Dante Platt STEC Blog

 Game Development: The gamification task was about creating a realistic type character based of us. I went with a cyberpunk theme about a character named Markus Rian. We had to write about their backstory and personality and describe what ability set they had. This took quite a long time to figure out what kind of character would be best suit for the environment and backstory. It all focused on the personality and backstory of them. The outcome of this was a list and brief review of the character but it didn't fit very well so the task was left for now. The Mini Game Project was by far the most fun and easy of tasks to complete, I had lots of enjoyment trying to create and browse ideas for mini games. The main idea I had come up with was a 2D runner running atop buildings and kicking gangsters off trying to escape. This mind map was to show the character split into different sections and give a brief description of him. This was the easier part of the task and was fruitful.

 Character Design: We were given the task to create a character based off 3 words that came to our head or generated by a word generator. My words were Teenager, Detective, and Skinny. There weren't many options to choose from so these were the best I could go for. This was the final result of trying to create this character, to me they look a bit scruffy but for a few easy attempts, they came out alright. I used the website Piskel to create pixel art of a detective. Piskel is a website which allows you to draw anything up to a certain resolution, it is very easy to understand and nice to use. Any of this could have been completely different if I had gotten any other words describing a character. For me this shows the levels of character design in highly produced games.

 Dave Moth Poster: I have used Canva to make multiple posters of moths saying "beware" due to a joke that goes around class. it was used to get used the website Canva for the first day. It was made to know what utilities it has to offer when we get the chance to use it again. It was easy enough to use and very easy to understand, it was a very fun idea and task to complete as a starter. The whole class created either 2 or more posters for a 'man' named Dave. 

 Blender: Blender is software that allows the user to create anything from 2D animation to a 3D scene from a movie. I used blender for to create a map layout for the moodboard above to show what it could potentially look like if I went ahead with it. I took snapshots from different angles to get the right dimensions for the project, which turned out ok. This software could be highly useful in the future so its a good idea to get used to it while I can so its easier to use when I do come to use it.

 Level Layout: I used paper to create a simple layout of how a level will look. It was a simple task to begin with and then we later moved onto putting this idea onto Piskel, i decided to put the final level as it would be the easiest for me and would give me more ideas of what my final product may look like. This Top-Down layout of a level was designed in class to show a substitute member of staff what level we are at when designing a level, it went from Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced, and Expert. I was given expert for a knowledge of level and different proportions of areas.

 Primary And Secondary Research: Primary Research is where you gather information from a source of your own independence. For example a survey would be Primary Research. Secondary Research is a where you gather information from a source not of your own make. For example google would have Secondary Research.  We used a survey to gather information about favourite video game characters. This is Primary Research. For Secondary Research, we looked up 3 websites about favourite video game characters and said what was good about them. This took only around 20 minutes to do but gave me an idea of which characters appeared more and why. This gave me more info about how the characters have kept alive so far over the vast many years. This could have been different had I used a different program to make the survey to get different tools to make it look more appealing.

 Recap: Dave Moth Poster: I have used Canva to make multiple posters of moths saying "beware" due to a joke that goes around class. it was used to get used the website Canva for the first day. It was made to know what utilities it has to offer when we get the chance to use it again. Moodboards: It is an arrangement of images or bits of text intended to show a project in a style or different concept. We had created a moodboard to get a better view on how to make one and what to put in it. We were assigned to make a moodboard about a character we had thought of, and it was a fairly simple task once I knew how to continue on. I had come up with 2 separate ideas when I was in class and the second one was ideally my favourite of them all due to the simplicity and how it turned out. This one was about a guy running from gangsters and trying to escape but the boss will not let him unless he defeats him. This along came with a storyboard which took very little time to complete but wa

 Minecraft was a idea created by a man named Markus Persson who is more commonly known as 'Notch', the father of Minecraft. The game is a 3D sandbox game developed by Mojang Studios where players can travel the world, fight monsters and face bosses in different dimensions. It was made to the public in May 2009 before being fully released in November 2011 with 'Notch' stepping down and letting Jens 'Jeb' Bergensten taking over development. It has become the best selling video game in history with over 238 million copies being sold nationally, and with over 140 million monthly players. Gameplay: The game requires little to no instructions on how to play and with no goals to accomplish, players are granted freedom to what they wish. Some players choose to march through and focus their efforts on getting all the achievements known as 'advancements'. Since this assignment was for 'retro' games I decided to play on the older version on Minecraft to not