Final Game Release
December 26th, 2009Beta Testing Complete!
December 17th, 2009Thanks to everyone who helped Beta test Hideout! We received a lot of great feedback, and we are currently implementing some of your great suggestions!
Stay tuned for the Final Release which will be available for download on our website!
Help A Friend!
November 23rd, 2009
Note:
This is a non-existent founding of the Help A Friend charitable organization, anything you see, read, or contribute, is not actually used to provide for any individual(s) or motives mentioned below. No monetary material will be accepted, or given to this charity. Cardboard cutouts have created this organization for the sole purpose of promoting Hideout! in a non-existent fashion as the marketing strategy of a project created in an educational facility (Carleton University). If this game is later chosen to be created as an actual product through which it is founded, there will be potential for this charitable organization to be officially approved through the Canada Revenue Agency. Essentially this document does follow the rules outlined by the CRA in order to create an actual charity.
- We are a non-profit internationally acclaimed charitable organization (allowed to perform business activities, and only fund our charity not others, international by providing monetary value to other individuals around the world).
- Hideout represents in many ways the mission of this organization by providing children with healthy food (power-ups), education (use of a new medium), and moral obligation (in connection with the goal of Help A Friend).
- Our goal through Help A friend is to provide Advancement in Education and Relief of Poverty for many children around the world.
- Your role is to have fun and play the game, the more you play, the more friends you save in the real world.
- By contributing to this charity you are allowing children the benefit of receiving healthy food, water, school bags, school necessities, and much more.
- Every child within the game is equivalent to a child in the real world; the child who receives your contribution will be of the same age as the fictional character. Children who receive the funding will be randomized and no one concentration lies on one certain ethnic background, religion, or gender.
- Carboard Cutouts and its Sponsor(s) will be handling the process of reaching worldwide children and giving them the hope that you have offered through your simple contribution.
Advertising – the beginning
November 4th, 2009We have finally created our first set of poster designs! They can be seen on our Facebook page here: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Hideout/154150152302.
We decided to create two sets of designs to target two different types of audiences. The more colourful poster targets children, and the more ambiguous poster targets young adults! We will be posting them all over Carleton University to create hype and interest in our game!
Up next for advertisements: Character collector cards that will one day be distributed in healthy cereal boxes across Canada!
The Secret Sauce to Developing Any Video Game: Communication
October 26th, 2009
Whether you’re thinking about creating a game on your own or in a partnership or group setting, there will be several components of your final product that are interdependent. So to make sure that all of the little parts add up to one awesome final product it’s best to communicate between the different sections (ie: 3D, programming, concept art, game theme and story, etc) early on itself.
With different people being responsible for various parts of the project, it’s easy to slip into your own silo and forget how your work interacts with your team member’s in the final product. The difference between a video game development project as opposed to most other technical ones is in how it’s compartmentalized, but not. For example, our team is very diverse and each of us have our own specialties that we feel most comfortable doing. But that doesn’t mean we each do our own thing, smoosh them all together and end up with amazing-ness, ex: the 3D modeler just models whatever they feel like and on their deliverable date just submit the required models. No, that person needs to make sure their model complies with programming needs (ie: ‘poly-counts’ are compatible with the game engine, etc) plus models should follow all stylistic requirements including the story, theme and concept art, and more. So the interdependencies run deep when creating a video game, and the best way to make sure the project runs smoothly throughout is to communicate all of the time.
Whether you just drew a new stick man to demonstrate a character animation, or you created a particle engine run for the stars in your space scenes make sure to show your work to some of your colleagues throughout your development stages. This way you won’t have to go back to the drawing board every time if your work doesn’t gel with that of your co-workers. If your project involves a lot of people, show your work periodically to the people responsible for portions of the project that are directly related to your work, for example if you work at EA games, don’t go showing your stick figure to the entire company. Instead run it by the animator, the 3D modeler and the programmer to find out if the animation is feasible from the perspective of each respective department.
The most important part about communication in a project such as this is to be ‘aware’. Be aware that your work is a spoke in the wheel and that it needs to work together with all of the other parts to make the wheel turn. If you don’t know who or what departments would be dependent on your results, ask. Keeping yourself isolated and uncommunicative not only makes you a poor sport in a team setting, but it may slow your project timeline down if in the end your work doesn’t comply with everyone else’s and you’re sent back to the drawing board.
