Major Project Ⅰ/ Task2&3
24 Feb 2025 - 23 Mar 2025 (Week4-7)
Kaho Yamaya / 0364278
Major Project Ⅰ / Creative Media / Taylor’s University
Task2&3
JUMP LINK
・Work Progress
WORK PROGRESS
From Task1 proposal, We found our direction is not clear and we should change our storyline.
TASK2 DESIGN PROPOSITION
Fig 1.1 Story board for new ideation, PDF, Week4 (28/2/2025)
Since we got feedback from lecturer, our biggest problem is lacking character variations. We only have three characters–Protagonist (Father), Mother and Daughter. Our original storyline is psychological horror and it is difficult to add more character in it. I suggest we can add the colleague and whole family of the protagonist, however, my team member seems to not decidable yet.
Fig 1.2-4 Game style suggestions, PNG, Week4 (28/2/2025)
I feel we should not stick to the original idea: making animation. I suggested first person exploratory game, third person escaping game, and horror novel game with mini-3d model. My teammates are agree with change our direction to make games.
Fig 1.5 Location of the story draft, PNG, Week4 (1/3/2025)
We couldn't decide what game are we going to make, so we try to determine the details of the world setting and game details concurrently. This is for the location in our world. Basically we referred the Kowloon city in Hong Kong, however, lecturers suggested us to make it more unique. I make difference in height based on people's income. It can be clearly show how the economy in this city works.
Fig 1.6-7 Character design for protagonist and enemy, PNG, Week5 (5/3/2025)
Note: After the week5 feedback, the character design should have more consistency and I moved on to the Chinese theme completely.
Fig 1.8 Enemy design, PNG, Week5 (8/3/2025)
The enemy design are referring the Chinese cultural mask from 川剧(Chuānjù). I put the reference in the last pdf slides. It is one of the opera in Chinese culture. Hiding face and change it based on the character's feeling seems good to make each enemy's character more clear. For example, the #3 character has angry expression in his face. #4 character is a woman's face with smile. It is more easy to make each enemies characteristic.
Fig 1.9 Silhouette study, PNG, Week5 (9/3/2025)
Fig 1.9 More character outfit study, PNG, Week6 (11/3/2025)
For the protagonist's main costume, I referred 锦衣卫 (jǐn yī wèi). I put the reference in the last pdf slides. It was the imperial secret police that served the emperors of the Ming dynasty in China. However, the storyline of our work is modern. The reason why I use bit old reference directly in here is the character is the member of exorcist family. So his home have these kind of old clothes as the exorcist costume. However, it is discomfort when we see it as modern design. I added some fluorescence parts and attach glass visor parts in his head accessories because I want to combine modern and old style in one design.
Fig 1.10-11 Character with weapon animation study, GIF, Week6 (11/3/2025)
Fig 1.12 Character jumping animation study, GIF, Week6 (12/3/2025)
At the same time, I did jump motion study to see how character can jump in game. However, I feel the scarf movement is wrong and it makes the jump motion not understandable. I need to fix it in game.
Fig 1.13-15 Character turnaround attempt #1, PNG, Week6 (14/3/2025)
From three outfit in Fig 1.9, I choose no.3 design to proceed. I want to merge modern and old features in this design, so I made some parts glowing and shining. I feel it has more modern features compared to the original design.
Fig 1.16-17 Character colour pick in discord, JPG, Week6 (14/3/2025)
I was not satisfied with the colour scheme, so I asking my teammates for help me. The no.3 neon green one (I don't know where my teammates start counting) got votes, so I proceed with this colour. Also my teammates suggested me to add more scar on the amor and down the brightness of whole design. I fixed these points in Fig 1.34.
Fig 1.18 Install Unity, JPG, Week6 (15/3/2025)
From Week6 feedback, we need test in the Unity to show the feasibility of this app. I cried over and over in this section because Unity has a lot of versions and I really don't know about it, so I download the newest version and suffered. The newest one always have bug in it and sometimes the assets you want to use were not allowed in that version. I really don't know about it, and crying for three hours to get over the situation that I can't use any assets or tutorial files.
Fig 1.19 Start tutorial in Unity, JPG, Week6 (15/3/2025)
I start tutorial in Unity to get used to the system. After the tutorials ended, I feel so powerful and thought I can change the image of these tutorial character's image and use all code as our test. However, there is no easy way to achieve things. I couldn't reach the assets image files in this project, and I forced to build new project from zero.
Fig 1.20 Make sprites in Unity, JPG, Week6 (15/3/2025)
After suffering for many many hours, I could add sprite in my screen. GameObject > 2D Object > Sprites > Square. You can add square sprite into your screen.
This is the most basic object in the game screen. We can change the appearance of this square into our character.
Fig 1.21-22 Change gravity preferences, JPG, Week6 (15/3/2025)
If I check a box of "Is trigger", it loses the gravity. It can be use in the static object, such as the walls, ground and etc.
Fig 1.23-24 Adding extra app to add code into Unity, JPG, Week6 (15/3/2025)
After crying for can't apply the image into the sprite, I couldn't add any C# code into Unity and cry one more time. We need extra app to support coding in Unity. You should get dotnet and Visual Studio Code into your PC to manage coding.
Fig 1.25 Direct screen capture #1, Youtube, Week6 (15/3/2025)
After struggling with many thing, finally I could made character walk in the game screen. I use free asset to see the basic move before I apply our character design. I directly capture the PC screen because I was afraid of lost my progress because of PC screen recording.
