SYNERGY: GAME DESIGN DOCUMENT AND PRESENTATION

           Finally, after many weeks of work, communicating with other members of the group, and desperately trying to design a consistent game to present to tutors as the final assignment of the year, the Game Design Document for my game idea 'Synergy' has been completed along with the Pitch Presentation.

With 17 pages, this slightly larger 'ten pager' design document covered the most common sections of the typical GDD document. With a game like Synergy, we found it quite the challenge fitting in all the details we wanted into the 15 pages we were set and restricted to, thus I believe we could of done a better job - the time limit did effect the document's quality.

It's worth nothing that both this and the presentation was a complete group effort, both in developing the document and presenting it to our university tutor. However, as a group, it was sensible to delegate the workload to get the document and presentation completed as efficiently as possible.

WHO DID WHAT IN THE DOCUMENT?

    I myself, developed the game's initial concepts, visual style of the game and therefore, both the document and presentation. Along with this, I wrote and developed the Front page, the Contents page, the Mechanics pages, the Enemies and Bosses pages, the Digital Strategy and Competition page and finally, the Chosen Engine page. It is also worth nothing that I set out the layout of David's pages to ensure the document was both consistent and completed on time - he wrote his own page information.

David wrote the content for the Story pages, the Character pages, the Gameplay Page and the Game Flow and Controls page - he was assigned the first section of Synergy's GDD. He did a great job and understood the game's concept fully.

Nicolas on the other hand was assigned the middle section. He wrote the content, developed the artwork and set out the page layouts for the Main Gameplay Concepts and Platform Specific Features page, the Game World page, and the Interface pages. Unfortunately, due to Nicolas being absent for the majority of the games low level design and brainstorming, he didn't really understand Synergy, which was real shame, and due to time constraints he himself had to develop the pages, resulting in a lack of consistency and flow. Regardless of this however, his artwork was amazing, it really gave the game an identity - without that, Synergy's GDD would of severely suffered. Thanks Nick!

Look at the document below!

COMMENTS AND CRITICISMS APPRECIATED!

SYNERGY: GDD - FRONT PAGE
by Christian Whelan

SYNERGY: GDD - CONTENTS 
by Christian Whelan

SYNERGY: GDD - STORY
by Christian Whelan and David Barker

SYNERGY: GDD - STORY (2)
by Christian Whelan and David Barker

SYNERGY: GDD - GAMEPLAY 
by Christian Whelan and David Barker

SYNERGY: GDD - GAME FLOW AND CONTROLS 
by Christian Whelan and David Barker

SYNERGY: GDD - CHARACTERS
by Christian Whelan and David Barker

SYNERGY: GDD - GAMEPLAY CONCEPTS AND PLATFORM
by Christian Whelan and Nicolas Piskorski

SYNERGY: GDD - GAME WORLD
by Christian Whelan and Nicolas Piskorski

SYNERGY: GDD - INTERFACE PAGE
by Christian Whelan and Nicolas Piskorski

SYNERGY: GDD - INTERFACE PAGE (2)
by Christian Whelan and Nicolas Piskorski

SYNERGY: GDD - THE MECHANICS PAGE
by Christian Whelan

SYNERGY: GDD - THE MECHANICS PAGE (2)
by Christian Whelan

SYNERGY: GDD - ENEMIES AND BOSSES
by Christian Whelan

SYNERGY: GDD - ENEMIES AND BOSSES (2)
by Christian Whelan

SYNERGY: GDD - DIGITAL STRATEGY AND COMPETITION
by Christian Whelan

SYNERGY: GDD - SELECTED GAME ENGINE
by Christian Whelan

WHO DID WHAT ON THE PRESENTATION

The presentation was also a group effort, and was vital aspect in presenting Synergy to our tutor - it had to be good!

Again, I myself developed the visual style and layout of the presentation, along with the slides that covered my pages. In addition, due to work load and time constraints, I also wrote in the information for David's slides which he dictated (so that he understood what he was reading). With my slides and David's done, it was down to Nick to finish his slides.

Nick competed his three slides on his own - fortunately, his slides were great! Being visually rich, the slides kind of spoke for themself, but again, it was the much needed identity Synergy needed. 

Considering the 10 minute time limit we had, and the scale of an idea Synergy is, we could have shortened the presentation down a little bit, but again, we didn't have time. Regardless, the presentation turned out fine (I think).

