Just a Note...

http://gamersinreallife.wordpress.com/2009/09/18/character-creation/

A good article I want to keep note of for my research, good quick read.

Steampunk

Stumbled across this steampunk style on the BBC news website. It could be quite relevant to my character design so I thought I'd make a post just to keep track. I admit it is very bioshock-ish but it would lead into a character editor extremely well.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8383183.stm

End Credits

Hmm I watched the film gamer last night and in my twisted mind managed to relate it to my project. The film itself is as bad as you'd expect but the idea behind it is genius. It is set in the future with the public playing two games called Slayer and Society. Slayer is basically a FPS but instead of playing virtual characters you are controlling real people, ex cons on death row. I guess you couldn't get a game much more realistic than that. The society game was really cool, just like the Sims but again controlling real people that you wish to look like. These real people worked for the society game but were basically classed as prostitutes to the outside world. Anyway found this interesting.

Mistake in the trailer for the film, they say "the players are real people" whereas they clearly meant to say the characters or avatars are real people because obviously the players would be real people. I guess it depends on your take of the word "player"...

Also managed to pick up a good magazine about character design, the name escapes me for the moment but no doubt I'll reference it on here some point soon.

An Interesting Article...

I was just reading an article and even though it is based on the game Spore, it sums up my project quite strongly. Just making sure I make a note of it on here for future reference.

http://www.gamasutra.com/news/columns/?story=20949

Screenshot from my copy of spore (character is one of the presets) to show interface not on a youtube video.

Also tryed to recreate myself in the Sims 3. Hmmm maybe I failed as an artist here...

Other design work...

Have been asked to make a poster for a Band Night, and thought I'd post it up it because I like the colour scheme I used and the simplicity of it all. Also had to quickly model a character for it which was good fun not having touched Maya in to long, been a bit busy with exciting research...

Small note that I noticed while looking closely is I used two different styles of red by mistake, my bad, maybe no one will notice.

As far as my anatomy work goes, I've been working on the hands at the moment... my weak point, but I'm getting the hang of it. Wish I had a scanner so I could post some of my sketches up... never mind lets see what Santa brings this Christmas.

I have been reading through a journal which talks about the concept of embodiment, basically what stance the player takes in relation to a character while playing the game. It's been hard trying to describe this to people so I'm lucky I came across those words because it makes life a lot easier.

Realised I wrote my proposal slightly wrong which is a bit worrying, needed a much larger bibliography, which I have but I got confused at what you actually need to put in it. Ah well we will see what feedback I get next week.

Have been doing a lot of research on dark and grungy basements, and also on a mutated angel type theme... hmm I'd be able to describe that a lot better in images than in writing.

After Crit Week

So my presentation went really well and I have handed in my initial project proposal, which is hopefully of a good standard. Had a good diccusion with other people in my group about my ideas which was helpful. I still really like the idea of making a similar character female and male. The idea of customising items came up also, but I don't want to go into to much detail.

Finished playing Call Of Duty which has some great characters in as always. The story line was slightly confusing and maybe a bit movie like but it was an incredible game. I especially like the character called Ghost, probably just from a visual point of veiw. He has a really cool mask which I will take some inspiration from. its about time I start filling my sketchbook with drawings for my main player character now too, I don't have a scanner though so I'm not sure if I will get chance to put anything up here.

Still a bit stuck on my enviroment ideas, can't get past operating theatre. hmm...

Gender

I was reading about how gender effects game play and found this really interesting. This is where a character editor comes in extremely useful to make sure both sex's are happy. For example a lot of games are very orientated at male audiences, having sexy female Non-player characters for the players to 'fall for' such as in halo but nowadays the games industry is getting a far larged audience. I would like to incorporate the ability to choose a sex of character into my editor and I've got a few designs floating around in my head how I can go about doing this. Changing the sex of a character could have a large ripple effect on the rest of the game play though, maybe having to change story and love interests.

At the moment I've been working on my initial project proposal and should get most of it finished today. Will try and put up a list of tasks tomorrow just to give myself an online version to keep track of.

Anyway going to add another photo up here, I want to start showing should characters with a strong story behind them (lots of these in scrapbook but again just for an online reference):

A long weekend

So it's been a few days since I posted here, had a few more thoughts about my project since though. I was sat in class today and thought more about how the character editor could relate to gameplay aswell as story. I was thinking that the editor could be based on some kind of labratory with the player experimenting on their character which leads into the story, I thought this could have a bit of shock value. So alongside this idea I thought the edits you make to your character could change the gameplay slightly, for example difficulty, you could leave your character un-editted and in good condition, but if he doesn't have any protection then the game will be almost impossible, then again if you cut parts off and stuck robot parts and genetically modified arms to your character then the game would be a lot easier, except the character would be unhappy and harder to control or please. I do like this extra level of effect instead of just having an 'avatar'.

I think I might hop into Zbrush shortly and do some mock-ups for my presentation next week. Real shame COD4:MW2 has to come out the same week as the presentations...

Had to put up pictures of stalkers (the game...) here too, very cool outfit designs.

Also I have been having some internal debate about using the words "avatar" which from what I've read means a self representation or an alter ego but I think if your not giving unlimited control to the user then it's not really an avatar, as even the slightly common trait in a character editor creates character. And what if I'm not wanting to create a character to represent myself, but a character to adhere to the story best, I wouldn't class that as an avatar.

Finally got a hold of a book I've been trying to get from the library for a month called "Better Game Characters by Design". Will be extremely helpful reading this.