This last semester at UVU I got to work with twelve other students in DGM 3610 to bring together a game in about 4 months. None of us had ever really worked on a project like this before, so we didn't really know where to begin. Many of us had had our first exposure to the Unity game engine the semester before where we each created our own small game, but this was a different story altogether.
We brainstormed together and came up with a basic premise and storyline for the game and jumped in. In retrospect, we all agree that we should have spent a lot more time developing the game play and fleshing out the game docs before we ever opened Maya or Unity. Despite an overly anxious sprint out of the gate, there was a lot of excitement and we found a good chemistry between classmates. After dozens of re-designs and script resets, we have reached a point where we can be proud of what we have!
We decided to take our game to the Utah Indie Games Night in April to get a little more feedback on how we could improve what we have. The event was hosted by React Games in Taylorsville and we had a great time getting to know other indie developers in the area who were working on projects of their own. It was a great opportunity to share ideas and get some honest criticism to get us on track to a better game. (Greg Squire, coordinator of Utah Indie Games and owner of Monkey Time Software sums up April's IGN here)
Classes have now ended, but most of the class is still anxious to work on Skylantis. We have a LOT of work left to do if we want to turn any heads, but many of us have decided to invest more time over the summer to squash out bugs and refine our content. I'll be sure to post here with any big updates. (You can also follow the class blog here)
My role in this game was as a coder. I wrote the scripts for the main character controller, animations, enemy AI, and a handful of game logic to fill in the holes. I also worked with our coding team to improve the grapple mechanic to the point it is today. Here are a few web builds to show the direction we are going.
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