Developing a Video Game: It’s Not Just About Programming
October 18th, 2009Okay, so yes programming is at the core of any and every game on the market but it has to be put in combination with other elements to make it a great one. We often forget the multiple talents that go into a video game, after all it is a full product. If you’re looking to get started on your own video game of sorts, here are just a few of the things you should consider before you get started (in no particular order):
- Story
- what is the background of your story? It’s purpose, it’s objective?
- Gameplay
- how do people get to actually play your game? what buttons do they have to press? what obstacles do they need to avoid? what are the consequences if they don’t?
- Usability
- how easy and intuitive is it to actually play your game? If I am a user, and I become intrigued by your game and want to play it straight away can I intuitively know what controls to press (ie: on my xbox controller, use the joystick to move around) or do I need to read instructions first? (tip: you don’t want your user to have to do the latter option most often)
- Design
- what is the overall design of your game going to be? is it consistent? can i see a screen shot of your game and recognize that it’s your game and not someone else’s?
- Concept art
- you have the design, now it’s time to put it on paper and make sure your entire team is on board with it. Do they understand what your vision is? ex: does the programmer know how to allow the required movements in the environment you have created? does the 3D artist know how to make your models such that they comply both with design as well as software restrictions?
- Graphics
- Staying consistent with your game’s design, you also need to have graphics to deliver your game to the masses. What is your logo? what does your website look like? etc. But most importantly can your game be easily identified from these mediums?
- Visual Appeal
- So you’ve got some of the back-end stuff sorted out, now what does the actual game look like? What do the characters look like? What about the environment? What about the heads-up-display (HUD)? Most importantly does it contribute towards captivating your audience?
- Sound Effects & Music
- This is one aspect that is often forgotten in initial stages, but just start play a game without sound effects and see how lame it is. Sound can do so many things including: bringing across feedback to the player, creating a mood , enhancing the play-ability of the game and altogether making it an entire experience!
- Hardware
- What physical hardware components are needed to play your game? (xbox controllers? keyboard? mouse? joystick?) tip: if you want maximum play-ability, choose hardware that is widely available and used ex: computer keyboards and mouse are widely used over a specific model of joystick
- Technical requirements to play the game
- how much RAM does someone need to play your game? Do they need a specific graphics card? sound card?
- Marketing
- If you want people to play your game, you’re going to have to market it. Even just telling your buddies about it is a form of marketing. But what are you going to say? People don’t have much time, you need to be able to summarize it in 10 to 20 seconds tops!! Then once they know about it, where can they get more information? Where can they get more information? How can they get to playing the actual game?
- Branding
- If you’re going to market it, especially by mediums other than ‘word-of’-mouth’ you’re going to need a brand identity. Something that uniquely identifies your game. Make sure it is consistent, so that whatever platform it is seen on it can be recognized and related back to your product.
- Advertising
- People are bombarded with ads, and most often ignore them. How are you going to bring across your product such that people will listen?
- The Competition
- It’s hard to come up with an idea that no one has ever come up with before, especially in the gaming world. So the best way to stay on top is to recognize and keep a look out for games that are considered to be your ‘competition’. These would be games that have the most similar game play, visual appeal, etc that your game is going to be competing with for an audience. One game doesn’t have to have all of these similarities, but you need to keep a watchful eye on them all and then analyze them. What features do they have? Read reviews, what are their players saying? what do they like? what don’t they like?
- Website
- The web is such a staple now that it’s almost detrimental to your product if you do not have a tangible site to go to. Plus, don’t expect people to know your URL off the top of their head which means your product must be ‘google-able’ and for it to be you need to have content on the web! Choose whichever medium you like (ie: it could just be videos posted to youtube) but make sure it has your product attached to it in some way so that people can actually find it. Using google analytics is a great way to monitor your site too. It helps you keep track of who is viewing your site, how often, from where, internationally, and more.
- Differentiating factor
- video games are basically a ‘dime-a-dozen’ now a days, so yes you’re developing a video game but what’s the big deal? (please don’t take offense, read on..) What is it that you’re bringing to the table that sets you apart from the rest? If you don’t really have anything different, don’t let that discourage you, just starting on a project such as developing a video game shows much more than what’s on the surface. It shows great initiative, determination, commitment, and not to mention your actual skills involved in making it!
