Production Blog 3

Hello, and welcome to the third production blog for The Warfront From Intercepts! I’m Natalie, and I have a lot of great work to show you today. The Warfront From Intercepts is a puzzle, strategy game where the player sifts through papers to find the enemy’s battle strategy. Our main goal in this sprint was to add the AT Machine and chemical station features to the prototype. If you would like to hear more about the design process for the game, you can read Justin’s blog.

For our prototype this sprint, we couldn’t include our new features because multiple scripts were controlling the paper handling. This was causing the scripts to conflict with each other and not function properly when transferring from one area to another. Since this issue arose, one of our programmers, Mario, was able to figure out how to separate the code controlling the paper and the rest of the script and merge the paper handling into one script that works for all stations. This was an issue due to poor foresight on my part, and I’ve learned to carefully think through any aspect of a game that needs to be handled by one script rather than only feature to feature. Luckily, this wasn’t a huge setback overall in terms of our sprint velocities; however, it did cause our prototype to have fewer features than previously planned.

Level Design

For this sprint, Miguel focused on putting the analysis room together and attaching all the scripts to the necessary objects. He also imported some models that aren’t being used yet, and created a couple more templates for the announcements, encryption keys, and junk mail.

Miguel Antonio Fuentes

Programming

Our programmers completed a lot this sprint, despite the prototype being unable to show it yet. Rodrigo finished the final touches on the chemical station, while Mario completed the main functionality of the AT Machine. Mario also created a script that managed all the camera movement, so none of the scripts conflicted with each other when the camera needed to move. Bryan worked on the prototype, including the temporary point system and control UI, and put together the elements we had that could work together without a working paper handling script. Bryan also completed the unit deployment feature, getting us closer to having the battle simulation completed for a future prototype, and being able to get rid of temporary prototype features. 

Prototype - Bryan Ramirez

Bryan Ramirez

Mario Garcia

Rodrigo Lopez-Patino

Modeling

Our modelers also got a lot of work done this sprint, focusing on the last of the units for the battle simulation and the war map. Andrew finished the M4 Sherman tank and retextured the general infantry model for each subunit type, flamethrower, paratrooper, and scout. He also created the tank sheet and anti-air boat that will be used in lake battlefields. Jax completed the Flakpanzer anti-air unit, and also made signs in the transition room so the player knows which door leads where. Peter created all the war map pieces for the units, so when the player places units on the battlefield, wooden pieces will represent the units placed there. He also made the accessories to the general infantry that identify them as the other subunit types. Most of Sarah’s work this sprint was 2D Art, but she created the model for the M16 Motor Carriage and will texture it next sprint.

Andrew Olsen

Jax Potmesil

Peter Gahl

Sarah Youngdahl

2D Art

Sarah was the only teammate who worked on 2D Art this sprint, and she completed a lot of the Battlefield UI icons. These will be used for the unit deployment, so players can have a quicker reference as to what something is rather than only being able to read it.

Sarah Youngdahl

Sound Design

Our guest star Colby Herbison was able to create one last theme for us. He made a sped-up, more stressful version of the main theme, which indicates to the player that their time is running out. I linked both the main theme and the stress theme because listening to them back to back is really cool.

Main Theme | Stress Theme 

For this sprint, our team completed 105 points of the 158 assigned, which also caused our current velocity to match our goal velocity! For the next sprint, we plan to implement the unit deployment feature on the war map and get started on the logic for the battle simulation. We will also remove the temporary prototype features once the battle simulation logic is complete. Watch for future posts about the production and design of The Warfront From Intercepts!