20 – 26 April, 2015:

During soft opening on Monday, the faculty stopped by our room to play our game.  There were several issues with bugs that we added to our bug tracker to fix this week.  The rest of the week was dedicated mainly to QA, bug fixes and continuous UI iteration.  Hilman fixed bugs on the server side and implemented new UI from Hannah and Wei.  Sam reduced the app size to import art assets, and added background music for the whole app.

Meanwhile, as things wrap up for the semester, Hannah has been working on the 3 minute and 30 second videos.  She met with Vasso this week to conduct interviews for the video and edited together footage from our playtests, demo, and project work to create videos that would describe our project and be a tool for Vasso to promote the app.

We also had the opportunity to have a playtest on Wednesday, and found out there were some places where the kids had trouble, such as understanding the “make a wish” scene would grant more items for customisation.  Thus, we made some changes to the Lending Hearts star and separated the wishing volcano and leaderboard to clarify the contribution aspect of the game.  We also made the UI brighter, with more visible buttons, as a result of this playtest.

Next week, we hope to work together to have documentation, an updated website and a postmortem for the project in time for softs online.  Ruchi will be accountable for organising our team archive.  Programmers will continue to work on bug fixes and Hannah will create the final versions of our videos based on our advisers’ feedback.  We are looking forward to the ETC Spring Showcase on Thursday 30 April and then will start preparing for our final presentations the following week.

13 – 19 April, 2015:

We chose to focus our final week before softs on constellations and customisation aspects of the app.

For the constellations game, work was done on the opening screen, directions to draw and being able to visit the gallery afterwards.

For planet customisation, more than 200 unique art assets were added to the pool of available items to be unlocked.  The customisation UI was tweaked yet again, with a new bar for adding name and description of the planet.

Our last playtest at the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh was the first chance we were able to test the visit scene, and kids seemed to enjoy seeing other planets and got inspiration for decorating their own.

We also began some other work for client handoff and softs online.  Wei created three concepts for the app logo, from which Vasso and the board selected one.  Hannah began work pulling footage for the 30 second and 3 minute videos from our playtests, and writing interview questions for Vasso to answer.  Cheryl-Jean began the conversation about the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) for apps for kids with the legal representative from Lending Hearts.

For soft opening, Sam got the updated visit scene and gifting functionality ready, and a build combining his and Hilman’s work on the constellations game, customisation and UI is ready to be presented to the faculty on Monday morning.

6 – 12 April, 2015:

For week 12, we chose to focus on the Lending Hearts Star, hoping to have a complete experience loop

The week started with our sixth playtest of the semester on Monday, at the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh.  We were able this time to get more children in our target audience, as well as a teenager who was able to understand the contribution loop and provide some feedback for the UI.  Feedback from the playtest informed our work for the week.

Hannah is working on the promotional videos for our project.  She also created the effects and feedback for the wishing volcano this week, and glow effects for the Lending Hearts star.  In addition to preparing for playtests, designers Wei and Ruchi are working on the UI portions including tutorials.  In the coming weeks, Hannah, Wei and Ruchi will all be contributing art assets for the customisation game.

Hilman added updates to the Lending Hearts star surface, and worked on the galaxies and solar system screens to get them linked correctly in the experience loop.  Sam has worked extensively on the backend for the contribution loop this week, and helped troubleshoot and solve bugs.  The main task for programmers this week was to create the final scene we needed, the “Visit” scene, and lock the playtest build for next Monday by Friday.  The online task management through our bug tracking system was well-received and is useful for establishing dependencies, blockages and deadlines.

We have also started to consider plans for publication and archiving, as well as getting a clear idea for what the final project will look like.  Cheryl-Jean has a plan and schedule in place with our listed priorities, and this week, Wei and Hannah have been organising our folders and asset names to prepare for archiving.  We spoke with Vasso during our client meeting about requirements for app publishing, and hope to get started on the first steps and logos this coming week.

Our upcoming work for week 13 will include completing our videos and preparing for soft openings.  Our work will focus on the constellation and customisation parts of the experience.  we have our final playtest on Monday and intend to spend much of next week polishing and fixing bugs, as well as considering semester end goals and documents.

 

30 March – 5 April, 2015:

We have entered the finalisation phase of our project, and much of the final weeks will be focused on polish (especially UI) and refinement of what we already have in place.  Each week until softs, we will focus on a different component of the project.  This week, we will be looking at the whole user experience and thinking about the player’s journey through the Lending Hearts universe.  In week 12, we will focus on the galaxies, solar system and Lending Hearts star, and in week 13, we will return to the core gameplay of the constellations and customisation games.

Production shifted a little this week and Cheryl-Jean implemented some process changes.  First of all, we are now using digital task management through our bug tracking system, logging tasks that come up from playtests and meetings.  Additionally, we met every day this week to go over the different scenes, screens and tutorials we need for the whole experience, walking through a part of the player’s journey each day, creating paper versions of each layout and logging tasks based on that.  These paper layouts answered many design questions and filled in some gaps in knowledge, ensuring everyone is on the same page.

