10 Questions

So what did you think of the assignments?
I found the assignments fun and interesting, as I learnt more than expected. I found that most of the assignments were very similar yet very different, which helped me create the games as I had already learnt some stuff about it.

How would you rate the assignments in terms of difficulty?
The assignments were surprisingly easier than expected, with more maths and code involved I expected it to be much more challenging. I began to actually enjoy the coding at some level as it can make your game very cool.

An example of a subject I have learnt
For example the platform game had to contain gravity, which I had no idea on how to place it, with some little research I found how to code it, and since then I have been doing the same technique to all my games that involve gravity. In this game I also learnt how to make enemies and to to animate them which was fun.

In the Space Invader game, name one thing you learned during its development.
In Space Invaders I learnt to place cool effects such as an explosion, by using the drag and drop technique. I also learnt how to get enemies to fire and to have a health bar.

In the maze game name one thing you learned during its development.
In the maze game I learned how to animate players and enemies, I also learnt how to use the "control" which all the game needs for it to function correctly.

Did you learn any maths during this experience? These assignments?
I don't think I learned any new maths skills during the experience, as it was basic maths that were involved.

How do you rate your maths?
Okay I guess

How hard did you find the maths during these assignments?
I found the maths very basic

Do you think your opinion's towards maths has changed?
Nope

Do you think you gained any maths when you did any puzzles for the maze game?
No, as the maths I placed in that game I knew.

BTEC Extended Diploma in Games Development
  

Assignment 2; Creating and applying sounds to a video game

Unit 73: Sound for Computer Games

"Space Invaders": Sound effects (5)

"Brain box" (Maze Game): Soundtrack applied (Loops)

"Food catch" (Platform): Soundtrack applied (Loops)

The Plan: (Space Invaders)

The sounds are recorded as Mono then edited to Stereo.

The game will be Space Invaders.

The platform should be for computers so the sounds would be recorded using MP3

The sounds wanted: The death, collectible, win, next level, explosion, alien, spaceship, NASA.

The voice for the aliens would just have the pitch, tone and echo changed.

The soundtrack would either be a simple wind affect or a soundtrack that I would create.

Plan: (Platform game) If the sound effects were placed.

Stereo, Platform, Character sounds, enemy sounds, collectibles, death, next level,

Character (Man) the sound recorded: eating, odd remarks, death

Collectibles (food) the sound recorded: activates sound of player eating.

Death (collision with body builder/health inspector) the sound recorded: (voice) “darn it” “nooo!”

Next level the sound recorded: (voice) “mm more food” or door opening

Enemy (health inspector) (voice) “no, you’re not eating that” (body builder) “Stop!”

(Time) voice recording first, then environment recording second.
Soundtrack done after sounds are recorded.
Applying sounds.
Then record gameplay. 

Two soundtracks: 

This will be placed in my platform game and the space invaders.

The platform game would have a good and jolly atmosphere with high and medium tones. The sounds should be a mix of free copyright sounds and music.

The space invaders would have a gradual increase in sound when in combat and a higher level. The game could also contain the original soundtrack for "Space invaders" at the end of the game which would be edited. The sounds would be edited using "Audacity".

(Soundtracks are placed on a loop and are Stereo.

(Most of the sounds needed for the games are voice recordings).

  

Soundtrack 1: (For Platform)

These sounds that I placed in and edited with are all copyright free sounds. 

In editing I used:

Crop, cut, move, fade in, fade out, pitch, stereo, sounds (High/low), mono (which ear), 

9 tracks 

Last's for 6 minutes and is on a loop. 

Soundtracks: (Original)

Fade

Force

Fire burst

blank 

The first track was "Fade" this was cropped and placed at the beginning. With "symbolism" fading in then fading out just before the next track. "Force" was the track that continued the sounds with a fade in, so that it built up the atmosphere. Just before half way I place the bigger version of "symbolism" that was changed in pitch to be a little higher and the tone to be louder. This track also has fade in and out to join the next track. The track "fire burst" had no additional edits except cut and crop. Mid in between the track I placed a sound of a man saying "yeah" which I thought went well with the sounds. "Firefly" was next and had similar edits i.e. fade in/ out and had "force" in between when the sound got lower. I took a small part out of "miles away" which helped continue the sound for the other opening track. which was the same track that finished the previous.

