Animal Frenzy Group Progress

    I haven't really documented our group progress up to this stage so here's a rundown on our efforts so far.

    We began by expanding on what Nic and Rob had already produced for the Animal Frenzy game concept. We started looking at possible gameplay mechanics, thinking about the 'drag and drop' aspect of the game and how that might work. We came up with ideas relating to what happens when the player pulls an animal out of the animal library and how they could be placed and animated on screen depending on whether it was the correct animal or not, for example if the player picked the penguin in the Antarctica environment, when dropped he would place a section of an igloo down, whereas if a lion was chosen then he could run of screen/tunnel off etc. We thought that the objective aspect (such as 'Help the animals build the igloo') was a fairly important aspect of the game as just added a slight narrative and purpose to the game, in that you (the player) are traveling the world helping the animals.
    We also decided to include a bonus level after completing the first 5/6 levels, which could include moving a net along the bottom of the screen in order to catch falling animals, just to act as a reward for completing the main game. We also thought about varying the difficulty of the bonus round depending on how well the player did during the game, for example if they got the answer right first time on a level then that would increase the net size, making it easier to catch the animals.
    Dan produced a few sample vectors of possible animal designs in keeping with the research and referencing that we had done on our group discussion page on Wolsey. We looked at a few existing cartoon animal designs (the links to which are on Wolsey) as a means of communicating to each other what kind of styles we had in mind. I was thinking of styles along these lines, which I then suggested to the group:

http://www.heroturko.org/vectors/2220-cartoon-animals.html
http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-illustration-9614223-cartoon-safari-animals.php
http://www.vromansbookstore.com/life-on-farm 

    We also began thinking about possible environments, creating an initial list of areas around the world to which the player could be visiting, we were aiming to keep it quite varied in terms of environment to give implement some variety. Again we used a few websites to do some research into what types of animals live where, here are two that Nic linked during discussions:

http://www.animalsoftheworld.ecsd.net/
http://www.kidsplanet.org/factsheets/map.html

    After having another look at the national curriculum for KS1, we found that 'care for the environment' was something that we hadn't addressed in too much depth. So we came up with the idea to have litter or some form of pollution on each level that the player would have to find as an optional objective. We decided that this also could contribute towards the bonus round again, so if the player found all bits of litter then the animals would fall slower/bigger net etc.

     We also began experimenting with different layouts that would support what we were trying to achieve, we agreed that the visual elements of the game were fairly essential so we were trying to maximize the environment space and keep interface elements such as the animal library, help text and any other relevant information at a minimum. We each contributed different ideas and finally settled on a basic layout which I knocked up quickly. As shown on the example below, we are thinking about having the animal icons along the bottom which the player would drag out and drop onto the environment area, as well as Mickey and Mandy figures in the bottom right which upon hovering over would give help like the current objective or telling the player when they have done something wrong/right.

    The next image was a basic concept that we had had regarding interactive environment objects, the player would hover over an object and a popup information box would appear or Mandy/Mickey would say something about it. I used colour to highlight the object the text was referring to although upon discussion we decided that perhaps creating a border around the object would be better.

   
    By this time the foundations of the Animal Frenzy game were pretty much made, we had settled on environments and the basic objectives as well as graphical styles. So today we met up and just finalised some of these ideas by establishing colour schemes, definite environments, animals and interactive environmental details, the list of which I posted on our discussion board.
    So now we are at a stage where we are just developing the core features of our game, like beginning to create graphical assets and discussing how we can go about achieving some of the more script heavy aspects of our game.

    And that's it! Any further discussions had/progress made we will posting on a group blog although I will be updating this blog as well on a less regular basis.