2010/11/08

Alphabet You Bet

Occasionally when I show people my concept for KanaKana, they will ask me if I plan on making the game for other languages further down the line. While this is a possibility, it probably won't happen until I've had a chance to study those languages and seen how they work.

That being said, I've had an idea for the first such spin-off.

Alphabet You Bet

A game designed to aid in helping Japanese people learn the English letter system.

It won't take much to make once KanaKana is ready. A simple palette swap at best. Replace the English menu with one in Japanese, and change the letter sets from ひらがな (Hiragana), カタカナ (Katakana), and Romaji (Roman letters, the alphabet) to UPPERCASE, lowercase, and カタカナ (Katakana, the foreign word system).

Both languages involve the use of two letter sets (as well as the home language letter set), so I won't have to monkey around with the code to get it to work. I have gone with another play on words (that no one will get) for the tile, to keep in line with KanaKana.

For now it's just something to think about, but one day I'll try and make it a reality.

Final week

Time sure has shot by.

Not that long ago, I started this blog to document my work in my university course, and now that course has reached the end. I've done so much and kept so busy, but still it feels like I've only just begun.

It's hard to believe that it is over. Nothing left to do but wait and hope that I've done everything right.

Even after my course is finished, I intend to continue posting my work on this blog. I also plan on working on KanaKana until it is a finished game capable of being fun as well as being a useful study tool.

In honour of the occasion here is the link to a build of the game I will be submitting.
KanaKana final build

2010/11/03

KanaKana in focus

The long day is over.

I have managed to rewire KanaKana several times over. Out of the things I was hoping to do, I have managed to:
  • Add the option to choose which character sets are in use
  • Add a colour changing function
  • Add a letter set function
  • Add a decent menu (still needs work though)
  • Make the labels handle a lot better than before
  • Include a Splashscreen (the one up /|\ there)
  • Redo the help section to be a lot more accessible
  • Fixed the graphics on the tiles
Not bad for a single night's lost sleep.

After having it examined today, I've received a good number of suggestions on where I can improve it better:
  • Change out the Go board for something else (the grid pattern is distracting, especially with the different sized tiles)
  • I should move the score counts to the bottom of the screen and move the collected tiles into a cushioned area over the side so that the connects can be observed easier.
  • Add a review mode so people can study how the letters connect in greater detail.
  • Have it as an unlockable web as the player passed each set.
  • fix the new game menu, so that it is more clear what each option does.
  • Have the discarded letters appear as bonus pieces (we, wi, wu, ye, yi)
  • Give people a chance to review the characters to be learned, by having them appear more often.
  • fix the textures so that there isn't pixelation on some and not on others (get rid of the bevels)
  • fix the random colour issue (too many of the same colour appearing in random mode)
  • have completed letters disappear from the HUD (some sort of wipe)
  • fix the speed so the longer you hold the faster it goes
  • lessen the accuracy if this is going to be more than just a learning app
  • decide on an actual theme and start working from there.
A lot done, and a lot yet to be done. But first to sleep.

End run

Reaching the end of my 24hr battle.

As I am running short on time now I shall be focusing on the art a bit more thoroughly. First up is the Helpscreen. I've received some complaints about how I had it set up before so not the are helpful visualisations included to help.


Hopefully I'll have this fully integrated as well as a proper splash screen by the time it's due.

At the crack of dawn

Coming up on 6am now.

I somehow managed to make it through the night without going mad. I have made a lot of progress over the night, adding some features I knew I was in need of.

Here goes:

Added a colour changing option. Players can now select from 3 gameplay modes.
Pair (colour coded)
Mixed (random colours)
None (plain white)

Set it up so that letter sets can be changed in game by clicking on the Set display.

Fixed the options menu. Now the class swapping, colour changing, and set switching can all be done in the one place.

Added a random letter mode to the letter sets.

Still have a few things I'm going to try and fit in while I still have time but otherwise KanaKana finished. The main game is functional, there are options to adjust gameplay, and it has all the letters needed to learn Hiragana and Katakana.

2010/11/02

2 minutes to midnight


Approaching midnight now.

Have been working pretty much nonstop since this morning. I have gotten a fair bit done, but have spent even more time fixing the code every time it broke (pretty much when ever I tried to do something).

