The past week I continued working on my build in the alpha channel. I created the OLP2018 channel and accidentally sent my alpha build up to that channel - I planned to NOT send my current alpha build to the OLP2018 channel until after my project was ready for review.
I finished up the AIML file edits last week and verified the bot's Kanienkeha dialect responses are relevant and the virtual keyboard is working properly. I really detest having a keyboard in the VR experience and want to add STT (Speech to Text) features to this project, but do not have the funds to make that happen yet.
I got the most tedious time consuming coding work completed for this project, so can move on to the game play mechanics. Now I'm focused on adding visuals, game objects and new scripts to my scene to help visitors learn how to Kanienkeha Satati with more confidence (speak Mohawk language dialects). I reviewed the most current Oculus dev documentation regarding rooms, matchmaking, parties and voip for integration. I enabled my app to support oculus rooms, voip and parties - tested with random people on facebook and super happy with the results.
Bartles Player Types: https://gamedevelopment.tutsplus.com/articles/bartles-taxonomy-of-player-types-and-why-it-doesnt-app...
I'm also planning out future online tutorials (adding to my work calendar) to show other developers how to add the Endangered Language Revival bots to their own Unity projects in the future for any Endangered Language - - languages that have no tech support nor tech foundation regarding ISO codes, dictionaries, keyboards, speech engines, etc.
I setup a new website for my OLP project for future promotions. I intend to have the VR Experiences correspond with physical location events in my community (Akwesasne Indian Reservation) and the tech workshop locations; so the website is important to have setup and functioning when my OLP project goes live.
This week is going to be another short update as I just got home from my vacation. I have a week and a half before heading off to Connect, so there's a lot I am planning to hit in that time.
The first thing on the list is to get a new build ready to submit for feedback. I have a few bugs to squash and some quests to re-order before I can do that. So far when I've had people try the prototype they've had a good reaction to the visuals, but have needed some cues in what to do. Since it's a prototype I don't want to put in a full tutorial system, but I've been adding some smaller indicators to help with this like "!" icons to guide the player through the delivery quests, and an intro scene to explain the basics.
Bub the Snail, Agnes the Inchworm, and Post the Snail
Lastly here's a gif of the completed characters for the prototype in their idle animations! Cheers everyone.
This week, my computer broke down so I lost a lot of work hours. I did manage to make a lot of progress earlier in the week so that's good! The In-game VR headset works now and transports you to the conveyor belt scene, and it looks like the image effect will work. I also implemented a lot of optimization tools (Combining meshes, Occlusion Culling, Automatically writing textures to an atlas and updating mesh UVs). I've been holding off on updating any UVs until the scene is more or less locked, since it's a bit of a pain to restore them afterwards (right now its reversible if all the meshes have been updated once. Any more than that/meshes that have each been updated an arbitrary amount and I'm not sure how to do it). I've also been messing around with volumetric lights that don't crash the Go, but that's low priority for the 7th.
Unfortunately I don't have access to any of the gifs I made this week. So instead here is a beautiful spreadsheet I worked on for today.
Looking at this. It looks like even with any setbacks, if I maintain my average pace, I will be alright for October 7th. I'm still going to try and pick up the pace to get something in for the 20th, and I'll also want to add more padding to that in order to make sure I don't miss any VRCs. It's kind of nice to have some extra time for housekeeping but I hope I get my PC back well enough before the 20th to get some much needed feedback on it.
Unfortunately I don't have access to any of the gifs I made this week. So instead here is a beautiful spreadsheet I worked on for today.
Looking at this. It looks like even with any setbacks, if I maintain my average pace, I will be alright for October 7th. I'm still going to try and pick up the pace to get something in for the 20th, and I'll also want to add more padding to that in order to make sure I don't miss any VRCs. It's kind of nice to have some extra time for housekeeping but I hope I get my PC back well enough before the 20th to get some much needed feedback on it.
