O' SNAP!!

Well its time to rush things. We get to present two things in two weeks O'JOY,but its ok my team can handle it. We have everything ready for the demo presentations, but we still need to finish a majority of our game. Guys im very sorry that I hav'nt blogged for what seems like a month, and im sorry for this being short. Guys i'll prove myself next time.

Future Globaloria

Now as we go further into the year we all go our seperate ways in Globaloria. As of now my team has already coded most of the necessary action script to make the character move. What we will be looking for in the near future is coding for drag-n-drop (which we will use for students to drag-n-drop notes into the right positions in a sheet music), but mostly we plan on using keyboard controls in the game. Thus making coding more easier for the future (Im going to be copying and pasting a whole bunch).

Adding Sound

How do you plan to use sound in your game? How will it help enhance the game play and learning experience of your game?
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How do I plan on using sound? I plan on using sound everywhere in my game, because sound is almost like a key-character in my game. Sound or music is what the game revolves arround, thus we plan on using a lot of sound in our game. Without it the game would lose most of its meaning, and we would just have a regular game in our hands instead of a game that teaches the fundimentals of music/ the impact on music from society.

This YEAR!!

Reflecting this year..... hmmmm. Well to state the obvious this Globaloria class has been great. I've of course learned more skills then I had imagined possible, and again I've of course have learned to work better with a set deadline. Now a part of Globaloria is working with flash. "Do I like working with Flash," I suppose I like working with flash, just because I like being creative and ect. Mainly I like to dabble with things, or just for the fact that I really like to play games. "Ok its all of the above."

adding ANIMATIONS

*This animation(EarthWorm Jim) stands out to me, because I imagine my game looking and having the same feel as a platform game.*

Adding Buttons

"Explore your Knowledge Community and find a research link you find helpful from another student's blog. Write a post explaining why this is a useful resource, link back to the blog of the student who originally posted it, and add the link to your blogroll. If you can't find anything of use from your peers' blogrolls, do some research and suggest a new resource that you found on your own."
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simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Note_(music) <-- Link for reading Musical Notes).
- I believe this would be helpful to those who are creating a game based on Music, and just like The Lost Notes its purpose is to teach students on HOW to read Music.

Adding a Scene

-"Creating scenes in a sequence helps game designers tell the "story" of their game through a narrative. How are you using visual storytelling through your sequence of scenes to help players learn about your topic? What are examples of games you played in the Playing to Learn topic that use storytelling to teach a concept well? How have other narrative games influenced your game?"
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Well we havnt really added anything that I would consider "Visual Storytelling", but I would expect once we add in "Gameplay", "Learning Goal", and etc that this would help players at least have a total understanding of our topic. A game that I consider using visual storytelling would have to be ZeitGeist
. I wouldn't say many narrative games have influenced our game idea, but I would make an exeption for ZeitGeist.

Culture and Music

What influences music, and how is it defined? After researching on how "Society influences Music" I found out quick that its nearly impossible to find a website dealing with societies influence on such a thing. So I just went ahead and searched "music" on the search bar, and I came up with a very interesting page (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music). This page lists how culture itself has formed music to what it is today, and it has many references to different influences. So culture/or society has a great deal on how musicians create their music. For example in the '60s musicians has insperation to create music that we all know today. Hints "Insperation" that is what is key to what I needed to know.

Try this.....

jingle bells. Batman smells. Global-oria-break.

I want to wish everyone Happy Holidays before we all head home tomorrow and sleep in. One of the questions I was asked was "What are you going to be doing over break to further your gaming progress?", and all I could think about was "WHAT!". I was kidding of course, but I really plan on sketching out most of my characters, backgrounds, and etc. I just might go ahead and do some research as well, but most likely I'll just plan and brain storm. Well I have to get back and help videotape prototypes, heres a picture of something christmasy to lighten the stress of the day.

Thanksgiving farwell

Let me start out by saying "THANKSGIVING!! WOOO!!" Sense I got that out of my system, lets discuss my progress. So far I've done everything to keep myself caught up in Globaloria. I've filled in numerous projects pages, and created my own team page (Surreal_Monkey). Just to dumb it down a bit, I've done eve-ry-thing."Do I feel comfortable with what I've accomplished?", yes I have no regrets about my work. I do plan on getting ahead by drawing consept art for my game, and many other things just like that over break. Basically I'm going to do a whole bunch of brainstorming. Once I get back however I'm going to go ahead and draw most of the characters/scenes on flash, or some how draw-scan-then upload onto my computer (If that makes complete sence to the readers).