This is a gamble for the this platform game, due to the sounds not being related to any group of sounds or genre.

This is a video of gameplay with the soundtrack enabled.

The game was changed to Shape man game which I feel makes the soundtrack more suitable due to the fast paste movement. The other platform was originally the game that would of had the soundtrack however the gameplay of that platform isn't great.
Next time I would create this piece of sounds that will go very well with the game, and try not to do to much of originality on a soundtrack that im gambling on to work well with the type of game.
However I do feel the soundtrack itself was okay and that it would of been better if I had a more suitable game for it.


This is the full soundtrack without gameplay

The last part of the track was edited before recording to make an echo so that in gameplay the sounds don't suddenly change to another track.
The edits made it seem that the beginning was joined with the end which worked well.

Due to it being such a long soundtrack, I wasn't able to record the gameplay for that long because the game is short.

"ALL SOUNDS ARE COPYRIGHT FREE"

Project rate (Hz) 41000

Soundtrack 2: (For "Brain box"-Maze game)

Tools used:

Pitch, echo, fade, copy, crop, cut, paste, import, export, volume, pitch, speed, duplicate, 

Project rate (Hz) 32000

The steps to making this track was very similar to the first soundtrack I made. With the move, crop and copy tool it helped me moved certain sounds in places which I thought went well.
This sound isn't like the first and takes a similar root to what platform soundtracks sound like. The sound placed at the end suddenly drops in volume which doesn't require me to use fade. At the beginning I used fade in which helped the end of the soundtrack link with the beginning.

Applying sounds:
Original sound: Fan

The sound was changed using a range of tools for example the pitch was increased to give the sound a more futuristic and robotic effect. When this was changed I edited the length (cropped) so that the effect of the (bullet) doesn't seem silly when applied. Due to the amount of bullets that are going to be shot at once, the volume of the bullets are turned down dramatically, while also making the effect of a fade out, The effect of the "fade out" isn't gradual compared to normal and i wanted a fast ending of the shot without completely removing all the sound.
originally, I thought it would be very cool to use this sound effect on a generator or laser, however I wanted the effect to go with the shot, because it would be unique as most shots sound the same in video games.

Original sound: Voices
The sound was an error in one of the recordings, however I decided to keep the recording and edit the sound so that it could be used for the aliens in the game. The sound was cropped at the beginning and at the end as most of the wanted sounds were in the center.

I highlighted the areas I no longer needed and removed them using the cut tool.
The pitch was increased to give the same wanted affect as the first sound, yet had no fade in or fade out edited in it. I placed a simple echo in the sound which you can barely hear as I don't want it to remove the effect of the aliens.

Versions: I decided to use this effect for all the different alien types. The first version was changed in speed by a percentage of -14.000 This gave a similar effect to the original edited version that I did, yet has a more deeper and slower sound effect, which I want to use for my larger enemy.
Version 2: The only thing I decided to change for this version was by reversing the sound so that it was backwards. This made the sound effect sound rather different compared to the last version.

And saved me time when editing, this also gives a cool effect that they make different noises.

Original sound: burp
This sound was going to be used for a zombie game that I had in mind, however I decided to change some settings and edit where necessary to make it sound good. Firstly, I copied the sound and repeated it four times. Each individual sound had a space in between them to give an effect like an alarm.
Then I used the fade out tool for the sounds, which gave the basic idea on what I wanted the sound to sound like. Then I changed the speed and tempo of the sound the speed was increase by 153% and the tempo by 15%. This is placed on a loop until the player kills all enemies or if the asteroid is destroyed.    

This is the image after the editing was completed.

