Management Style
I liked the idea of having ideas not set in concrete, creating concepts that would and could be easily redesigned to fit newer and evolving concepts however, Management and Idea's still require balance, D-67 did come out with alot of ideas being created and implemented and in the future finding a proper balance between idea's and having those ideas properly tasked will ensure that they are seen within the game.
Self-Task Management
I have slowly gotten better at organizing my task load, D-67 showed that I can set out a list of things that I need to get done and be able to follow this list. My problem however is not creating them at the times i allocated them, where some tasks were made at the end of the project when I should have instead made at the start. Taking from this I can set myself more solid guidelines to follow in creating assets where I begin with a based set assets and expand them instead of creating entirely new assets.
I liked the idea of having ideas not set in concrete, creating concepts that would and could be easily redesigned to fit newer and evolving concepts however, Management and Idea's still require balance, D-67 did come out with alot of ideas being created and implemented and in the future finding a proper balance between idea's and having those ideas properly tasked will ensure that they are seen within the game.
Self-Task Management
I have slowly gotten better at organizing my task load, D-67 showed that I can set out a list of things that I need to get done and be able to follow this list. My problem however is not creating them at the times i allocated them, where some tasks were made at the end of the project when I should have instead made at the start. Taking from this I can set myself more solid guidelines to follow in creating assets where I begin with a based set assets and expand them instead of creating entirely new assets.