SkyIslands VR

[erica_layton]

Hello, from a world where islands float in the air, and an ancient guild of mages once lived, only to vanish. Clues about who they were and the ecological disaster they wrought can be found in the landscape. Your mission is to help restore balance, and set their ghosts to rest.

I'm actually a few months into the process of building the SkyIslands game. It's slow going, because I'm doing all parts of it myself:  game mechanics, 3D assets, coding, sound design--whatever is needed. I've also been doing various contract work on the side, but focussing as much time as I can afford to on this project, with the goal of publishing it for GearVR on the Oculus Store.

Participating in the Launchpad has given me the encouragement I needed to continue working towards my goals for this game!

So far, I've produced a demo. Here's a walkthrough, captured in GearVR. It's not very interesting yet: I'm currently re-writing the mythos for the world (Thanks to Bernie Yee for great advice!), out of which will flow stories, strung together with puzzles and games for the player.

VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ybZEH8c5I8

[akababa]

By the way, have you seen this? Maybe the particle treatment can be of some inspiration for your waterfalls? I have no idea how they designed this. https://vimeo.com/140057053

[erica_layton]

akababa said:

By the way, have you seen this? Maybe the particle treatment can be of some inspiration for your waterfalls?

That is amazing!!! I'm building my game for GearVR, so can't do anything so computationally expensive as clouds of voxels like that. Might be able to do some much simpler particle systems for things like waterfalls, though.

I chose to use floating islands for two reasons. One reason is that they are a fascinating magical concept to explore, that could not happen in real life. The other reason is a practical design choice for GearVR: islands allow for "open world" style level design, while reducing the number of polygons needed, and thus helping keep the frame rate up. From there, it follows that a system of teleportation is needed, since my player cannot fly.

Are you building for Rift?

[akababa]

I am aiming for Gear VR initially, then evolve onto Rift if I can. It is super challenging to have to make such compromise in the beginning for mobile VR but I think it's better to work at the lowest common denominator in some cases. Your point about the frame rate on the islands is good to hear, I was also thinking in my case it conceptually works if the viewer travels with Moki, they can "hold hands" or fly together - it just feels more conceptually clear there are distinctively different ecosystems. But honestly, I have NO IDEA what I'm doing graphically. Still doing my unity for VR course on udemay :smile:

[erica_layton]

SkyIslands Update: GDD

Here's a link to my (rough) game design doc. Feel free to leave comments, questions, suggestions, critiques! It's at a stage where I'll be doing major editing, to save time during dev.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1WDahF1nGw_kH2rqmteCm0KQ6P1jyy4qx_9nLwM4g_wg/edit?usp=sharing

Still brainstorming level design, and aesthetic... 
http://www.skyislandsvr.com/pages/redwooddusk.html
(click + drag to look around, WASD keys to move)

[NataliaVR]

Hi Erica,
Thanks for sharing about your process and design doc! Love to see how your project is progressing since I last tried it. Where did you get a template for that GDD? I am starting some new CG VR project design as well...

[erica_layton]

NataliaVR said:

Hi Erica,
Thanks for sharing about your process and design doc! Love to see how your project is progressing since I last tried it. Where did you get a template for that GDD? I am starting some new CG VR project design as well...

Hi Nathalie!

For the GDD, I used pretty much the same format as this guy:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RaRF4pjyK3U

[erica_layton]

More concept sketches for the "desert ghost towns" level, that will get revisited the most.

Not sure yet whether this scene will be encountered at night. That decision can come later, though... for now, got to focus on what goes into the upcoming demo.

[erica_layton]

Now that I have the GDD, what part of it would be best for the demo? 

The intro scene is a good starting point, because it can act as a proof-of-concept for the interactions between the Spirit Guide and the Player, as well as the Player's inventory system. I'll be spending most of the next couple of weeks in Unity, Blender, GarageBand, and possibly Fabric or FMOD. 

Question for @cybereality What is your suggestion for recording audio along with video capture in GearVR? It's important for my proof-of-concept to be able to hear the recording as well as see it!

[erica_layton]

USEFUL FOR DEMO VIDEOS:

For capturing audio as well as video from GearVR, this is what I did..

1) Run audio cable from phone to PC line in.
(Make sure it gets a signal by listening to stuff on my phone with headphones plugged into PC)

2) Open Audacity (free audio recording/editing software)
(Test recording audio from phone--playing anything with audio on the phone will work. Test volume.)

3) Open your app/build/demo (MUST have Universal Menu access) and hit the back button to enter uMenu. Start recording. Lower GearVR away from your face

4) GearVR will continue to record when away from face. Hit Record on Audacity. Return Gear to face, and playthrough/walkthrough/flythrough your experience!

5) Stop recording in the GearVR, and then hit Stop in Audacity.

6) Export audio in some convenient format, and edit back together with the video from your phone. I used mp3 format and iMovie --- don't have Final Cut Pro anymore 😞

Kind of fiddly, but it works! And now I can share the spatial audio with the footage :wink:
(use headphones, please!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHUxIb2fLFg&feature=youtu.be


..I've been working on some new stuff, and will share a video soon.

[Anonymous]

Good point on the sound, I just overlaid some music with mine last time around, but maybe I'll go cord hunting to grab the analog from the headphones.

I very much want to play your game, I love this aesthetic, I'm sure I probably said so before, but it's true.

For everyone else's benefit, adding the universal menu is as easy as downloading the Oculus Utilities for Unity 5 and adding the OVRPlatformMenu script to any Unity object.