The black lines are where I can merge the sound tracks together, however I decided to leave it because of the gaps I want in the sound effect.

Original sound: voice recording (blowing)
This sound was wanted to make a wind effect within the game, so that it doesn't seem quite and that the gameplay seems always active, which makes it seem more realistic. The sound was copied then placed after the sound which then were merged together. The sounds had to be edited using fade in/out so that the tracks don't suddenly sound like it has changed in pitch dramatically.
This will be placed in the controller with a chance of 1-500 which means that the sound wont always be happening.    

Original sound; paper
This sound was all cut except a small piece that i took and edited with the pitch and speed, this is going to be used for the sound of my bullet in gameplay.

Extra sounds: Wind
This was edited and cropped and to last half a second with the pitch decrease and the speed increased.

Original sound: voice
This was edited to a high pitch which made it sound like a baby crying. This gave me an idea to make the sound appear when a alien baby is created.
The Sprite would be changed to a small alien instead of a bullet, however it still behaves like one, this is to make the sounds more suitable.

(When activated) This sound happens when the bullet gets reflected by the enemy boss, the bullet turns into a small alien that makes this sound effect.
In this image you can see the edits of fade in and out. The fade out is more important, as its leaves the area (room) of the game, which makes it more realistic.


Video of Gameplay with sounds (Level 1 and Level 6 show)

Level 1: Sounds (Player-shot, enemy-shot, wind, explosion,)
Level 2: Sounds (Enemy boss noise)

Overall:
The Sound effects were exported out of "Audacity" then placed into (Game-maker) Space Invaders is the game that contained the 5 sound effects, which I think went okay, I understand that most of the sounds are not very unique to others, however my favorite effect was the bullet collision with the boss, I think that went really well. Next time I would record most of the sounds with a mic if I did this game again, due to most of the effects being voice acting.
The First soundtrack (Shapeman) was a big improvement to the original idea that I had with the platform game. The soundtrack looked as if the game was a similar speed.
The Second soundtrack (brainbox) was much more suitable for the game and made it really cool effect. The effect is slow and has a classic feel towards it which made the gameplay more enjoyable and helps the math game more fun.

Space Invaders

Space Invaders

Plan:
I have decided to do Space Invaders instead of Blackjack due to me knowing my skill set. I didn't know how you played blackjack and I knew that most but all of the making of that game would be code, and I knew that Space Invaders would be less challenging with code and that it would be more to do with art.
The idea that I have for the game is to make it completely different from the classic yet keeping its key features (function of game) and then half way through (6 levels in total) would contain the classic sprites (enemy).
I wanted to design a futuristic design of a background, and then a simple black background for the ending.
I also want to add a boss that doesn't get destroyed and doesn't attack except reflect bullets that the player fires so it acted more like a support unit.
I want two different designs of the future aliens and two different designs for the classic aliens.
(Spr-alien 1) looks like a turret that fires at a chance of 1-500 and a alien that looks like its in a UFO which has a fire chance of 1-250
The classic aliens have different colours (green and white)

Sprites
Alien-1

 This is the first sprite, this was created to look like a turret and to act like one. The animation will spin every time it shoots. This also goes red in colour before it fires.
The reason for this animation is that the player will know and expect the shot.

The Sprite is the smallest of all the enemies and for that reason is has less detail.



Alien-2


This enemy was created using Gamemaker but in a bigger size format. This gave me the chance to make edits I wanted then I made a smaller size version with the same detail, to give the effect.
The animation to this sprite is that the alien and the top part of the sprite went down with it.
The fire at the bottom chances so it looks more realistic.

This effect happens every 30 seconds.




Classic alien-1

This sprite doesn't have any animations and has the same function as the original games sprites.
The bigger version of this sprite has the same function except has more health and fires more often.




Classic alien-2


This is a different colour to the first to show the difficulty difference. Because this isn't the original colour it keeps my game my own style.
This has the same function as the first.




