Meeting Minutes Final - Richardng12/Terra_Tales GitHub Wiki

16/09/19

Attendees: Bryan Ang, Clayton Lan, Dalton Lim, Richard Ng, Hong Shi, Jun Han Zhu

Apologies: Yin Wang

Time: 11:00pm - 4:00pm

Met up and thought of team name and game name
Discussed various game genres and game modes, brainstormed about strategy, action, card, narrative games
Jotted down level ideas, game world and how our game ties into the overall environmental theme.
Chose our temporary Design Features and Advanced Features (Could be changed in the future)

Name Suggestions In terms of the naming of the game, we wanted the name to be easily understood by our target user. We also placed particular emphasis on the relevance of the name to our game theme/objective. Below is a list of potential names.

Climate Crisis
Climate calamity
Climate crossroads
Divergence
Trash tales
Into the past
Terraria Tales/Terra Tales

In the end we chose Terra Tales. Jotted down notes are pasted below:

Game Genre ideas

Binding of Isaac, side scroller

Super seducer (but like kiddie climate change style)

Birds eye view battle royale (bad things from climate change slowly enclose on players)

Pandemic

Puzzle

Puzzle game where you put the trash into the right bin

User has to determine the environmental problem in each level Each level gets progressively harder Time to complete each level acts as the score User has to fix the problem by Slay the spider/hearthstone

Role Playing

User navigates a 2d sidescroller Has to find items to solve the impending environmental crisis Sort of like a mario-esque game Collect all the items and get to the end level to win Talk to NPC’s which talk about environment

Narrative

Walking through post-apocalyptic world - time travel back Change past = change present I.e. throw rubbish away change the world Live feedback of future impact Two screens - one past one future. - co-player? Side scrolling Themes Stages Pollution Rubbish Ocean level Pick up rubbish with spear Boat Fishing rod - fish for special items RNG - bonus level Signs Explaining what happended Newspaper Health System Different objective for each level Defeat boss/finish goal/ grab item One boss at end? Sub bosses - final bosses? Sub bosses - Everything related to themes

Strategy

City builder where instead of building from scratch, you’re trying to fix the city Multiple policies players can choose (each has different effects) Players can build stuff NPC’s can also “guide” users through narration. Different NPC’s can also have perspectives.

Adventure

Card game, “slay the spire”

“consider mechanisms such as raising awareness, building empathy, encouraging solutions brainstorming, and other creative avenues.”

Collect items related to the environment to save the world Teach them climate change with a story

2D side scroller

Puzzle elements to collect specific items that can save the environment Items to unlock special powers that can be used to pass next levels Different stages with different themes

18/09/19

Attendees: Bryan Ang, Clayton Lan, Dalton Lim, Richard Ng, Hong Shi, Yin Wang, Jun Han Zhu

Time: 12:00pm - 3:00pm

Discussed different game genres (puzzle and 2d sidescroller)

Discussed pros and cons of each genre

We need to have a good justification for which one we pick

Both puzzle and 2d sidescroller can have an overarching story

Puzzles can maybe convey the idea of solving the problem better??

2d sidescroller can provide a more story driven atmosphere?

IDEAS THOUGHT ABOUT BELOW

Antarctica - levels rise/ platform decreases Desert - gets too hot Air Pollution - hard to breathe

Overarching goal: Teaching young kids about climate change

Home screen, where you have a map with a machine that brings you to each level. Last level

WE “Kill” them and convert them from corrupted to human.

Themes Electricity Boss guarding stone, stone is infinite energy, energy companies don't want you to use it. We need to kill the boss which is electric companies. Pieces of the energy source are obtained by solving puzzles, then at the end you kill the boss to put it back together???

Goal: Save energy by switching off lights in the house Gameplay: Puzzle, levels get progressively harder, some doors are locked have to find keys to unlock then turn off switch in the house. Installing solar panels Possible timer for fossil fuel wastage. Switch to renewable energy, more hydro power more wind farms.

Planting trees Seed that makes a tree that can’t br cut down Deforestation

Rising sea levels Big ice and dump it into ocean

20/09/19

Attendees: Bryan Ang, Clayton Lan, Dalton Lim, Yin Wang, Jun Han Zhu

Apologies: Richard Ng, Hong Shi

Finalised project plan
Work distribution

23/09/19

Meeting Zone : Leech
Attendees : Hong, Dalton, Richard, Bryan, Clayton, Allen
Meeting Time : 12-6

Discussed viability of options - topdown vs 2d sidescroller

Discussed game level design in depth - what sort of puzzles/motive of the game

Top down approach

top down approach encourages more exploration
how do we convey the main motive of the game, with open exploration
level design in top down approach is often more complicated - have to direct where the user should go
open level world design?

2d sidescroller

more detailed art ?
easier to create a prototype for
more focused and directed so easier for user to complete

Finalised work distribution and added more points for the planning (mechanics and dynamics)

Motivations for timer based gameplay?

Based on story, e.g time until people cut down trees
doing objective based actions increase the timer? (e.g planting trees increase timer)

How to make scoring serious mapping?

Maybe just time taken to completed each stage?

26/09/19

Meeting Zone: Leech

Attendees : Richard, Dalton, Hong, Clayton, Bryan, Allen

Meeting Time : 12-3

Discussed every stage in depth (are we including monster representations still?)

Formed questions to ask Rashina on Friday

Discussing the time constraints between having sub levels between each themed stage.

