This project gives our team the opportunity to experience the processes, deliverables, tensions, joys, and frustrations of working on a game team in the professional world. Instead of a one-semester project, this project begins in the Spring of 2020 and concludes with another team in the Fall of 2020. Our team’s goal this semester is to create a clear and concise pre-production package to hand off for the next team to build.
Learning from the feedback we received from the previous year-long teams, we changed our approach from the previous year. Talking with a few members from the development team from the Fall of 2019, their issues with the pre-production package they were handed off can be summarized as follows:
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- The game’s scope was way too large for a 6 member team to create with a 3 month development cycle
- The pre-production package did not include any documentation of UX/UI design, making the team have to start from scratch
- The codebase from the prototypes in the first semester was almost completely unsalvagable, meaning that the programmers had to almost completely start over.
- The art and design documents they were given were unfinished and needlessly bloated, making it difficult for the Designer and Artists to parse through.
Our studio’s goal is to learn from the past mistakes the previous team made, and try to create a pre-production package that covers all areas that were not previously. To accomplish this, our goal is to create:
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- A white box prototype that showcases all major mechanics we believe to be essential to the core experience. This will be created with a code-base that will be detailed and organized well enough for the programmers next semester to immediately begin building on top of it.
- Concept art for all major characters and environments we expect to be necessary to create for the team.
- A clear and concise Design Document that details all design decisions made, and backing behind the direction we headed in.
Since scope was a huge issue with the previous game, we decided to take an iceberg approach to our development. We are creating a framework and outline for what would be a full game, while focusing in on only one piece of what would be the final product (similar to a Vertical Slice). We are building a white box prototype of what would be the climax of the experience, and expect the team next semester to finish what we started. This will help to narrow scope in hopes that there will be at least a piece of a game that is refined to a AAA quality.