Evo In Development
Team Derby & London Met
Team Derby/London Met from Richard Birkin on Vimeo powered by Flip Video.
Team Derby/London Met – Friday Night from Richard Birkin on Vimeo powered by Flip Video
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Thursday, May 28th, 2009Archive for May, 2009
Developing Chronofix
Here are some videos taken over the course of X48 by the X48 organisers and mentors on their Flip camcorders:
Team Huddersfield (Black Hoodies) from Richard Birkin on Vimeo powered by Flip Video
Team Huddersfield Black, Friday P.M. from David Hayward on Vimeo powered by Flip Video
Team Huddersfield Black, Friday P.M. from David Hayward on Vimeo powered by Flip Video
An Interview With The Team
How are you feeling post-X48?
Alice: I am really pleased with the outcome, as me and Debs hadn’t done anything like this before and we had only met the boys that Friday morning, so I’m pretty chuffed with how it all turned out.
Paul: Feeling pretty good now I’ve had some sleep! The event was a lot of fun and a real challenge but that made the lack of sleep worth it.
Was it worth the slog?
Paul: Absolutely! It was worth every second of broken code, sprites being in the wrong place by themselves and even completely blank screens! It was such a good event to be a part of.
Deborah: Definitely, the experience gained was well worth the ’slog’ many times over.
What did you all gain from the experience, and what do you hope will come from it?
Paul: I gained a greater sense of open mindedness in that you have to go into an event like this with a completely open mind and no expectations of what type of game you are going to make. That way the best ideas can come together however strange or insane they might be.
I hope that on the whole that the Newport team having a great deal of success from the event will inspire other students from the university to think about entering events like these and maybe we will get more success in the future as a university.
On a personal level I hope that people download, play and enjoy the demo that we made and hopefully my involvement in the programming of the game shows my abilities as a programmer.
Alice: I learnt that you need to keep a steady balance of art and technical. The game wouldn’t have worked so well without the visual treatment or without the hard work the boys put in to achieve an interesting way of playing the game. The scale could easily have tipped one way or the other but definite compromise and prioritising was needed to achieve what we wanted in the short space of time. As I want to go in to producing this was especially interesting from my perspective.
Deborah: Working with 3 people I have never worked with before was interesting, and worked well in this case. It’s always good learning how to get on with new people when producing work, and it’s harder to do so under such tight time constraints, when stress levels are really high. I also managed to talk to some really lovely people from various games companies, which was one of the most valuable things to me.
I hope that this competition, and being in the top 3 winning teams, shows future employers that I can deal with working in teams, I can work on my own without much assistance, and I can produce artwork quickly to produce a game in such a short time!
Where are you at with your degrees/courses, and what specific areas are you doing? How has X48 contributed to your studies and career aspirations?
Alice: I am in my last year and will be graduating this summer and am interested in entering the industry as an entry-level producer. X48 allowed me to further develop skills as a producer as that was the main role I took in our team. I also met lots of really friendly people with lots of useful advice.
Paul: Currently I am in my final year of the Games Development and Artificial Intelligence course at the University of Wales, Newport with the remainder of my time now being focused on my final project/dissertation which I am working on as part of a small development team. We are creating a multiplayer combat flight game using XNA where two players team up to form a Pilot – Co-Pilot team for a single plane against other pairs. On this project I am currently responsible for game play and network coding while integrating code and art assets from other members of the team.
X48 allowed me to continue to use the skills I have built up with XNA in a totally different environment to the one at university and helped me to find out just how much I do know and remember under pressure.
Hopefully the X48 game I was a part of will show, in part, that I have the potential to be a successful programmer of games and the experience of making it has inspired me even more to work towards getting a job coding games.
Deborah: I am in my final year of Computer Games Design [CGD] at Newport. It is a design based course, unlike our sister programming course from the other Newport campus. We do 3D modelling, animation, art and design, using programmes such as Flash, Photoshop, After Effects and Maya.
