Break's coming

Oh yes. Thanksgiving break is finally here~! I'm so happy to have a week off from school, but I still have to be thinking about my game in the meantime. As far as my own progress for it, I'm not entirely thrilled - I missed last class so I didn't start the paper prototype with everyone else, and I'm kind of afraid to do it on my own. I also have to look up some stuff so I know what I'm doing is right. (Although I kind of doubt that going to college would teach the way I'm setting up the game, but I don't think they care that you go exactly by the book on this stuff.) But so far everything else is pretty tip-top. Globaloria is getting a little more stressful, but our teacher warned us of this, so at least I knew it was coming.
Hopefully when we come back I'll have the paper protoype set up for what I need to get done and we can start to learn how to make this game.
I still think my team name is kind of lame, but that's okay too. Mr. Allder said we should have a link to our team page, so here ya go. I've also not really attempted to draw anything in flash yet, which worries me since the tools on it are not quite what I'm used to (MS Paint, iscribble.net, muro on deviantArt). Everything is more confusing, but I guess I'll just have to practice with it just like I had to with those.

Planning My Game

Unfortunately, our teacher isn't here, so our assignment now is to write another blog post on how we plan to create our game. Here is a picture of that link from the last post I made to that drag-and-drop dress-up game:

As far as strengths and weaknesses in flash go, I'm not too sure about them yet because we've used it so little. I've had a little experience with layers via computer art programs, but this is a different ball game. However I think I did pretty well with figuring out the coding, at least the simple steps we were given, so I'm confident once I know what code does which action I'll be fine (: If I'm as good with coding as I think I could be, I could try to help around the class for those who're confused about it. Um.. A weakness might be that I'd have to draw everything (the character, the clothes and whatnot, the background, etc. ...). I've drawn on the computer with a ball mouse (and currently trying to figure it out with a touchpad) but not much with a laser mouse, which seems a lot more difficult.

Again, obviously, my game isn't going to be full-out girly like the one above. There will be a variety of character designs to make, not just a simple fashion-day thing.

Although I'm still a bit edgy about it, I'm anxious to start trying to make this game work.

Oh yes! We're also supposed to come up with a name and a picture for our teams... I'd been hoping for someone else to do this, since I don't think I'm very good with that, but most of us are one-person teams so... I guess my team will be called Epic Flying Squirrel (Even I'm like "What?" But it sounds funny so eh. -shrug-)

Look at that squirrel! Ain't he epic?

Thinking about our games

We're really starting to delve into what our ideas about our flash games should be about, how they will look, etc. My idea is to use a flash game to teach the job of a concept artist. In it the player will be able to basically dress a "naked" doll up using drag and drop on the hair, clothes, accessories, and so forth. However, it isn't just a free "pick what you want" deal - there will be a teacher who will assign the player a specific description of who they want the character to be. For instance, if the player were assigned to make a pirate character, they wouldn't be able to make it a scientist character without consquence. The character won't have to be exactly as described (e.i. instead of just giving the pirate the proper attire, you could give him a funny hat, a lot of piercings, a parrot or a cat, etc.) but as I said before, if it isn't even close to the same idea you won't be able to progress farther in the game. The player will learn how to collaborate on ideas, learn what colors and patterns would go together (lighter and darker shades of red go better together than bright oranges and darker blues, plaid doesn't mix with stripes), and that being a concept artist isn't always easy, sometimes the character designs are later changed or altered. It's not really targeted to any specific age group, as a dress up game can be fun (and this one isn't just a simple girly dress-up-barbie-your-way deal!). Hopefully I can put this idea together and it will be enjoyable for everyone~