Fig 1.26 Direct screen capture #2-3, Youtube, Week6 (16/3/2025)
I could move my character in the game screen, and also add ground object to make him able to run and jump. I added gravity in the game world, and it accidentally make him backflip a lot in here. I didn't program to do so, however, I think the gravity do some work in here. But I don't know how to fix this, so I just let him acrobatic at this time.
Fig 1.27 Take character weight balance, JPG, Week6 (16/3/2025)
When I try to test the game, the character always fall down or do a backflip and moving with unusual way. I wonder why and I guess the gravity make it unreal. I changed the box size to take a weight balance. It makes more smooth movement.
Fig 1.28-29 In-game character design, PNG, Week6 (16/3/2025)
As we show the reference in the task2 slides, we got reference from Limbus Company to make our character bit taller from chibi-style. The chibi-style is easy to apply in game, however, that style is not suit to our story. So we proceed with taller artstyle from chibi.
Fig 1.30 Walking test, GIF, Week6 (16/3/2025)
I tested frame-by-frame walking, but it gives me uncomfortable because the upside of the body and the scarf are not moving. It can be a future development when we apply the animation in game.
Fig 1.31-33 Walking test, PNG&JPEG, Week6 (16/3/2025)
Based on Yap Guang You's enemy design, I refine it a bit to showcase.
Fig 1.34 Final protagonist turnaround, PNG, Week7 (17/3/2025)
With my teammates advice, I changed the details of his design.
Fig 1.35-37 Working screen with background, JPG, Week7 (17/3/2025)
I started combine the character with Yong Zhen Xing's background in game screen. I was struggle to manage the hierarchy in Unity, however, you can add tag to your object and you can adjust layer in that tag. The lower you put the object, the hierarchy gets higher.
Fig 1.38 Unity test, Youtube, Week7 (17/3/2025)
TASK2 DESIGN PROPOSITION SLIDES
Fig 2.1 Design Proposition Slides, PDF, Week7 (17/3/2025)
TASK3 Concept Presentation
Fig 3.1-4 Final enemies design, PNG, Week7 (19/3/2025)
I am running out of time and couldn't refine all of their designs. However, the enemy colour scheme is referring the hell in buddhism. The hell is considered as black in buddhism, and it can be divide into red, blue and yellow. I use these colour to enemies to make consistency and to get sense of hostility from looking appearance.
Fig 3.5 Final protagonist design, PNG, Week7 (19/3/2025)
I feel the turnaround is not enough to showcase characteristic of this character. He use spear as his main weapon, so I make his splash art with more dynamic pose.
Compare to the enemy design, he has green in his whole outfit. It is because I want to add the sense of healing by his appearance. His goal is kill the ghost and let them go to peace. His personality is not loving the battles, so I want to set his colour palette with more calm colour than the enemy colours.
Fig 3.6-8 Character bone animation test, JPG, Week7 (19/3/2025)
While doing a test in Unity, I found that it is really hard to attach the animation. I thought it is because I'm using frame-by-frame animation. So I try the bone animation to see the difference. As a result, I couldn't apply animation in Unity at this point. The bone animation give us more smooth movement, however, it was really hard to rigging. When you want to do bone animation in Unity, you should download 2D animation file in the Unity file library. If not, the bone preferences are not appears.
Reference vid:
Fig 3.9 Character bone animation test, Youtube, Week7 (19/3/2025)
This is a screen capture of bone animation test. Although it could not be applied in the game, you can see smooth movements that were not in the frame-by-frame style.
TASK3 CONCEPT PRESENTATION
Fig 4.1 Concept presentation slides, PDF, Week7 (20/3/2025)
FEEDBACK
Week4 (24/2/2025)
The presentation is really hard to read and understand. It can be a thumbnail, not a super long sentences. You have to make the protagonist's goal very clear. You need to think "What?How?Where?When?Who?"
Week5 (3/3/2025)
Your character design is lacking silhouette study. You guys need problem statements and the technical issue. You need a small step like a motion test, 3D test and whatever to achieve the big goal. For the UI, you need to refer existing games and mix them together.
Week6 (10/3/2025)
You need a side view of your character. The words are still too small. Layouts are too random and hard to see. Bring references properly. You need to be able to explain the whole function as a one piece. Download the unity template and go and see what is happening in there. You should decide the animation style is sprite or frame-by-frame.
Week7 (20/3/2025)
The bone animation cannot do the turnaround. We suggest the sprite animation before, so just refer it. You guys have no style and no unique points. The reference game is not worked as a reference. Go and find a game that have similar point with your work. The character has broken anatomy. However, the enemy design have the style. Unity test is fine.
REFLECTIONS
I learned a lot in this class. For example, we learned how to use Unity and C# code. At first I was worried about how much I could do in the limited time, but I feel that it was a good experience for me to concentrate and try to shape something into a certain result. I was able to use what I learned in the character design class last semester to change the design of the robot to make it more functional. I was also able to increase my speed in drawing characters, and I can say that my skills improved throughout the semester.
As for the group work, overall there was an undeniable lack of communication, and the progress reports by each group member did not seem to go well. It made me keenly aware that there are some things that cannot be accomplished alone unless everyone is motivated to work on the project, just as there are some things that can be done together. I myself regret that I could have done more to encourage my teammates and manage their progress.
Based on these improvements, I would like to further develop these skills and strive to present a more complete work in Major Project2.
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