I personally focus on 2D and concept art, using traditional art methods, Photoshop and my trusty Wacom. Currently I have teamed up with someone from a different course at my uni to make 4 flash games. This is my website, the games will be up here as soon as they are finished in May. www.debbiestephens.co.uk 
X48 has contributed to my career aspirations by giving me some contacts who I can talk to about what I need to get into the industry.
What did you learn from X48?
Paul: As well as learning that Red Bull is my friend, I have seen that sometimes the ideas you least expect can turn out to make the best parts of games. I would not have thought at 2am on the Saturday morning that trying to stop wind from blowing seeds off the screen could amount to much of a game, but I was wrong and now probably every game I’m a part of will have a wind meter in the corner!
Would you do it again?
Paul: Absolutely! This is the second event like this that I have taken part in with the Global Game Jam earlier this year being the first and even without the sleep it is so worth it. Being able to turn up and develop ideas with likeminded people for a few days and having the potential to make any part of that idea a reality is very rewarding.
Alice: Yes, in spite of all the hard work and the lack of sleep it was really good fun. I thought it was brilliantly organised and there was a really good atmosphere around the place. Although next time I would like to be warned in advance about all the cameras so I could bring more make-up with me!
What was the thinking behind the type of game you made, and why did you pick the target audience?
Alice: We wanted to create a game that had abstract control. In Bellis Perennis you are something more than an avatar…you are a theory. It is pure puzzle and strategy. We felt that on an educational level this was more beneficial as you are not learning by being told information but you are a part of the information. You have to understand the way the balance of an ecosystem works to win the game, which is the lesson itself.
Paul: I guess the main focus from a game play perspective was to make the demo as easy to play as possible but at the same time, make the player the one that sets the challenge. The game mechanic works in such a way that the player can do as little or as much playing as they want. There is the potential to just let the game go about its business with no input to see what happens and at the same time, that same level could be played with the upmost intent to never have a seed get lost or a flower die. Because of this i think the target audience can really be anyone that has a mouse attached to the PC as the challenges come from trying to match your previous scores, beat a friends score or end up with a crazy looking garden at the end.
Deborah: We wanted to make a game that was visually pleasing as well as technically good. We wanted to move away from the obvious, or cliché, and be noticed for this. it worked It had to be a game which was easy enough for anyone to play, which is why there is only one button to click. It’s also quite experimental. It’s interesting to see what happens when you just leave the game to play by itself with no interference.
Bellis Perennis In Development
Here are some videos taken over the course of X48 by the X48 organisers and mentors on their Flip camcorders:
Team Newport from Richard Birkin on Vimeo powered by Flip Video
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Team Newport – Fri PM from Richard Birkin on Vimeo powered by Flip Video
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Thursday, May 28th, 2009An Interview With Team Leader Ben
How are you feeling post-X48?
Tired, we all are, the energy drinks and pizza is still in the system. The event has just become one big blur, kind of like a dream as if it never happened.
Was it worth the slog?
Definitely! Not just because we walked away with two awards but because the whole event was just so much fun! Also meeting so many nice people and just being in that environment was worth it.
What did you gain from the experience and what do you hope will come from it?
I think it really showed us all how much we can actually do when we set out minds to it. I’m still amazed at the quality of the game we managed to create! I’m not really sure what I hope will come from it, I really want to start up my own games studio when I finish University, so maybe this will be a title we release With a lot more work obviously.
Where are you at with your degrees/courses, and what specific areas are you doing? How has X48 contributed to your studies and career aspirations?
We are a mix of computer games designers and programmers. We are all currently in our final year, with a shed load of work. I’m focusing on the Design/Production side (Ben.Hinchliffe), (David North) is focusing on general art, (Karl Miston) is working on game play programming and (Adrian Smith) is an AI programmer.
With regard to career aspirations it has proven to me that I’m a competent designer and producer, this is not the first games design competition we have walked away with a prize. It really does show I have something and the same goes for everyone else in the team.
What did you learn from X48?
We have all learnt that team work and a solid idea is the key to game production. We knew what we wanted to make and just got on with it, that’s why I think our game came out so well.
Would you do it again?