As for project progress, Wei designed the function and navigation for the gallery, wishing volcano and solar system, and Ruchi created tutorial and help screens.  Hannah focused on UI for the solar system and visit scenes.  Hilman implemented gallery functionality and made updates to the solar system scene, which now allows planets to be selected and information to be shown.  Finally, Sam worked on the backend system for the wishing volcano and unlocking items, as well as loading screens, toolbars and help buttons.

On Friday, we had our fifth playtest which took place at the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh.  As it was our first time there, we had a little trouble approaching kids of the right age group and setting up the playtest.  This playtest taught us a lot about what worked and what didn’t in the UI since we were testing with younger kids, and also informed our future playtests at the Children’s Museum.  With a better, more complete build and a clearer plan for our next playtest on Monday, we hope to improve on our playtesting process and effectiveness.

 

After covering the whole experience this week, we want to narrow it down to the Lending Hearts Star next week, focusing on the gallery, newsboard and wishing volcano scenes and the galaxies and solar system.  We are thinking ahead about what we will need to finish by the end of the semester for a complete experience, and prioritising features as such.  Finally, we will continue playtesting with two more visits to the Children’s Museum to learn more about how we can improve the experience we are building.

22 – 29 March, 2015:

With the semester’s end looming and a long list of features that we’d still like to implement, this week was a challenge to complete our production phase and lock features so we can have some time to finalise and polish.

Ruchi and Wei prepared extensively for ETC playtest day, devising a system to test the contribution loop using physical tokens and a plastic cup in lieu of the wishing volcano system that the programmers would not have implemented in time.

On the production end, Cheryl-Jean has organised the final three playtests this semester at the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh, to occur once a week until softs.  These will occur on the 3rd, 6th and 13th of April.  We are also starting to get more diligent about logging bugs for programmers to make the experience smoother.

This week, our prioritised user stories were contribution, unlocking, newsboard, gallery, friends, leaderboard.  However, we will work on them in order of priority in order to ensure that the final features are bug-free and polished, and it is likely that we will modify or integrate the lower priority items into what we can make, or leave them for the future, keeping the goals of companionship and creativity in mind.  On the programming end, Sam is taking the lead on the backend systems for contribution and unlocking, while Hilman is in charge of the newsboard and gallery.

Hannah has been working on UI for the customisation game and visual feedback for the constellations game as per feedback from the Lending Hearts feedback.  On Monday, the team gathered to go over feedback from our previous playtest and determine next steps for this Saturday.

Saturday was the ETC playtest day where we playtested with sixteen kids ranging from 7 – 12 years old.  While the contribution loop seemed engaging, we realised we had to explain a lot to the players as they went through the experience, making UI our biggest hurdle to tackle in the coming weeks.

We have a better idea of the realities of scope now and are consistently narrowing down our concept to better fit the goals of the project.  Next week we will focus on walking through the user experience, delineate granular tasks for each team member, and put a heavy emphasis on the UI.

Below are some photos from ETC playtest day.

Here are some constellations and planets made by playtesters.

16 – 22 March, 2015:

Much of this week was devoted to our halves presentation on Wednesday.  We refined and iterated on our slides, and Hilman prepared to show a live demo.  Wei did a good job of tying together the vision and making all the slides look polished.  In our halves presentation, we wanted to show the vision and direction of our project, our progress with our product, and what changes we had made based on quarters feedback.  We were happy that Vasso and Mary Nell were able to join us at the ETC for our halves presentation.

Towards the end of the week, final touches were made on the constellations and customisation parts of the experience and Ruchi made a plan for the Lending Hearts playtest.  Cheryl-Jean coordinated the Lending Hearts visit on Saturday 21 March, and set up playtest sessions with three other ETC teams that volunteered their time: Cat Scratch, Legato and Stratos.  The families were also brought on a tour around the ETC and met Anthony Daniels who was kind enough to say hello, which was a highlight for many.

During the Lending Hearts playtest, we addressed some issues focusing on gameplay and UI for the constellations game.  Additionally, there was some confusion about the controls for the customisation part of the experience.  Based on this, we have come up with tasks to refine the UI and test different controls, to be implemented for our next playtests.

We enter our final week of production focusing on big picture features, such as unlocking content, gifting to friends and contribution to the Lending Hearts star (Sam).  Additionally, we look to implement the newsboard and gallery on the Lending Hearts star surface (Hilman).  Hannah will be working on UI for planet customisation and visual feedback for the constellation game, including the art for the new “black hole” feature that reduces the number of stars.  Ruchi will be working on constellation UI and preparing for our next playtest on Saturday 28 March, and Wei will be designing the overall system and creating art for it.  Cheryl-Jean will be planning for future playtests as well as QA and logging bugs.

There is a lot to do in the last stretch of the semester and we are constantly managing our scope and thinking ahead.  We are confident we can deliver a final product.

2 – 8 March, 2015:

With Hilman, Sam, Cheryl-Jean and Wei away for Game Developers Conference in San Francisco, Ruchi and Hannah held the fort at the ETC this week.

On the design front, we are starting to focus on the big picture over the individual parts.  Ruchi’s work included designing the login and tutorial and creating UI elements for the constellations game.  Wei worked on the design for the unlocking and reward system.