Have a look at the presentation below!

SYNERGY: PITCH PRESENTATION

    Looking back, although I love the game idea, I think I should gone with a  much simpler concept - one idea, one mechanic and game play built around that and only that. It would of been much simpler, as I bit off more than I could chew, which I believe is entirely to blame for the quality of the GDD. I like it, but it's not perfect by a long stretch. Fitting all this information in 15 pages and 15 slides was one of the hardest things I've done in a while.

   However, although it could be improved, I think we did a great job considering the size of the idea and the time and resources we had! Here's to hoping I get a first for this final assignment!

NEXT POST: YEAR CONCLUSION

UDK LEVEL: FINAL ADDITIONS

           The only assignment I did not get a first grade on this year was the UDK Level and it was for two reasons - one, I did not have any sounds or triggers and two, my level didn't make use of packages (UPK's). I must admit, the level I created was buggy, but I was proud of it considering it was my first ever attempt at using UDK.

    Even so, I couldn't bare finishing university without getting an entire years streak of first grades (you just can't put a price on that). So, in an attempt to achieve this goal, I went into university outside of hours and added what needed adding in. It was hard, I'll be honest, figuring out UPK's with very little assistance had me dumbfound for a little while, but eventually, I did it! I added in preset sounds and tweaked the triggers etc and added in a custom sound that required the creation and exporting of a UPK for future use on other computers.

I'm fully aware that further use of UPK's will take place next year, as the course begins to focus more on level design and the use of UDK, so this challenge I have been posed with has been beneficial. Hopefully, after these additions, I should get a first for the UDK Level!

Here's to hoping I get a first on my group GDD document!

GDD: SYNERGY: GAME DESIGN DOCUMENT AND PRESENTATION

GDD: UPDATES (DIGITAL STRATEGY / COMPETITION)

     So after completing the Pitch Presentation, I realised the Competition section of the GDD wasn't as credible as it could of been. So in an attempt to fix this, I did some sales research on the games and franchises that offer competition to Synergy. To my surpise, these games didn't sell that well internationally... weird, I loved Prototype and Infamous (Infamous maybe a little bit more... ok, a lot more).

Anyway, I updated the Competition page of the GDD to keep consistency between the GDD and Pitch Presentation. The updated page is below.

GDD: SYNERGY - COMPETITION PAGE UPDATE
by Christian Whelan

NEXT POST: UDK MAP: FINAL ADDITIONS

GDD: PITCH PRESENTATION

       Finally the pitch presentation for Synergy, our game idea, has been finished (besides Nicolas' parts). Me and David wrote it and I proof read it. We tried our best to get the slides down to a minimal, and I think we can present it effectively within the 15 minute time limit for sure, but the hard part was cutting down information that was already hard to cut down in the GDD, hense the 16 slides.

Anyway, mine and David's parts are finished, we just need to add in Nicolas' parts and develop speaker notes when we're all next in the same room (tomorrow). Have a look at it below!

SYNERGY: PITCH PRESENTATION

 

     The next task is to add Nicolas's pages into the GDD and his slides into the Pitch Presentation. Once that's done, it's a case of developing the speaker notes and presenting this bad boy.

Oh, and in a disucssion with Nick today, it turns out there are some inconsitencies between mine and David's sections in the GDD regarding the King Pins of Synergy (the bosses), so I'm going to have a look over them tonight and tweek a few details here and there - David doesn't mind.

NEXT POST: GDD: UPDATES (DIGITAL STRATEGY / COMPETITION)

GDD: PROGRESS 02/03/2013

         Today, me and David met in University to get the entire Game Design Document for Synergy, our Action Adventure RPG, completed. Although Nicolas's middle four pages are missing, me and David have realised the idea and documented it - we're really confident about Synergy.

   As for the missing pages, we don't really know, we've both added in aspects that 'should' be in his pages just as a fallback, but when it comes to the Pitch Presentation (which we're working on) we have a problem - we want the presentaiton to flow. Most importantly though, we just want Nick to understand Synergy as well as we do - we want consitstency and flow both in the GDD and presentation.

Anyhow, the pages me and David wrote are below. Once we wrote our information, I took it, put it into Photoshop, developed a visual style and devloped the pages as you see them below.