At the time we said “no” but that was because of the 29 hour straight session with no sleep, being fueled by energy drinks and jelly beans. Looking back now, without a doubt we would defiantly do this again!
What was the thinking behind the type of game you made, and why did you pick the target audience?
Our target audience was casual gamers, specifically Xbox Live Arcade. We chose this audience because casual gaming is a booming area, simple games can be made and the often bring the most satisfaction. We felt keeping the game simple and easy to play was key. We wanted people to be able to pick it up and know how to play within a few minutes. We wanted the game to have that casual look, so we went for bright colors and simple primitive shapes. However we gave them some characteristics like eyes etc, so that people could associate with them.
The game play itself was to take evolutions core concepts and translate them into a fun game. We read the key points of “Darwin’s Origins of the species” and included many of these in our game.
I feel we managed to achieve what we set out to do, if this game was put into a casual market be it XBLA or PC; we feel it would be right at home
Involved In Development
Here are some videos taken over the course of X48 by the X48 organisers and mentors on their Flip camcorders:
Team Huddersfield Orange – Programming from Richard Birkin on Vimeo powered by Flip Video
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Team Huddersfield (Orange Huddies) – Art from Richard Birkin on Vimeo powered by Flip Video
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Team Huddersfield Orange, Friday P.M. from David Hayward on Vimeo powered by Flip Video
Seavolution: An Interview With Dan and Jay
How are you feeling post-X48?
Dan: Saturday was a bit of a blur to me, and trying to go out on Saturday night to celebrate was a bad shout…
Was it worth the slog?
Dan: Most definitely, one of the best experiences of my life for me so far. Hopefully something will come from it ?
Jay: Definitely, has to be one of the most stressful and intense things I have done, but the reward for succeeding out weigh the cost.
What did you both gain from the experience, and what do you hope will come from it?
Dan: I guess I got a sort of sense of pride. Winning showed me that my skills as an artist and team-worker must be of some merit otherwise we wouldn’t have won. I think that we are both hoping that this is the first step into the industry for us.
Jay: The past few years I’ve worked really hard in my degree and my current placement and to win the X48 Game Camp showed me it might all be worth it and that I must be doing something right. We’ve made a few contacts with Microsoft Games Studio and Dean Calver from SplashDamage so hopefully I might be able to use these contacts to get into the industry straight after graduation.
What kind of placements are you on at the moment?
Dan: We are both currently working at Canalside Studios. It’s a studio set up within the University of Huddersfield. It’s run by a group of 8 students and we are currently working on Xbox Live Arcade games.
What did you learn from X48?
Both: We learned that good teamwork is really essential to making a game. Also, having a sense of time management is vital as from what we saw some teams bit off more than they could chew in the time limit. The game we made was just manageable by a team of 2 in that time.
Would you do it again?
Both: Definitely, maybe with a couple more people this time we could make a far more polished game. We’ll have to come back just to defend the title!
What was the thinking behind the type of game you made, and why did you pick the target audience?
Dan: Well I’ve come from a science background – doing Biology, Chemistry and Physics in my A levels – so the science theme was brilliant for me. I remembered just how boring some of the methods of learning at college could be. So we thought “why not make a game to try and make educating people on subjects like DNA interesting and fun?” I think we made something simple and fun in the end. Jay certainly learnt some science stuff he didn’t know before!
Jay: The target audience fell into place when Dan suggested making proteins which is learnt at the end of GCSE and start of college education. I definitely learnt something about I didn’t know before we started the event!
What are plans for Develop in July?
Jay: Go down there and hopefully make as many contacts within the industry as possible. We’ve been asked to take videos of the event and it gives me a chance to try out the Flip Mino camcorder I won haha!
Seavolution In Development
Here are some videos of the team taken over the course of X48 by the X48 organisers and mentors on their Flip camcorders:
Team Huddersfield (Green Hoodies) from Richard Birkin on Vimeo powered by Flip Video
Team Huddersfield Green – Fri PM from Richard Birkin on Vimeo powered by Flip Video
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Thursday, May 28th, 2009