Things to do:

Flesh out the themed puzzles and content within each themed level
Get everyone on the same page - delegation of work
Issue a timeline so we can keep deadlines in mind
UML diagram discussion on breadth and scope

27/09/19

Attendees - Richard, Hong, Dalton, Clayton, Thomas, Allen
Meeting Zone : Leech TODAY - 11:30 - 6:30pm
Set up and went to meeting with Rashina, discussing our ideas
    Monsters still possible as long as theme is on track
    Switched from 6 sub level and 3 final levels to 3 levels due to realisation of time constraints
    Kept idea of role playing game
Internal group conflict surrounding group practices and ideas
Performed RUP and change our idea to another of our original ideas
    Switched from Top down to 2d side scroller
    No longer wish to change to other genre completely
    Issues facing consistency and gameplay
    Issues facing incorporation of main themes and how we went about creating ideas
    Ideas were refined and merged into a 2d side scroller
Designed lo - fi prototypes for each of our themed stages
Finalising UML diagram
Plot updated - Protagonist is now the son of the former global CEO. On the fathers deathbed, he wishes to undo what he did in the past, and sends his son, our protagonist on the mission to save him.

TO DO

Find sprites to fit our desired levels
Finish Character Skills/Actions
Finish Character and Game mechanics
Learning Unity through tutorials

ISSUES BROUGHT UP

Design phase needs to be improved - need an overall base idea instead of patching up different ideas/themes
Meetings need to be more efficient - set up two leaders and assign tasks to each member.
Team is quite fragmented - need to all be on the same page - (Team unity)

30/09/19

Attendees : Richard, Thomas, Allen, Clayton, Bryan, Dalton

Meeting Time : 12-5

Location - Leech TODAY

Finalised UML diagram

Finalised the design documents

Delegated roles towards coding the prototype

01/10/19

Attendees - Richard, Clayton, Dalton, Hong, Thomas, Bryan
Meeting Times - 2-6
Location - Level 5 Engineering

TODAY

Set up everyone with their appropriate tasks to do on unity
Clayton finished up exit and main menu screens
Worked on level design and forest level assets
Worked on character design and mechanics
Worked on City level design and mechanics
Set up git repo again (but properly with git lfs and integrated with unity) - integrated and familiarized ourselves with how branches work in unity
Transferred wiki and relevant documents into the new repo

TO DO

Flesh out the mechanics of forest level
Flesh out mechanics of character - (smoothen out jumping and attacking)
Start working on ocean level
Merging discussion

02/10/19

Meeting Zone: Level 5 Engineering
Attendees - Hong, Richard, Bryan, Dalton, Thomas, Clayton

Splash/ Start screen has been implemented.
Forest level sprite has been chosen
Building prefab has been started.
RNG aspects have been discussed.
Added some interactions for forest level

03/10/19

Meeting Zone - Level 5 Engineering
Attendees - Richard, Hong, Clayton, Bryan, (Thomas worked from home)

Tree planting has been successfully implemented.
Dialogue and achievements screen has commenced.
Rubbish pickup, more code optimisations have been implemented.
Building fixed again for remerge.

04/10/19

Meeting Zone: Lvl 5 Engineering Attendees: Thomas, Clayton, Dalton, Richard, Hong, Bryan

Thomas presented his ocean level with ai enemies which follow the player.
Clayton optimizing the file sizes.
Hong improving ocean level.
Tree planting text finished
Merged ocean and forest branches together - cleanup of folders/files
Dialogue on trigger events added
Fixed jump mechanics
Extra prototyping done using a whiteboard

06/10/19

Meeting Zone: Lvl 5 Engineering
Attendees: Richard, Dalton, Thomas, Clayton, Bryan, Hong
Time - 12pm - 11pm

Activities Covered:

Coding
Enemy projectiles added
More prototyping
Restart scene added
Combination of different scenes
Timeline
Fixed NPC dialogue
Added continuous scenes
Added pause menu
Fixed Tree Tracker
Scoring system

07/10/19

Meeting Zone : UG4

Attendees : Richard, Hong, Thomas, Dalton, Clayton, Allen

Time : 12pm-11pm

Activities

Final merge for prototype

Fixing small bugs in code

Adding final transistions between scenes

Getting ready for subsmission

Serious mapping completed

Contribution table created

Team Reflected writen

14/10/19

Meeting Zone : UG4

Attendees : Richard, Hong, Thomas, Dalton, Clayton, Allen

Current Progress

Added hiscore table to menu screen
Worked on score calculation
Added fade/in out for cutscenes
Basic name input added for end game screen
Added basic NPC functionality to city level
Implemented partial achievement functionality to every level
Added monster death sounds and hit sounds
map border extended to make room for item hud
timer properly works

15/10/19

Current Progress

Added sound pause in esc menu
Background parallax added for backgrounds
Tutorial level design fleshed out
Multiple level bug fixes
Fade to black bug fix added
Script and folder cleanup
Task tracker scaling

16/10/19

Current Progress

Achievement manager refactor
Tutorial to menu screen transition
Audio to ocean level
Popups only pop up upon first run
Tree counter and ocean counter is now dynamic
Animation for player started
Skip dialogue added
Text prompts for wrong rubbish added
Changed coral to net image

17/10/19

Current Progress

A lot of time spent merging to premaster
Achievements bug fixed (trash,oilspill)
Hiscore bug fixed
Collision bug on forest level fixed
Player name to hi score added
HUD scaling fixed
Added text when user tries to plant without water

20/10/19

Today:

Majority of the day was spent finishing off city level
Small bugs to do with fixed level design (easy, medium, hard)
Difficulty for ocean and multiplier for scoring
loading screen issue fixed
Pause screen control appears now