Dare to be Digital 2012 week 3 comes to an end and we have reached PB version. This version has as major improvements the fix of the butterfly effect bug which caused that the replays could differ from what was recorded due to physics and that we interpolated positions of the units for the replay so a small difference could made the whole battle change, ending up in some cases in changing the results of the winner of a battle during the replay.

Regarding the units, the king is finished now. It’s by far, the most polished of all the units, with 6 animations and different textures to change his expression to mirror the state of the battlefield.

Finally, there have been improvements in the GUI, the render of the current unit is more polished and includes its health too and the previous hourglass has been changed by a semicircle.

Another thing that we’ve been working on is in improving the information shown when a round ends as now everything ends static and we believe that useful data could be represented in the map to help people think their strategy easily. A first reasonable approach seemed showing each units path to aid the player in decide where to attack. After implementing this we ended with this:

Which looks like the a metro map. So we have discarded the idea and we will try in next approaches to simplify the information shown: trying with heat maps or a simplified points of interest maps.

Next week we will be working on the version entitled Pandora. It’s name comes from the fact this version will include a new map that will replace the current one since we’ve been given the suggestion to avoid the current environment because it’s claustrophobic. The new map shows us a battlefield in the middle of a floating gorgeous island full of vegetation and a waterfall that separates the two reigns. You have some concepts and the design as a preview:

Today it’s the 4th competition day and mentors are going to visit us for the first time. Until now we have been working on finishing the playable prototype in order to address the playcentric approach we decided to apply to IsoChronous development as it has some parameters that will need a lot of testing to find the ones that provide the most enjoyable experience. So let’s see what’s been happening these first days:

On Monday it was the induction day were we had to bring our props for the photo shoot. Everyone brought nice props that left us willing to know what the other team games were about (look that awesome big moustache and the gorgeous art from Finnish team):

After that we had lunch provided by the organisation in Albertay Union followed by an ice-breaking activity were everyone had to introduce the team and their game as well as what had been done during the available 40 h of work given before the start of the competition. Everyone seems nice and there are plenty of really interesting ideas out there.

Second day was spent in having everything set up. There were some problems as we didn’t have Unity installed in our PCs and some drivers were needed for the graphic tablets  and gamepads but it was all fixed by the IT crew. We did some work in a new unit for IsoChronous, the crossbowman and also in the playable prototype:

 Finally, yesterday we were working hard all day to have the mentioned playable prototype ready finishing randomly generated environment and record mechanics. Our artists finished the crossbowman so this means we’ve 3 units ready! Now we’ve got something that looks like more like a real game.