Gary's Blog

Gary here. Here's the trailer for My Alien Farm that I showed at ExpoTees 2018. See you.

Gary here. This was the last week of the project. I added the last needed sounds and made the HUD look pretty. After fixing some bugs that popped up, I was able to submit it on time! Here's what the HUD looks like now - the bags change size depending on the number of items in them: Fig.1 - The new HUD And finally, here's a video of some gameplay from the finished game: This will be the last blog post, for this project. :( A report and presentation still needs doing however, so I'll be working on the last pieces of this assignment over the coming weeks. See ya!

Gary here. Penultimate week this week, which I've spent adding sound, music, and fixing bugs, as well as fine tuning some pixel art. You can hear some of that sound and the music in the video below: A pretty big bug I'd had for weeks  was that the character's walk cycle wouldn't transition properly from and to it's idle - I finally fixed it this morning! Bar any new ones that pop up, the game is now bug free! Next week is the final week of the project. I just have to: Make a better looking HUD, and Add the final few needed sounds. Once that is done I need to: Record a video of gameplay, Take beauty shots, Submit! I'll be very busy, but hopefully will manage to get everything done in time. Fingers crossed! See you then!

Gary here. I didn't have time to do sound as planned, but I was able to completely finish 15 aliens! Fig.1 - Complete lineup of aliens Which is your favourite? Here is a video of me capturing mine: In addition to completing the alien lineup, I also made a tutorial; to teach the player the controls and their goal to make food. Fig.2 - The tutorial consists mostly of just animated arrow keys telling the player what to press and where they should go. Adding sound and fixing a few bugs is all I have left to do for the project. Next week might be the last! Fig.3 - A cool new alien See you then!

Gary here. I've been focusing on the 'end-game' this week - what happens after the player collects all the aliens in their pen? Well, they must then attempt to tame the ultimate alien... Fig.1 - The last alien... Conversely, should the player fail to survive long enough to meet it, it's game over man, game over. I also made statues which block the player's way to the deeper parts of the forest, and must be given gold to break through to get to rarer and more valuable aliens. The mechanics for these statues were made all the way back in week 2! Fig.2 - The player giving the statue gold until it breaks And finally, I made a new alien. Isn't he cute? Fig.3 - Newest alien Getting close to the end of the project, I have just these things left to do; Adding sound, Making the user interface (particularly the HUD) look pretty, and Finishing as many aliens as time allows. I'll be tackling these things over the next week. See you then

Fig.1 - New character Gary here. This week I finally remade the character; I struggled to get the farmer + astronaut look down, so instead I went for a more adventurer/explorer look. Fig.2 - Finding the old character. And as an Easter egg (fitting for the season), you can find the previous look deceased somewhere in the game. The rest of the week was spent on UI. I did the title screen, main menu, as well as in-game menus such as the game over screen. I also added a save feature - in the video above, you can see me continue on a previous save, and start where I'd left off with the same amount of items and aliens stored in the pen. Next week I'm going to make more sprites and possibly start adding sound. See you then!

Gary here. This week I made the rocket, where tamed aliens can be sold for gold: Fig.1 - Rocket I also made the grinder, where tamed aliens can be churned up into delicious food: Fig.2 - Grinder I also worked on the mechanics for a couple of new aliens, like the new alien in figure 1 and 2 who just needs a tweaked idle animation to be finished. I didn't have time to do the character as planned, and hope to squeeze that in to next week in lieu; however, I will be home for Easter so I won't be able to do as much work as usual. Time I do have to work will be spent between making the user interface, and writing the report I have to do for the project. See you then!

Gary here. The game looks like this now: Fig.1 - Progress  I'm very happy with how Europa has turned out, though the character obviously still needs work. My final addition to Europa's look was another creature flying through the background - it's carrying one of the birds it's captured back to it's nest to eat. Fig.2 - Exotic alien I liked the idea of the creature and figured one of the exotic aliens could be based on it. This alien is tamed by bringing another alien to it, whereupon the exotic alien will eat the other! Fig.3 - Food item I also remade the look of the food item, as before it didn't remotely resemble food, which feedback from peers and my supervisor said to change. Finally, I made a pen for aliens to be stored in - you can only store one of each kind of alien, and you have to store one of each to beat the game. Fig.4 - Pen This coming week I will create the final farm assets (the machine that grinds up aliens

Gary here. This week I decided I just didn't like how the game looked - too much odd and empty space. The depth effect caused trees to clip into each other, meaning they had to be few and far between. I thus removed the depth effect from trees, to place them on the same level as the player; this looks much better I feel, and now I just need to work on the mountains in the background. Fig.1 - Progress I made a couple of new trees - the below one has a little bird atop it, guarding an egg. Fig.2 - New tree The same birds can be spotted in the background, flying through the sky (figure 1). I also completed a new alien, which hangs as an egg from a tree at first. Fig.3 - Alien egg Next week I will make the sprites needed for the farm, and after just work on new alien mechanics. See you then!

