Studio 2 - Week 11
What have I accomplished this week as a developer?
After reflecting on this last week gone it’s become clear that every week has been a roller-coaster this trimester. I'll start with the lows. This week was our analytics play-test for our final project “Home” game Heartland. We had shown off a build the week prior but due to some team miscommunication and unforeseen circumstances we were left build-less. This was incredibly disappointing as we are a strong team with a really clear vision of what we were making. It was insult to injury when we had a former student now professional game developer come in and talk to the class and look at everyone's builds. He gave valuable information about upcoming work in the degree and life as a developer outside of uni. I will touch more on the info we gleaned a bit later. Instead of letting our heads hang low team heartland banded together and we spent our days off on campus working in person. I can’t tell you how much of a difference this made. Our game completely transformed. Every facet started to come together and we got the chance for a play-test on Monday and are proud of the game were able to show off. We got some fantastic feedback which has just pushed us harder and further to make this game all that it can be. This week really ended on a high and we are all working diligently and excitedly towards an amazing final product. Keep an eye out for the final build and my twitter as I will hype everyone up in preparation for Synergy.
As I mentioned earlier we had the incredibly insightful guest lecture for a very successful and inspiration former student. It was information overload with super beneficial things for us as students like getting our portfolio up and ready over this long upcoming holiday break instead of the end of next tri when we will already be looking for internships. We also learnt a huge amount about how our next trimesters are going to go, specifically in regards to final project. One thing which was mentioned was to pick our teams carefully and not to have too many members as they were a 10 person team and over 22 weeks it became a death trap. After further talking to the final project lecturer and finding out that a team of 4 games students was the maximum I’m very proud to report that me and some of my peers have already formed a team. The major point I took from the lecture however was finding out what I want to get out of the project. For example our guest had specialised in environment and level design and wants to work in third person action games like the Uncharted series. Yet the game he and his team made was a local multiplayer puzzle game. This got me thinking about what I really want to specialise in and once i had chosen got me to do some research into how to get that job in industry. So my current plans and dreams would be a member of a professional dev team as a VFX artist. Making beautiful particles and giving that valuable feedback to a player is something I really love and am dedicating a great deal of time to over the break. When researching how to actually get this position though I found that your best route would be becoming a Generalist first and then focusing on the VFX work. This suits me fine and has given me some necessary direction in my career aspirations. Keep an eye on this blog over the holidays and also my twitter as the goal is to make a new effect every 2 days.