ART
- Worked on level art assets & UI elements
- Collected valuable feedback from the second playtest at Trinity High School
DESIGN
- This week I finished building a prototype level for use at our second playtest at Trinity High School. I also worked closely with Akshay and Kshitij to make a system for giving players feedback on the pressure, temperature, and volume values of the gas inside our cylinders. How well this feedback system conveyed these values to players was what we were testing for this past Friday. We found that 100% of users could correctly identify the temperature feedback, 33% could correctly identify the pressure feedback, and 0% of testers correctly identify the volume feedback. My focus this week will be to build out most of the puzzles that will appear in the final product and continue to work with Kshitij and Akshay on getting the feedback for thermal variables as clear as humanly possible. This feedback is key to this project’s success as the gas laws are in essence a description of how pressure, temperature, and volume are related to each other in gas systems. Thus, students need to be able to clearly see how these variables are related and to do that good feedback is required. On the teacher outreach front I’ve been visiting many schools and learning about how they teach and how they incorporate technology into their classrooms. My skills as an orator and background in advertising have served me very well in these meetings as I have gotten most of the teachers/administrators very excited about the project. What is really needed now is cultivate the relationships we’ve made with teachers who we aren’t partnering with so that they can assume and advisory role on this project. This will allow us to continually gain insights into pedagogy, how games are used in the classroom, and how educational software is bought in a school setting.
PROGRAMMING
- Implemented a new camera waypoint system that allows Julian to create zones where the camera automatically zooms in and out to focus on puzzle sections.
- Added functionality for the player to zoom in and out
- Background size and different elements also scale with the camera
- Re-programmed the core system to use discrete values rather than continuous values.
- This required syncing the values of P, V or T based on the gas law being taught – Hopefully this symmetry will make the relationships between these quantities easier to understand for the player.
- Re-programmed the UI to reflect these states of the system
- Added a volume indicator which shows the volume level of the system
- Changed jump button to a sprite
PRODUCTION
- This week on the production end we had the last of our teacher outreach meetings at Avonworth Middle School. It has been interesting getting to meet different educators and school administrators and definitely a learning experience trying to decide how to proceed with partnerships and at what level. Julian is doing a great job at these meetings, and I feel we are getting better the more we meet with teachers. On Friday we had our second playtest, held by Julian and Kshitij at Trinity High School. Mr. Botzer has been extremely supportive and a large part of the design and development process so far, so we hope to keep him on board. As for me, remote production for this next week will be a challenge, but our pipeline and production practices have certainly settled down since the first few weeks and I am confident in the team’s ability to adapt to changes in plans and other unforeseen circumstances. I’m especially proud of my team this week, because it feels like everyone continues to be enthusiastic about the project and working well together. I couldn’t ask for a better team and I am so grateful for their support. I know I can trust each person to step up and do great work, not only in their individual disciplines but also to help out where the team needs it the most.