Fig.1 - Progress This week I did my progress review, which I feel went well. I made mountains for the background of the level, which ties the look of the setting together. As with most things in the game, they'll look different every morning for a unique setting. The setting definitely needs work however, as it looks much too sparse and a little odd. Fig.2 - Alien Grove I also made an 'alien grove', which is where aliens spawn at - it's like their own little house! Fig.3 - Improved fireflies I also worked on the 'fireflies' further... they now spawn close to the camera, and look better as a result. I also worked on designing several new aliens, and fine tuning some existing mechanics. Next week I'm going to apply some randomness to Jupiter - different moons will be orbiting the planet every morning. I will also make two new trees, which will finally complete Europa's look. See you then!

Fig.1 - World resetting at night (sun sped up) Gary here. This week the university was closed due to the snow (in real life, not the game's), meaning the amount of work I could do was limited. I was able to still make the sun, which lights up the world when it rises and turns the world a burnt orange in the evening before setting, and resetting the world. Fig.2 - Glowing bugs I started messing with possible additional light sources, such as little bugs that light up an area around them. Fig.3 - New alien mechanic (Alien 01 sprite) Finally, I started a new alien whose plates must be activated with bait in a specific order. Besides starting my presentation for the progress review (which was delayed to next week due to the university closure) I wasn't able to do much else besides various bug fixes, improving the snow particle effect, etc. Fig.4 - Presentation opening slide Next week I will be playing catch up and making mountains for the background, add

Fig.1 - Progress Gary here. This week I made various cloud sprites that scroll across the background, as well as flying insects that spawn across the world and make the place look more lively. I also stopped background objects from clipping into each other. I also started a bunch of things that I haven't finished entirely, such as a new alien which requires the player to lure it to stand on 'plates' to tame it. Mechanically it is pretty much complete, but still needs the art to be done. Fig.2 - New alien mechanic so far (Alien 01 sprite) I made another new alien, which is easily tamed by distracting it with the robot. It's completely finished mechanically and the sprite sheet is finished bar the walk cycle, which still needs work. I'm happy with the idle animation though: Fig.3 - New alien I also started an 'exotic' alien, which is rarer and harder to tame. The sprite sheet for it is finished, and I've made a start on the mechanics.

Gary here. This week I made the game logo: Fig.1 - Game logo It'll build itself in the title screen when the game starts. I also finished the alien from last week I wasn't happy with: Fig.2 - Finished Alien I started making the sky, such as making a big Jupiter for the background and a couple of it's moons, when I began experimenting with perspective cameras to render objects that are supposed to be further back (trees in the background, etc.) higher up and smaller. They also move slower as the player walks by the further away from the camera they are. It still needs playing with to get right as objects clip through the background then disappear as the player moves away, but I think it looks pretty cool so far (particularly with the aliens while they're in the background) and is worth the investment to fix. I made a tile sheet for the ground with different toppings of snow and ground 'decals', which spruce up the ground tiles with underground

Gary here. This week I remade and improved the script that controls the alien and got all the needed interactions working. I just need to make aliens 'wander' back and forth when not engaged in any activity. My other goal for this week was to create the sprites for the first alien: Fig.1 - Alien 01 sprite sheet Fig.2 - Alien 01 idle animation In addition I created some particle effects. Mainly, the constant snowfall on Europa. It consists of small, fast moving snow that go all the way down the screen as well as bigger, slower snow that disappears halfway. It needed to crumble up so I made a simple sprite sheet for it: Fig.3 - Snow sprite sheet I also gave items that pop out of chests (as well as the grinder and rocket) cool particle trails, using this sprite sheet: Fig.4 - Trail sprite sheet That and the snow look like this in Unity: Fig.5 - Particle trails I got a second alien working - this one must be fed until it is full, then will be tame. It

Fig.1 - Chest Hey, Gary here. This week was spent practicing pixel art - I started with making a chest that items would pop out of when found. It took me a very long time to get the sprite right (and that was just one sprite out of what would be an entire sprite sheet!). Whilst I'd likely get faster and better over time, it was too much of a risk to continue with this art style considering how many sprites I will need to make and I'd likely run out of time. Fig.2 - Revised chest I went back to a similar look I'd used for the bait, with large pixels and not nearly as much detail needing to be added (which to be honest I preferred, as its a more unique look). I made a few more throughout the remainder of the week, such as the: Fig.3 - Robot Food item Coin item Robot item A particle effect of question marks for when an alien is confused Stars that flicker in the sky (another particle effect) To prove my point, none took anywhere near the same amou

Hey, it's Gary. The first thing I did for my project was to make some quick game design documentation: this will act as a guide to the making of the project and store all the ideas I have for the game. It got pretty huge pretty quickly (6072 words, so far), but it was nice to get all my ideas on paper, so to speak. Fig.1 - The game doc so far The next thing I wanted to do was to make the prototype - this would just include the basic game play of a movable character, throwing 'bait', and interactions with one of the aliens. I'd yet to use Unity to make a 2D game so took some time to 'research' what was different. I learnt how to: Use Unity's sprite editor. Use Unity 2D specific content, like changes to animator controllers and altered components like Rigidbody 2D, etc. Any Unity 2D unique workflows, like slicing a sprite sheet. This formed the start of my prototype, with a movable character by the end of my research. For practice I sprited a