Growing up I was never much of a gamer, that occupation was delegated by my older sister, and that trend has kept consistent to today. But when the basis for this project was revealed, creating one’s own video game, I was intrigued. I had no idea how I would go about doing that very task, but it sounded like fun, right?
Naturally, Professor Dunkle would not leave anyone hanging and gave a clear explanation for what would be done for this assignment, as well as many displays of how to work the progrsm that this project would be made on: Maya. I’m certain I’ll be a broken record with this sentiment, but I felt that this program was mildly easy to understand, and that made the process far more enjoyable. So the game itself is a first person adventure, where the player must navigate through a maze in order to win. The maze was constructed with mountains to prevent the player from cheating by looking over walls, or worse, walking through them to the finish line. I’m not much of a puzzle aficionado, but making the paths for the maze was one of the most fun aspects of this project. It felt as though I was reverse engineering the solution, knowing where to connect the start and end points with a winding, complex solution, and then adding other options to confuse the players.
Now I must admit, I wish I could’ve done better with this assignment. While I don’t think the product is by any means terrible, I do wish that I couldve done a better spin on the idea of the maze. The layout is already very simple, but perhaps it is too similar to the design from the lecture. I even utilized pink ground to differentiate the start and end points, just as the video from class does. But I did use trees to show that the player is on the correct path, just as a little framing device.
While the purpose of these assignments is to display understanding and application, the creative in me cannot help but to strive for uniqueness. Some part of me (the idealist no doubt) imagined that the location of this game could’ve been an underground labyrinthine setting, in clear reference to the Greek myth. Yet even with that inspiration, I don’t think I would have ever been able to acheive that sequence with my beginner’s game designer status. But to any future DMA 201 student that is advanced enough to make that dream a reality, I give you the clearance to use it for your own project.
I would without any hesitation say the toughest element to incorporate was the winner script. The accomplishment of successfully completeing the game is supposed to be rewarded with a magenta coin that produces a chime, and for such a simple piece, it is the most crucial. Therefore, trying to work this aspect was the most difficult. This part left me tearing my hair out the most, making sure the script was in the correct places and working as it should was too infuriating for this assignment, and it definitely took me a substantial portion of time. Perhaps not in comparison to planning a maze, but certainly up there. Although, that may just be the nature of the beast.
But I do not mourn the loss of the underground maze game that never was, as it is always in the cards. One video online called How to Make Your Idea HAPPEN (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8he7nM4W1vw) discussed exactly how great ideas can be brought off the ground by having prototypes take the fall to learn from mistakes. It may not hold much material advice to this, or any other project in the near future, but it does give the sense that all work you do is worthwhile. Every failure leads you closer to your desired outcome because one learns what not to do, like the age old phrase about the 99 ways to not make a lightbulb. While I can do better with practice, I did manage to get the game working in the way I wanted, although having the map sketched in my notebook may have helped. So maybe there are 99 more ways to make this project, but at least the one way I tried succeeded.
