Taking Turns Together
2000 errors updating to the new engine version… legacy code causing issues with being able to pivot based on iteration… and a wild idea to have the players take their turns at the same time to encourage communication.
Read MoreLet There Being Lighting!
As the players move about the grid of an encounter their light source will uncover the tiles hidden in the shadows. Treasures and enemies can be hiding in the shadows; if they are in a player’s light radius, they won’t be added to the turn order array.
Read MoreCardsGrid - Initial Blog Post
“CardsGrid” is a coop tactics card game prototype that I am solo-developing. Much of the mechanical inspiration comes from D&D grid-based combat but instead of spell slots and dice players have cards.
Read MoreLucha Megadrive Post Mortem
Last semester we were the underdogs challenging the taboo of making a fighting game and we came out victorious and arguably a fan favorite among our cohort. If last semester was Rocky 1 or Karate Kid 1 were no one expected us to win, but we worked hard and we succeeded anyways– this semester was the sequel. The expectations for our success rose tremendously, we got maybe a little over confident over winter break. When we hit our first major road block of figuring out our new art direction the team’s morale dropped off the earth, communication went out the window, and there were days to me at least were it felt like we were living the sequel that didn’t need to happen. But eventually we came around, we rose up from the ashes of the first half of the semester, and we started to live the sequel that everyone always wants– the sequel that is better than the original.
Read MoreSprint 28: Gold Master
We did it! We finished Lucha Megadrive and everything is all set up for the show!
Read MoreSprint 27: Release 1
The game is almost done! The cabinet is almost done! The senior show is just around the corner!
Read MoreSprint 26: PAX
Lucha Megadrive was featured via Champlain College at PAX this week! Tori our environment artist and Natalie our UI/UX Designer / Associate Producer show off the game and here is what players are said about the game:
Read MoreSprint 25: Beta
It is nice to be back in the swing of things!Team mentality is shifting from less discipline focused goals / task to more feature focused goals and tasks.
Read MoreSprint 24: GDC and Alpha
I was away at GDC this last sprint, but the team did a great job putting together our Alpha!
Read MoreSprint 23: Spring Break
This week is spring break for Champlain College which means the Lucha Megadrive team is taking some much needed time off!
Read MoreSprint 22: Merging Scenes
For the past two months we have had a lot of progress in each of the areas of our development: art, design, programming, and sound; however, up until today we haven’t put our test scenes together to see how it all works in unison. This week we finally merged our test scenes! The game has gone through a huge amount of changes! We’ve increased our overall visual polish and put in our in progress models of our TWO characters! It was an exciting week for us.
Read MoreSprint 21: Surprise! We have a cabinet!
Our team’s dynamic is on the up and up. We are planning out the senior show. And we are ahead of schedule with our arcade cabinet construction!
Read MoreSprint 20: Team Dynamic and Communication Changes
This week I’d like to take some time to talk about our team’s dynamic and communication these past few sprints. Some mistakes were definitely made on my end as a producer that ended up affecting the teams productivity pretty negatively. It has always been my belief that if you don’t feel comfortable talking to someone about your life then you probably don’t want to work with them either. I realize now that I wasn’t doing a part of my job which is to make people feel safe, comfortable to speak up, and trusted in our work environment. I was too concerned with preparing deliverables and meeting deadlines that I forgot to take care of my team.
Read MoreSprint 19: Art Revamp and Trails Mode
This week we revamped our art direction. Credit goes to our amazing artists!
Read MoreSprint 18: Into Production!
This week was big for Lucha Megadrive's development! We made progress our re-imagining of our main character Jonny Fuego! Our other main character Nuclear Winter now has a test model in game so that we can start testing out their moves! We have our first artist pass for our new UI! And we now have a fully 3D environment blocked out and in game which has allow us to do cool tricks with our camera!
Read MoreSprint 17: Working Towards Greenlight
Week 2 of the new semester has been a busy one! Our team tackled a combination of documentation and implementation of some our of new assets.
Read MoreSprint 16: Back in Action
We are back into the fray! We took about a month off for winter break, spent sometime with our families, and now we are all ready to jump back into development of Lucha Megadrive for the next 3-4 months!
Read MoreSprint 15: Spring Semester Plan & Post Mortem
With the semester coming to a close here at Champlain College there is very little time left to make progress on Lucha Megadrive. It has been a long and intense semester for the team. Taking a few weeks off for the winter holidays will help us recharge, spend time with our families– and probably still work on Lucha Megadrive here and there because we all love working on it so much! Most of us already have some research work planned out for during the holidays– nothing super intense, but could save a lot of time at the start of the semester.
Read MoreSprint 14: The “Draft”
This past week has been a long one. Many late nights have been had despite the project being done for the semester. Much debate has been going through the game studio regarding the process and result of “drafting” the now free agent developers onto new teams. For those not in the know, 11 out of 24 teams this semester were chosen to continue development on their prototyped game ideas and our game Lucha Megadrive was one of those surviving projects. This process of prototyping and cutting game ideas is modeled after Nintendo’s “find the fun” methodology and is a standard process every year here at Champlain College’s The Game Studio.
Read MoreSprint 13: We Made The Cut!
Our presentation last week was a big hit! (Check it out at this link, I’ll be editing together a subtitled version with different camera angles over the next couple of weeks). In addition to the studio wides pitches, each team also needed to demo their game for the faculty members. When we demoed our game to Champlain College faculty most of them were able to pick it up pretty easily and start having a good time right away. We were given 1 hour to guide faculty members as they played our game and after all the games made this semester were played, the faculty locked themselves in a classroom for 2.5 hours and determined which teams should move on to next semester.
Read More