Planning My Game

( This picture can explain the overall concept I'm looking for, but its not going to be as *Detailed* as I would like it to be. Just the whole surreal concept for the game make it more attractive, thus make my game my game more appealing to the users.)
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-Strengths & Weaknesses
I really don't think I'll have to much problems with flash, because the overall coding for my game will just be key movement. Also most of the enemies will have only certain directions that they will move in (For ex: the Mushrooms in "Mario" only move back and forth). My graphic design capabilities I guess could be my greatest strength, so I really don't thing I'll have to much problems with that. I really can only see myself having a little problem with keeping my flash coding organized for certain moving objects and etc.

Imagining my game

synopsis
"My game idea is to create a game that teaches basic knowledge of music. In a platform based?Adventure the users can take the role of a young conductor named Danny , who literally gets sucked up into his work. While playing Danny you're surprised to see that you awake in a 2d musical world (Similar to Mario's). To get back to your own world you must fight various amounts of musical instruments, and fight against musical bosses. While in this musical world, users will gain knowledge of music through repetition. The game Itself will have some visual similarities to "Mario", but contain many original ideas & artwork."
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- What am I most excited about creating my own game?
What I really look forward to when creating my game is just being in the creative process.
-Who are you designing your game for?
I'm designing my game for anyone who is interested in learning the basics of reading music, not pinpointing certain age groups.
-What will your game teach the player about your topic?
My game will teach the basics of reading music, and how to become more creative with music.
-Where does your game happen?
My game is taking place in a distorted dream (Similar to the look of "Alice in Wonderland") where you fight musical notes. Your surroundings look very hipnotic, with swirls of purple and pale blue in the sky. Even the objects in the game will reflect from its twisted background. The setting itself will have various musical aspects to it, so the user will be more tuned into the music learning experience.
-Why is a game a better way of understanding your topic than a quiz?
A game is far more better way of understaning my topic than a quiz, because using a game to teach a topic is far more entertaining (thus allowing the user to want to learn).

My projects blog prompt.

Was it hard to create a mini game? No, making the mini game wasn't as hard as expected. The coding itself was rather easy, but I had some setbacks along the way (with coding). The best part of the topic had to be just creating the mini game, and the worst..... would have to be figuring out whats wrong if the coding wasn't right.

30 min. Reading

1.) "What did you read?"
I didn't have any reading materials on me, so instead I read a classmates blog.
2.) "How often do you read?"
I tend not to read as much as I would like too, but I say I read about a book a month.
3.) "What do you like to read?"
I love to read any fiction based book.
4.)"What has reading taught you?"
Reading has taught me many things, but I'd have to say books have taught me to be creative.

Mini Game!

Today we started on our mini games, and I'd have to say it was kinda interesting. Even though I got stuck trying to code the bunny to move.... so If anyone can supply a proper code for that , thanks.

Thoughts? 0_o

My thoughts regarding learning/using flash codes and etc. I would have to say I dont look forward to using flash again, because overall flash can be very tricky. Besides that dont get me started on figuring out what you did wrong if a flash code dosnt sort out correctly. On the other hand I do look forward to creating flash games, so in my stand point its fifty-fifty. And "Will I do well?" I'd have to say I have confidence in myself regarding to using flash, but NO PROMISES!

Choosing a Topic?!

Hi (me trying to intoduce myself), im Nick. But many of you already know me as "Bigkillernick". Today Im going to be sharing with you some links that I believe will help me on my way to creating my "Humanities" game. I tried to find as many websites that can share as much information that would be helpful to you and I. To answer you question, "YES I FOUND THEM!". Heres some links of information that might help the "Humanities" team -> (Game Studies) , (Arts Department) , (Yahoo Humanities) , (College Board Blog) , (WMU NEWS) , and (The Huffington Post) . Now I made sure all of these links had vital information that one game designer needs to know about the "Humanities" genre, so dig in. :D

Taking my next step

Racing, one of my least favorite genres. But in this case I can make an exception. While reviewing some games in Globaloria I got caught in a very addictive game. The game was in the Racing Genre, and for once for me very fun. Many of my Globolaria classmates already know, or played "Drift Runner". So I cant go into much detail about it, because many of you have already experienced the INTENSITY! Besides that example of a Racing game heres a pic, that is related to the genre-->

Blogging with Links

Today we all made a blogpost that provided a link of our choosing (Ex. I did my Linktest on a new game). It went smoothly for me, but just trying to figure out a topic that might be intresting was rough. In the end though I found a topic that I know that has to be one of the most coolest things ever, thus I chose the new game created by the game designers at "Spicey Horse". I know what a name, but they produced a game thats going to be a top seller. The name of the game is "American McGee's Return of Alice", If you want to know more about the game go to my blogpost named "Link Test". The link is at the bottom of the post, Enjoy.