I did a quick test and discovered that 35 is the maximum number of tiles you can have on the field and still have it playable. (For an idea I'll have to look into later)

Setup a larger display picture for the highlighted symbol and added a set display. (Hoping to add the option of choosing which set to study)

A functional in-game menu.

The options screen still needs some work, but now you can choose which letters you play with.
Romaji (alphabet) & Hiragana (curvy one)
Romaji & Katakana (pointy one)
Hiragana & Katakana

While I have spent a lot of time rewiring the code, I think in the long run it will be worth it. The way I had it all laid out before was very limiting. Now coming into the final stretch I am hoping for some luck at getting the rest of the features in.

24hr Sprint

Tomorrow is the beginning of the end.

I intend to have KanaKana ready for display by this time tomorrow. Henceforth, I plan on spending the next 24hrs sitting down in front of the computer doing nothing but work. Nonstop.

I will be starting at 10am (Brisbane time), being 00:00zulu. Hopefully I'll be able to show my progress throughout the day. Here goes.

KanaKana update:
  • Fixed the letter handler so it can now load all the letter sets.
  • Added a loading screen (doesn't show up to often ... if at all)
  • Optimised the letter textures to lessen load time
  • Fixed the problem with letter clicking
  • Letters clear as soon as they hit their partner

2010/10/30

KanaKana Progress Report

A couple of days ago I uploaded a build of the game to the language site Smart.fm, to have it tested. I got some very helpful advice on what needed to be done to make KanaKana work better. One of the biggest concerns was that more letters were needed. Therefore I have to go back and rework the letter handler (I'm keeping a back-up of the working script just in case).

Going through and creating the letters for each set has resulted in something quite startling though. There is 70+ characters in each set (hiragana, katakana, and english), luckily I've been able to lower the number of materials needed but that's still over 210 textures in use (not all at once thankfully). After I get everything working again I might need to worry about efficiency a bit deeper.

With some luck I'll have everything online before the deadline on Wednesday.

2010/10/27

KanaKana Progress

new KanaKana now with:
a fully functional HUD (some glitches excepted)

a New Game function

a display of which letter is selected

and sparklies when the title is selected (will lead to the About page).

On top of that, I've also fixed it so that:
  • arrows will disappear when their letter is destroyed
  • the player can click anywhere on the board to move a piece after it is selected (a bit iffy in the builds though ... will sort out ASAP)
  • the menu buttons will switch out for a Japanese word when highlighted and return to English when not
Made a lot of progress today. And today's not even over yet.

2010/10/26

KanaKana Update

After a little monkeying with the code and some issues of displaying text, KanaKana now has ... [drumroll] ... an actual heads up display, complete with functional buttons. The only button that does anything at the moment is the exit of course but it's a start.

The numbers along the HUD will actually change when I tell them to. At the moment all they do is cycle up, but it's a start. Once I get the different scripts talking to each other they'll actually have meaning. Might even try adding a clock.


Now just about all that's left to do is:
  • Get the scripts communicating
  • Set up the new game function
  • Set up the next level (hopefully so it will keep going)
  • Add a help-screen
  • And adjust some features
Anything after that is just gravy. If I get it running on time I'll be able to add more letters. With some luck, I'll have it ready for beta testing tomorrow afternoon. I've already got plenty of volunteers waiting to give it a try.

2010/10/20

Kana Kana Update

After correcting a few issues in the code, the basis for the game is finally ready. The player can now click on a letter and have it move in the direction they want it to. The pieces will move and gradually lose momentum. And each pair of letters is able to recognise when it has run into its partner. Now, I just need to add a menu and continued playability, but first an Art Pass.

Because my previous art style seemed a bit haphazard (and distracting), I have been advised to give the art style an overhaul before continuing. I am trying to give it a more Japanese feel by shaping the art around the game Go. Still have to adjust a few things, but I think that this approach is more suited to the game I am trying to make.

Not long now and I should have a nice little game to present (good thing too, time's almost up).

2010/10/13

Kana Kana Update

2 weeks left to get this game up and running.

I've managed to make a lot of progress today, but still have awhile to go before it is ready to play.

The game now has a proper title to work with. かなカナ(Kana Kana). Being that Kana is the name of the syllabaries in Japanese, and also a word meaning "I wonder" or "I think". A silly little pun that will need to be explained somewhere. Will be doing up the title screen when I get the chance.