In programming, Hilman implemented the “whack-a-star” gameplay to replace the previous “memory” design for the constellations mini game, which came from playtesting feedback that showed that many kids were impatient to wait to see the whole sequence of stars before clicking them.  He also added Cheryl-Jean’s sound effects and created a layout for the shop.  Sam implemented the colour changing and UI scrolling for customisation, as well as a field for players to input a description of their planet.

Hannah’s work has been to create the final art and layout for galaxies and solar system.

Cheryl-Jean has been finalising details for the Lending Hearts playtest day on Saturday 21 March, including coordinating tours and visits to other project teams for the families, as well as planning future playtests for the rest of the semester.

Next week is Spring Break, so with Sam and Cheryl-Jean away, the team will continue to work and prepare for our halves presentation.  Working remotely is not optimal but we hope to continue progressing on our project while keeping everyone in the loop, and have provided Vasso with a client update in lieu of a meeting this week.

23 February – 1 March, 2015

Stellar 6 was very touched to be invited to the Lending Hearts Gala on 26 February, and coming into contact first hand with the community that Vasso has built really hit home the importance and meaning of what we are making this semester.  We had a great time at the gala and it gave us a deeper sense of what we can hope to give, or how we too can lend our hearts, through our project.

Much of this week’s work was centred around the customisation component of the experience.  While Hilman began working on the login and server, Sam implemented many features for planet customisation: dragging items, inventory, and a new scaling/rotation control, to name a few.  This was supported by Ruchi, Wei and Hannah, who together created more than 50 assets for planet customisation in just this one week.

Ruchi and Wei attended the “Playtest to Prove” workshop on Wednesday, and Cheryl-Jean put plans together for our playtest on Friday at Elizabeth Forward School District.  Through Dr. Keruskin, we were able to meet with five kids from Central Elementary on Friday 27 February, who played our customisation and constellation games.  We soon pinpointed specific issues with the gameplay and UI in the constellation game, and narrowed in on the kids’ motivation to draw in the customisation game, all of which will inform our design changes in the weeks to come.

16 – 22 February, 2015:

Hilman, Sam, Hannah, Wei and Cheryl-Jean were happy to join Lending Hearts on a tour of Phipps Conservatory, on Sunday.  It was great to get to talk to the kids and also get a feeling for what the monthly events are like, so that we could think more about how to connect these to the design of our experience.

 

This week’s work was finishing up the constellations mini-game with the game design elements, completing the Lending Hearts home star navigation, and getting started on the customisation for personal planets.  We started mid-week meetings where everyone shows what they are working on and what they’ve made.  In addition, Sam showed the team how to use bug control and version tracking to test the current Unity build, and Cheryl-Jean showed the team how to comment and tag issues in Google docs, which the designers are expected to use to respond to the team’s queries in the design document to make it as comprehensive as possible.

Some of our work done this week included:

 

On Friday, we had a chance to not only show these new features to the client, but have our first (unofficial) playtest.  Vasso’s kids Nina, Stephen and Eirene came to the meeting and were excited to draw their own planet and play with the constellations game on the mobile devices and look at the customisation options we had on the computer.  We got a lot out of this playtest, including some great art that now hangs in our project room, and we are happy to have had the chance to see kids interact with our game.  We also talked more about the goals of the project and how the features linked back to our core values of creativity and companionship.

 

Next week will be focused on playtesting, including a “Playtest to Prove” workshop on Wednesday and a playtest session at Elizabeth Forward School District on Friday.  One of our challenges will be coming up with a strategy and plan for our first official playtest.  We will also need to balance this with completing the work that needs to be done and assets that need to be created for the customisation of the personal planets, and getting the constellations game to full functionality with the latest design.  We are also looking forward to the Lending Hearts Gala on Thursday evening.  It’s going to be a busy week.

 

9 – 15 February, 2015:

With a direction in mind at last, we spent a solid amount of time on Monday overhauling our previous project backlog and writing new user stories for the project as it is now.  For this week’s sprint, we focused on three user stories, regarding the constellations mini-game, the navigation menu and the Lending Hearts home star.  By the end of the sprint on Monday morning, we hope to have these items completed.

Our quarters walkaround occurred on Wednesday afternoon, and we received feedback and questions about our project.  There are still concerns about scope and scalability, as well as the large age range, which we will try to address over the course of the project.

By Friday, Hilman had put together a prototype for the constellation mini-game and Sam had put together a prototype for the navigation map of the galaxies, which we showed to our client.  Wei has completed art assets for the constellation mini-game and Hannah has created the backgrounds for the constellation mini-game and the galaxy navigation menu.

Drawing constellations mini-game prototype:

 

Galaxy navigation map prototype:

This Sunday, we will be joining Lending Hearts for their excursion to Phipps Conservatory.  Cheryl-Jean is also working on organising a tour for the Lending Hearts families to the ETC for 21st March.

Our next backlog items for the coming week include the planet customisation and login systems, once we have the mini-game, navigation menu and Lending Hearts home star.  We hope to test what we have every week and iterate on the design and components.