Background

I designed this using a variety of different paint tools.
I first placed random layers of paint and filled them in, in light blue going purple, I then blurred the colours together so it doesn't look cut and then used "58" paint tool to give the effect shown. I then added in the alien I created and then blurred inwards to give a grass feel at the bottom.
Other edits followed
(Colours changed and more stars (white dots) added to give the effect of distance.


Second version

This background is for the classic part of the game. I removed the layers that I designed the other background with and filled it white a black background, and left the alien there.
The alien was hardly noticeable which made me have to increase the colour (green) so that it would standout. I also wanted to give the effect that it was fading in the darkness, so I painted over the ends of the alien and painted over it, with the flow decreased to 38% so that it doesn't look like someone has just thrown paint on it.



Object

Obj_wall
The wall's sprite size was edited to 16, so that it was half of what the original size was so it wouldn't seem that something random is blocking the players way.
The sprite doesn't have any design and was left after editing size.
Then the sprite was given commands ("drag and drop") so that no player or enemy could go through it

The Obj_boss was changed in size when first created and imported into game-maker, due to it being much larger than intended.

Obj_player has the most commands (code/drag and drop) which makes this object one of the most important. This object contains the code for the movement, lives, shots and effects. The V2_player also contains most but all of the same code as its used as another life for the player.

Obj_enemy also contains some of the code that the player used but edited in ways which doesn't relay on certain buttons being pressed

Second player:
This is another sprite which is for the same player, the function of this object is exactly the same when movement and collision is involved. I wanted the player to have lives, however I wanted to have some originality, so I designed another sprite similar to the first, yet increased in size to make it harder. When the player is killed the rock in the left part of the screen will blow up and it would contain the other object which it allows you to control.
The problems:
Basic error codes when trying to control the other object. I fixed the problem without code and used the drag and drop technique, (when collide with "enemy_bullet" destroy player and rock) and then added a simple command to change object when killed.
Death when spawn. When the player died the enemies were already on the other side where the player spawns again, which doesn't give the player a chance. I fixed the problem with invisible walls that makes the enemies only travel where the player can shoot, this fixed the original problem with instant death, but it also fixed a problem that I didn't intend, when the walls were not there it gave the chance for the enemies to evade the shoots and cause the player to struggle when killing the aliens.

Effects
When the Obj_player, V2_player, and the Obj-rock are destroyed the effect is an explosion which gives a grey effect.
The enemies on the other hand have "Smoke up" as the effect to give a different feel when taking out aliens. The sizes of the effects are determined by the size of the object in game. An example is the third level, as it contains two different alien objects that have the same effect yet different sizes, this is to give a more realistic feel for the game.
I decided to use the effect of "Smoke up" because it makes the death of the aliens look as if the aliens travelling when they are not.
(I decided not to make the aliens go down due to the game already being difficult as it is).

When bullets are reflected by the enemy boss the bullets change object and turn to a similar sprite but red.

The player doesn't continuously move when no key is active which makes the game much more easier for the players.
Maybe next time it would be enabled and if so I would have to change the bullet rate chance to be lowered it would be more fair.

Functions

Boss:
The Boss is on the last level (level 6) the boss is seen through out the game by being placed on the background. This was intended to make consumers excited and wonder if the alien in the background would be the boss. I had many ideas for the boss to be strong and powerful, yet I wanted to keep it different from the original, so I made it become a support unit. The alien doesn't die and doesn't fire back, yet makes the last level difficult. The alien reflects any bullets that the player has shot at the boss and fires at a much faster rate.(Problem: difficult to notice enemy shots) I decided to make the reflected bullets different and made them red with the same design which gave a nice effect. The boss also hides the aliens behind it which results the player to wait for an available hit, as the last level is more about slow and careful decisions. With a large amount of aliens on the level it makes it very difficult as the player has to make the decision on if they want to play slow and careful or fast but dangerous.
If I did this again I would keep the idea of reflecting bullets but instead place suicide alien bugs that are used as bullets.

Video of gameplay. (All levels)