MY PAGE'S: Title Page, Contents Page, Mechanics, Enemies and Bosses, Digital Strategy and Competition and The Chosen Game Engine.

DAVID'S PAGES: Story, Gameplay, Game Flow, Controls and Characters.

MISSING PAGES: Main Gameplay Concepts, Platform Specific Features, Game World and Interface

COMMENTS AND CRITICISMS APPRECIATED

 

SYNERGY GDD - FRONT PAGE
by Christian Whelan

SYNERGY GDD - CONTENTS PAGE
by Christian Whelan

SYNERGY GDD - STORY (PAGE ONE)
by David Barker

SYNERGY GDD - STORY (PAGE TWO)
by David Barker

SYNERGY GDD - GAMEPLAY
by David Barker

SYNERGY GDD - GAME FLOW / CONTROLS
by David Barker

SYNERGY GDD - CHARACTERS
by David Barker

SYNERGY GDD - MECHANICS (PAGE ONE)
by Christian Whelan

SYNERGY GDD - MECHANICS (PAGE TWO)
by Christian Whelan

SYNERGY GDD - ENEMIES AND BOSSES (PAGE ONE)
by Christian Whelan

SYNERGY GDD - ENEMIES AND BOSSES (PAGE TWO)
by Christian Whelan- IN PROGRESS

SYNERGY GDD - DIGITAL STRATEGY / COMPETITION
by Christian Whelan

SYNERGY GDD - SELECTED GAME ENGINE
by Christian Whelan

 

      Regardless of the pages Nicolas has yet to complete, the document is closed to finsh. The only thing that needs to be completed is the second Enemies and Bosses page - it needs some character sketches.

 

Once this is done, the presentation could be completed (besides Niiolas's pages) - I'll get that done today and then fianlly, this GDD woul be completed.

NEXT POST: GDD: PITCH PRESENTATION

EASTER WORK PLAN

     So, after my massive setback with my huge games design assignment, I decided to shrug it off and set a strict work plan for over Easter. That way, when I get back into University after Easter, I'll have the majority of the work done (if not all of it). So here it is;

• 01/04/2013 - GDD
• 02/04/2013 - GDD / UDK REWORK
• 03/04/2013 - GDD PRESENTATION / WEAPON UV MAP AND BAKE
• 04/04/2013 - WEAPON TEXTURING AND SPECULAR MAPS
• 05/04/2013 - WEAPON TEXTURING / PRESENTATION SHEETS
• 06/04/2013 - CREATIVE THINKING ASSIGNMENT
• 07/04/2013 - CREATIVE THINKING ASSIGNMENT
• 08/04/2013 - CREATIVE THINKING ASSIGNMENT
• 09/04/2013 - CREATIVE THINKING REWORK
• 10/04/2013 - BLOG POSTS AND PRINTOUTS
• 11/04/2013 - YEAR CONCLUSION BLOGS

    I think I've given myself some room to take my time. I'd rather take my time than rush everything. Who knows, I may get things done before I expect to (in my dreams). 

Can't believe the year is almost over though! I just need two more firsts (from rework) to get 100% streak of firsts! I'm chuffed considering I though I was going to be the worst in the year at the interview! haha Yeah Boiiii!

NEXT POST: GDD: PROGRESS 02/03/2013

GDD: MASSIVE SETBACK

       I had planned to do a progress blog post today, showcasing and detailing all of 'my' pages of the design document. However, by some massive stroke of bad luck, when adjusting my monitor, my speakers fell off the desk, landed on the tower and crashed the computer.

I tried saving using the control and S keys, but it hasn't worked. The issue is, that all of the work I had done on Photoshop (which was around 4 hours of work) has corrupted, leaving nothing but a scrambled mess of layers that for some frustrating reason, has flattened, leaving the result below for all pages.

    Along with this, all the text that was to be in the design documents pages has been lost. Meaning I have to start from scratch. I'm not exaggerating when I say I'm devastated and seriously pissed. I saved the work at every update, but it seems even that hasn't saved me from this crap setback.

This is going to have a massive knock on effect with the rest of my work. I will no longer be able to create pages for David's or Nicolas's pages due to other assignment commitments. 

I hope this doesn't effect mine or our marks.

NEXT POST: EASTER WORK PLAN