Hello again everyone! I'm Tyler and I'm back to discuss all of the amazing work we were able to accomplish on Guilded Fletching in Sprint 2! A quick reminder as to what our game is: Guilded Fletching is a first-person puzzle platformer that gives the player a unique set of specialized arrows to solve environment-based puzzles and take on the local population in engaging combat encounters. The goal for this sprint was to have all of our base player and puzzle mechanics in the game to create our first digital prototype, which was built and tested on  2/23/21.

Now that we are well acquainted with one another, let's get into all of our great work!

Programming

The Programmers during this sprint really took off in terms of the work they were able to complete. They all came together to finish off the remaining core functions of the game that aided us greatly to have a successful first build/playtest! Our game's core functions can be broken down into Player movement/shooting Systems, Enemy AI interaction Systems, Arrow Systems, and Puzzle Systems.  The Player Movement and Shooting is a great, yet smooth controller we have on our players to give them another level of depth and immersion into the game. The Enemy AI is fantastic as it can track the player and accurately attack them from a "safe" distance. The arrows are also incredible, incorporating the Airburst and Warp arrow functionalities were incredible for testing and playtesting purposes. 

Check out the various GIFs below to see examples of our programming team's hard work!

- Airburst Arrow Demo

- Warp Arrow Demo

- Ranged Enemy Demo

- Bomber Enemy Demo

- Ladder Climbing Demo

Level Design

During Sprint 2 our Level Designers got hard at work again creating concepts, annotated maps, and more blockouts of maps. Tyler and Jonathan immediately began creating more and more amazing work. They were able to complete an annotated map and a blockout map for our Warp Arrow map. As well as finishing the annotated maps for the Standard Arrow tutorial level as well as a tutorial level that will teach the player about using multiple arrow types to complete different levels. During this time of Tyler and Jonathan rapidly building levels for this game. They were also hard at work creating different asset lists along with reference images for each level so that our 3D Art team can take these various assets and we can have our levels fleshed out looking beautiful in no time!

Look below for some examples of the great work the Level Designers were able to accomplish!

- Warp Arrow Blockout 

- Warp Arrow Blockout, Top-Down View

3D Art

During sprint 2 our 3D Art team yet again surprised us with their ability to take direction as well as their ability to adapt to change, during this sprint the Game Designer Alex, and I discussed changing up the texturing style on our assets in an effort to be more efficient, we had discussed these changes with the 3D Art team and they took it in stride and still were able to create outstanding textures that are identical the new look Alex and I were going for. During this sprint, they were able to texture some amazing assets they had previously modeled! Moving forward to sprint 3, we will have our 3D Art team begin modeling and texturing all of the main assets such as walls, ceilings, floors, and more to begin creating the real puzzle rooms! 

Look below at some great examples of work our 3D Art team was able to accomplish!

- Textured Tents

- Textured Stone Columns

- Textured Campfires

2D Art

During Sprint 2 we had asked our 2D Artist, Haley, to design concepts for each of the four different arrow types we intend on having in the game. She took the direction we had given her and went off to work creating these absolutely amazing concepts for our four arrows. Moving from top to bottom, the first image is of the Standard Arrow the player will use throughout the entire game, just below that is a Golden Standard Arrow that the player will acquire once beaten the game in its' entirety. Below are the three special arrows, in order, they are the Bramble Arrow, Warp Arrow, and Airburst Arrow, they each have different functionalities that will prove useful to players in a number of different scenarios. Next, we will have our 2D Artist begin creating concept art for our three different enemies as well as creating immersive and enticing art for our menus.

Check out her outstanding arrow concepts below!

- 2D Standard Arrow Concept

- 2D Standard Arrow (Once the game is beaten) Concept

- 2D Bramble Arrow Concept

- 2D Warp Arrow Concept

- 2D Airburst Arrow Concept

Rigging/Animation

During sprint 2 we had the class rigger, Eder Ayala rig up our Player Hands as well as the Bow that the player will be wielding. He did an absolutely great job, but when running into some rigging troubles, our Animator Daniel Marshall came to assist Eder in what troubles he was having. The final result was two incredible organized and smoothly working rigs, moving forward we are going to ask Eder to rig up our enemies once they have been modeled and Daniel can now get to work on animating the bow for when the player is either charging or shooting an arrow as well as the hands for the various actions it will have (Idle, Walking/Running, Climbing, Setting an Arrow on the Bowstring, etc.).

See below for the great rigs that were made up for our Bow and Player Hands!

- Rigged Bow

- Rigged Hands

 Overall in these first two sprints, we have been able to complete a whopping 102 points which is incredible. Our team has worked so hard this sprint and it definitely shows with the amount of work they were able to complete and show off this time around. We really wanted to hit the ground running in sprint 1 and we did, but my goodness did the team really take off this sprint completing an outstanding amount of work. Moving forward, our next goals are to model and texture everything in the Asset Lists created by Tyler and Jonathan so that their levels can be created to the way they are envisioning them. We are also going to tweak certain player and arrow mechanics based on the feedback we have received from our first build. 

Thank you so much to the team! Y'all are working like crazy!! And thank you for taking the time out of your day to read my Production Blog! It means the world to me! But until next time, stay safe and take care! I can't wait to show you all what we accomplish throughout Sprint 3!