Art Direction: Final Compilation & Reflection

29/08/2022 - 05/12/2022 (Week 1 - Week 14)
Evaleez Voo Lian Yun / 0350275
Design Research Dissertation/ Bachelor of Design (Hons) in Creative Media
Final Compilation & Reflection

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Instructions

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Task

Week 1

This week, we played 2 games, i.e. Among Us (AU) and Goose Goose Duck (GGD). After playing, we wrote down the  pros and cons of each game based on our experience.

Among Us

Among Us" is an online strategy game that can be played on a PC, smartphone, or Nintendo Switch. In "Among Us," you play as crewmates trying to complete tasks, while one "Imposter" tries to sabotage you. Playing "Among Us" takes more thought than raw gaming skill, making it perfect for both casual and hardcore gamers.

Pros:

• Consistent and better readability bcause of the choice of typefaces
• Consistent artstyle
• Clear char interface
• More responsive than GGD
• Can hide task menu to have a better view of the map while playing
• Task indicator (yellow) on a specific object to show whre the task is located
• Main screen (inside rocket shakes) & enhances use experience

Cons:

• No voice chat in the game
• Unnecessary scrollbars in places that cannot scroll, while places that needed scroll has no scroll bars
• Some of the buttons are blurry/pixelated especially the small ones.

Goose Goose Duck

One person is "it" and walks around the outside of the circle. As they walk around, they tap the player's heads and say whether they are a "duck" or a "goose". Once someone is the "goose" they get up and try to chase "it" around the circle.

Pros:

• Good and various sound effects, consistent with the style of the game
• Various roles
• Daily gifts for the players
• Has a mini map and indicator to task positions
• Has a voice chat during the gameplay, yellow indicator when speaking

Cons:

• Typography for codes are confusing
• Inconsistent artsyle
• Inconsistent line weight. The lineweight of the character is much thinner than everything else.
• Can hide task menu to have a better view of the map while playing. However, the menu bar is opaque
• There is no indicator (outline) on the task for players to find the task
• Movement issues

Fig x.x AU and DDG Pros and Cons

Week 2

This week, we tested another game - Suspects: Mystery Mansion. The Gameplay is similar to Among Us, with one of the differences being that the primary murderer role, the Killer is able to plant bombs instead of affecting the reactor which gives the murderer more flexibility. The game also provides more roles and modes. 

Pros:

• White indicator when someone is talking (even when muted)
• Can mute other players with reason stated
• Arrows and distance to task’s (both killer and guest)
• Can plan killings by placing bombs and detonating at will
• Main page UI is easy to understand
• Chat supports other languages and their respective characters

Cons:

• Unable to open for public after creating a room
• No room code in the public room to invite people
• Some tasks take too long
• Takes a while to wait for players

Fig x.x Suspects Pros and Cons

Week 3

 This week, we created a must have, good to have and nice to have list for the game.

Must Haves

• Movement options (joystick/touch)
• Responsive ui, buttons and joystick movements
• Consistent artstyle
• Clear indication of hallways & door (title & map)
• Good typeface for codes (especially if its all capital letters)
• Clear chat interface
• Voice Chat during the gameplay
• Indicators for when mic is on and speaking
• There is indicator (outline) on the task for players to find the task

Good to Have

• Has a mini map and indicator to task positions
• Different colors for each areas/sections on the map
• Good and various sound effects, consistent with the style of the game
• Various animation or diverse animation after killing someone.
• Various types of roles
• Different colors for each areas/sections on the map
• Private chat between the impostors
• EXP, Levelling and Leaderboard (for each region)
• Actual bots instead of just static dummies in practice mode

Nice to Have

• Shadow animations when moving
• Consistent font size
• Unskippable tutorial (to avoid confusion especially if there are roles)
• Practice mode as an impostor
• Immersive audio
• Mute button to avoid noisy people
• (voice chat)
• Main screen (inside rocket shakes & enhances user experience)
• Various characters (body type, skin colors)

Fig x.x Must Have, Good to Have & Nice to Have 

Week 4

This week we stated to ideate a new Among Us concept. We came up with 2 ideas, the first idea being "Humans vs Puppets". The image below shows the general overview and is, is-not statements of the game:

Fig x.x Humans vs Puppet

The second idea, "Bee? Wasp? Who? was our final decision. The slide below contains the progression of the idea, our decisions and the task allocations for each member of our team, from Week 5 to Week 14.

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Final Presentation & Compilation

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Feedback

Week 9

• Quite cohesive and very straight forward
• Justified well enough
• Make sure to have colours by the next meeting

Week 11

• For the in game interface, can reference Plants vs Zombies as it has simple, straight forward buttons
• Finish everything by Week 13 presentation

Week 12

• There is a steady progress of artwork delivery
• The group is very consistent from the proposal to the final presentation
• Good working narrative
• Good type choices in terms of readability
• Can tweak the consistency of outlines between the background and characters

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Reflection

This module was interesting as I have not experienced anything like it before. I learned to work together with a team to create a project we can be proud off.  Nonetheless, it was a bit hard for the three of us to maintain a consistent art style as all of us have very different art styles by default, fortunately this was fixed by deiciding on the line weight, colour scheme, etc later on. Making these decisions earlier in the projet would definitely make it easier. 

Besides that, I also learned how to direct myself and my team asthe second half of the semester was mostly self-directed. I noted how instead of asking "should we xxx?", creating a vote straight from the start was much faster and the reply rate was also higher. Moreover, creating a to do list for everyone has proven to make things more efficient and remove the risk of miscommunication. Overall, this module was quite eye opening and I believe that this experience would be useful for any future projects I'll be involved in.