Added a transparent sphere mesh to each letter to make them into balls. Also place a series of walls on the field with colliders on them to bounce the balls off.

Made it so that when a ball is clicked, an arrow will appear and rotate around the letter to follow the mouse. At the moment, the ball will move when clicked again but in a direction regardless of the mouse and with no loss of momentum.

Through use of some crafty coding I can now summon all 5 letter pairs to the field using only one mesh for all of them. I had to go back to using 5 separate materials for each letter (10 all up), but I should be able to go back to using texture swapping when I include the other letters (a half dozen other sets) by dividing them into sets.
Have also managed to set it up so that the letter pairs will recognise each other when they hit. They will then destroy and release a sparkly cloud of particles. In the end there will be some sort of score that is added to by this.

A lot done. Still more to come. This should be fun.

2010/10/06

Status Update

After much thought I have decided to focus towards the pool concept from my last post. By removing the typing component I am hoping to make it simpler for the people who never seen these symbols before.

What I am planning is for a half dozen balls to appear on screen (a pair of each letter set [kana & alpha]), the player then clicks the ball they want to move. The objective is to bounce the ball around the table and into its partner. This is done until there are no letters remaining. A side challenge would be to do it in the fewest clicks possible.

At the moment I should have all the code-base I need to knock together a functional prototype, just need to type it in. Right now I can summon a pair of letters to random positions on the field easily, adding more shouldn't present a challenge. After that it's just clicking and firing that remain.

I have also fixed the issue of needing multiple materials to texture (still need the individual letters as textures though), now all I need to do is figure out how to change colour via code and it should be set.

2010/09/22

Kana Brainstorming


Now that the project has a little momentum beneath it, it's time to start considering ways of making it a bit more playable.

_initiate_

Path 1: Bomb drop
Players click a section of the screen, placing a bomb. They then type a letter for that bomb to use. When the invading symbols enter the bomb's radius it explodes, taking out any symbols of the letter it was programmed with.
This would make it a kind of puzzle/strategy game, getting the player to work on clearing the screen with as few clicks as possible.

Path 2: Lasso pool
Not long ago I made a game involving using gravitational attraction to put an orb in a hole. This would be along a similar line of capturing a letter and luring it into the correct goal. Each goal would correspond to a letter set (a,i,u,e,o). Possible to even make it fit along the scope of billiards by having the player line up to sink the letter.
This would probably end up as a puzzle game, with the typing aspect removed in favour of matching the hiragana symbol with it's English opposite and then navigating the best way to get it in the hole.

_end_

I'll probably come up with a few more ideas in the next couple of days or so, luckily the requirements for most of the ideas I've come up with can be done using more or less the same code base. Therefore, I'll be able to build one then work others into a kind of arcade pack.

Kana Status

Today I've had the chance to work on my personal project a bit more.

The player can now type letters to make the symbols appear (a = あ, i = い, u = う, e = え, o = お). At the moment, though, the symbol appears by the dozen and firing out the wrong end of the cannon at high speed, but that should be easily fixable when I get a chance to sort it out a bit.

Next up is getting the enemy letters moving in (will need to sort out the firing error first though). Then I just need to work out the gameplay a bit, so people who haven't seen these letter before will still be able to play.

I have also made it so only 1 mesh is required for the letters with the material switching for each. Before I had a separate mesh and material for each letter, meaning the full version would require upwards of 80 meshes and textures accordingly. Now I just need the textures and a single mesh (I'll have to look into some sort of group texture system if I want to lower it more).

Working so far:
  • cannon rotates to follow mouse
  • keyboard entry
  • material switching
  • correct symbol appears when letter is pressed

Kebablhu menu sprites

For the past week or so I've been working on the menu sprites for Kebablhu. Simple little pixel assets to serve as menu buttons and cursors. Here are the finished products:

2010/09/09

Personal Project: Game


In the hopes that I will have something to show for myself come end of semester (it's getting too close for comfort) I have decided to try and make one of my game ideas on my own.


My Unity skills are a bit rusty, so it's going to be slow going for a little while (until I get back into it a bit). The main things I need to work on is 2-3 digit character entry, randomisation of symbols, material switching, collision detection, and some form of controlling which character sets are in use (k, h, s, t, etc.).


This project should be simple enough not to interfere with my other work, yet still stand a chance of being workable by the end of semester. Time to get started.