Gameplay Programmer
Department breakdown
Table of Contents
Game Summary
This game was done as a part of the 2017 Global Game Jam, and created at the Collin College site. It is a vive experience where in the player is placed behind the wheel of a space ship (that looks more like it belongs on the sea). The player can chuck lightning spears and also observe the outer space environment near what appears to be saturn.
I Contributed the code the lightning spear code, the vive controls code, and also debugged the github repo and handled integration of assets.
Personal Contributions
Vive Controls and the Lightning Spear
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Explored what was needed to get the Vive controls working in Unity.
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Got picking up and dropping objects working (which also got throwing objects working).
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Plugged in the correct pieces into the levels.
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Researched how to handle teleporting the player, as well as how to have a laser pointer come off of the controllers
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Made attempts to solve issue of spear clipping into a player's face.
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Responsible for getting the lightning spear to feel good for throwing.
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Stopped it from rotating once released.
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Removed all weight and gravity from it.
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Increased launch speed.
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Vive Spear Chucking script
SpearBarrel Script
Integration and Debugged Github Repo
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Integration
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The integration process went smoothly in some places, and less so in others.
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Exceedingly interesting to see how differently each individual chose to set up the individual pieces of the whole project.
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Those differences did cause some hindrance in the ability to integrate everything.
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The whale was originally suppose to be damageable and also able to attack the boat for instance.
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Debugged Github Repo
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Found solutions for when a submission collision occurred.
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Moved fast to help resolve the issues quickly.
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Set down some standards to help prevent future submission collisions.
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What Went Well
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The support for the Vive in Unity was very strong and easy to set up, had a prototype up and running within the first three or four hours.
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Likely due to my position in the room (the center of it due to needing to have access to a vive), and the producers constantly moving about, I felt like I was always let in on what all has been let in or changed decision wise.
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Although still more that would of needed to be done before could call what I worked on perfect, the spear chucking actually feels pretty good to do.
Challenges
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Integration was painful in places.
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The whale in particular was not set up or imported correctly. Thus the collision on it would not work; needed more time to get that functional.
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Most everyone on the time was unfamiliar with Github, thus a good chunk of the first day was devoured thanks to push collisions.
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Size of team with how much needed to be done in such a short time did lead to a rather hectic environment.
What I Learned
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Vive, or potentially even other VR hardware, is pretty simple to prepare in Unity.
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If need to hack stuff together as a team in a very short period of time, avoid using a version control method that most everyone is unfamiliar with.
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A large team can accomplish quite a lot in a short amount of time if well organized and with clear communication.