The Quirks of Perfection
October 17th, 2009As many of you know we are currently in the production stage of our game Hideout! Yes, we have undergone our design specifications and planned out our deadlines, now it’s time for the real work! But before we get into the technical issues we will come across in the future here is an interesting look into the little bumps in the road that all game developers go through along the way to perfecting their game.
One major issue that we have decided to tackle in this specific game is gender equality and how international we hope for it to be. We are introducing a number of female and male characters within our game from completely different backgrounds, to promote diversity and equal rights in order to add that educational factor. Our characters have varying hair colour, skin tones, and even personalities that would help children or young adults playing the game to aspire to be smart, educated, and fun individuals in their daily life.
However, this particular feature of the game was difficult to address at times because of the numerous methods and combinations that real people appear as (not everyone wants to be a doctor, not all Caucasians are blonde, and not every female wants to be a cheerleader). Therefore, it was difficult to appease and keep in mind everyones preferences when it comes to those characters, but nonetheless the task was completed and we came up with a useful strategy. As a team we decided that focusing in or having more variety in the characters, which come from backgrounds most seen in North America (primary market), would be the ideal solution as opposed to the less major cultural backgrounds in which you only see one of through out the game. Also the hobbies (or actions in this case) of both females and males are handed out evenly and equally, where some males and females are protectors and others perform more strenous acts. The characteristics of each personality was also carefully examined so that certain cultures would not be offended by stereotypes.
The cultures that we have decided to address: Caucasian, African-American, Asian, Native-American, Indian, Middle Eastern, and Italian. The gender is distributed randomly between the less major cultures like Italian or Middle Eastern.
**The hobbies that each of these characters do is related to the action they perform wthin the game while waiting to be saved from aliens.
Come back to read more interesting insights within the life of people, who for the next few months, will live, eat, and breathe Game Development!
Next Up for Discussion…Our marketing strategy for kids.
We’re Developing a Video Game, So Why Are We Blogging?
October 16th, 2009Being just shy of 2 months away to our final game deployment we’re currently in overlapping stages of planning and development in all areas. Now is when crunch time starts! We’ve come up with our general game idea, and due to our recent deliverables for project plan and design documents, the game-play aspects have been thoroughly flushed out. So from here on out its about getting into the nitty gritty with programming, creating concept art for our environments and characters, examining various marketing options and much more. As much as we’re becoming very emotionally attached to the project I don’t think many of us realized how much work and thinking was involved in creating a fully-functioning and self-titled ‘amazing’ game!
Each of our team members will try to take time (throughout this rigorous project) to chronicle our ups and downs. We’re hoping that for those of you who are considering or are currently in the works for making a game of your own can gain some insight into what it’s really like, on all facets: programming, design, development, marketing, game-play, etc. Plus, since we’re essentially making the game for ‘you’, why don’t ‘you’ get involved in the development process as well? Tell us what you like and don’t like. We’ll do our best to interact with you as much as possible and understand what it is that you want out of our Hideout game.
Come along with us for this crazy ride (fingers crossed) the final results will leave lessons learned, happy faces and a great game for everyone to play!
What is Hideout! about?
October 16th, 2009Hideout is set in 2012, where a young kid is playing make-believe in their backyard with a cardboard box costume. Soon after, they notice an alien invasion that is abducting all of the neighbourhood’s children. As they seek to rescue and “hide” as many of their friends as possible from the enemy UFO beams, they must also try to maintain their costume without it falling apart and exposing them to abduction. When all of the children of that neighbourhood are rescued by your character, the kid, you will move to a different neighbourhood and do the same. While the game progresses our hero must also look for juice, magic candy, and duct tape throughout each level to aid in their adventure. The juice will increase their speed of movement. The magic candy makes them temporarily invisible from the attacking aliens. The duct tape repairs the kid’s weakening costume.
The main genre of our game is an action arcade, where we will be providing the player with an infinite number of levels.
Facebook and Twitter
October 16th, 2009We now have a Facebook and Twitter page! Please visit them here!
Twitter: www.twitter.com/cboardcutouts
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/pages/Hideout/154150152302