Oh my God, I can't believe we are already on week 11!
This week we worked on the pitch and project description. It's quite hard to nail down the language for the description of VR game and all the examples that we got from the Game Center teachers are either for console / mobile games or for IRL games. However, I have some ideas and hopefully will be able to finish this week!
We also decided to meet with NYC Launchpad fellow for the playtesting session. We met on Saturday at the Game Center: me (Maria), Gordey, Ciera, Ryan and Hessvacio. It was very useful and I hope this meeting will help to improve everyone's game!
This week we worked on the pitch and project description. It's quite hard to nail down the language for the description of VR game and all the examples that we got from the Game Center teachers are either for console / mobile games or for IRL games. However, I have some ideas and hopefully will be able to finish this week!
We also decided to meet with NYC Launchpad fellow for the playtesting session. We met on Saturday at the Game Center: me (Maria), Gordey, Ciera, Ryan and Hessvacio. It was very useful and I hope this meeting will help to improve everyone's game!
Week 11 / Dev Blog Post
We decided to
develop out our storyline further to incorporate a new introduction in the
prototype and provide more details to the user.
OLP and this whole
process has really expanded our love of VR and the VR community.
Our goal with our project is to make a positive impact on the lives of others in a meaningful way and we cannot wait until it's ready!
We are getting down
to the final submission and it's exhilarating!
Week 11 - Woohoo!
- Revamped our logo
- Added new mechanics to the
prototype - Added new story line details
- Further user
testing and iteration
Keith Patterson
"Have a Beach-Tastic Week!"
Week 11:
Thank you so much Maria and Gordey for having Hess and I swing by the NYU Game Center to test out our prototypes! Ryan from Conjure Strike came by too. Such a wonderful Launch Pad Reunion 🙂
Got a lot of feedback that I am so excited to implement. These people know how to make VR amazing.
- Ciera
Oculus ID: Ciera_Jones
Instagram/Twitter/Facebook/Medium: @cieraej
Email: ciera.jones.cj@gmail.com
Website: cierajones.com
Thank you so much Maria and Gordey for having Hess and I swing by the NYU Game Center to test out our prototypes! Ryan from Conjure Strike came by too. Such a wonderful Launch Pad Reunion 🙂
Got a lot of feedback that I am so excited to implement. These people know how to make VR amazing.
- Ciera
Oculus ID: Ciera_Jones
Instagram/Twitter/Facebook/Medium: @cieraej
Email: ciera.jones.cj@gmail.com
Website: cierajones.com
Week 11: VR Sea Legs
Content Unlocked!
The Digital Lounge
This week we’ve unlocked the Digital Lounge - a place where you can kick back and relax. Anyone who’s finding themselves overwhelmed can lower their stress without removing the headset or leaving the experience. The goal here is to cease all motion and let our users just, you know… chill out, man.
Production Status:
This week we imported assets for the flight level of VR Sea Legs, ‘SpaceDragon First Flight’. You’ll be commanding a pair of dragon hatchlings, and they’re going to teach you how to fly. They want to make sure you love it!
We’ve been working on a pair of other VR projects - one of them an indie game developer who gave us the opportunity to help them develop a VR experience for their amazingly popular and outlandishly adorable game. They’ll be announcing it on the 18th, and I’m looking forward to sharing it with you!
The other project is a product demonstration application. Based on the NDA, that’s about all I can tell you.
Marketing:
We’ve been having a lot of fun with our new Mixed Reality recording studio. More calibrating, more equipment (a tripod, it turns out, is amazingly useful). We raised our lights, chased the cats out of the room, smoothed our backdrop, chased the cats out of the room, and chased the cats out of the room. After that, we started goofing off. First, we made a faux news report, complete with weather updates (note: it will be raining men, starting at about 10:30 pm).
Anyway, we also unleashed massive laser blasts from a pair of dragons.
Yes, it is a lot of fun.
One more unlock to go!
- 3lbGames