Month: November 2016

Project 12 Lydia Jin

I really liked the idea of Patatap by Jono Brandel. Therefore, I have decided to work on an artistic keyboard instrument. I want to make typing a more interesting task by creating this project. So when the user types letters and numbers on the keyboard, they will see their printed letters appear on the screen with unexpected visual and sound effects. So that typing is more of an artistic experience for the user. I haven’t decided what theme of sound I want to use yet but the sounds will all fall into the same mood so the typing experience stays consistent. It was a bit hard to draw the different visual effects but this picture I found online will be similar to the visuals in my project.

Grace Cha – Project 12- Proposal

I grew up near a beach, and I really enjoy the ocean and the peacefulness of the waves, but I’m also really interested by the things under the water.  For this final project,  I want to create a looping coral reef that shows the different colors and delight of a underwater land that we are not exposed to.

I was to create a delightful moving animation with the use of simple shapes and forms.  I also want to limit myself to a few colors to avoid getting too complicated.

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Shan Wang – Project Proposal

For my final project, I’m thinking about creating an interactive game similar to the mechanism of the doodle jump based on the animation and objects that we learned this semester.

With the background and platforms being generated with some randomness, all platforms are falling off the screen. Players get to control the main character (currently drawn as a scale figure in the sketch) to jump up to the surrounding platforms to keep the character alive. By pressing left or right key, the user can jump on to the adjacent platform. The game will also keep track of the score (height) that the character has jumped up.

There are some features that I’m considering adding: sound effects for jumping, background music, special platforms that will crack once the character stays over a certain amount of time.
The main focus of this project will be the algorithm that generates the platforms that space out reasonably, providing both challenges and fun at the same time.

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Looking Outwards 12 Lydia Jin

I have decided to work on something similar to Patatapfor my final project. So I decided to look at Patatap and a similar creation named Typatone. Patatap creates unique sound and visual when a specific key is pressed, whereas Typatone generates special tones when as the user types. Both are interesting projects in that they bring uniqueness and unpredictability in user experience. Patatap may have been better if there is a clearer indication of which key is pressed so that when users try to create a composition or sound combination they can better utilize their knowledge on which key produces which sound and visual. On the other hand, Typatone may be improved by changing font color or add more visual variations to it. Overall, I really like the idea of Patatap and Typatone as they bring in more variability and color to everyday lives.

typatobe Typatone screenshot

final-project-proposal

For my final project, I want to do some sort of simple platformer game, similar to one like the original Mario. While I’m not 100% set on the details re:how things will look (like the player character/setting/etc) I know it will be 8-bit style. You can’t go back to anything once it’s left the screen (i.e you can move forward right past the screen and it’ll move, but not back left past the edge of the screen) both to emulate Mario and to avoid everything being very slow because it has to load too much.
It will probably be a typical fantasy setting, and the player character will be a girl. And it will definitely involve rescuing a princess, because lesbian princesses.

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ELIZA, Joseph Weizenbaum, 1964 to 1966,

web port of Eliza

ELIZA was essentially the first artificial companion computer program. Weizenbaum created ELIZA to act as an artificial therapist setting up the program to have certain rules to apply to certain phrases so that the program responds in a way that appears natural and human. Weizenbaum claims that his intent with ELIZA was to create a parody of “the responses of a non-directional psychotherapist in an initial psychiatric interview”.

Mountain, David OReily, 2014

Mountain is a “mountain simulator”/”relax em up” game. The only controls the player has in the game is to shift the camera and the rest of the gameplay is simply watching what happens to the mountain in the center of the screen. While there are many varying opinions on the game, critics often compliment its ability to invoke a stroke emotional response from players about this inanimate object.

What I admire about both these projects is there experimentation with emotional human response and the questioning the concept of caring. However, they do this in two very diffrent ways. ELIZA is mimicking and commenting on real life (more specifically a failed mental health system). Weizenbaum was actually disturbed by the response that ELIZA was considered “alive” by many people. ELIZA brings up questions of sincerity and the player’s need for a caretaker.  While Mountain is actually cultivating an experience that unlike what the player has experienced in either real life or a video game. Mountain challenges the current definition of games and also the “active” role of a player.

 

Grace Cha-Looking Outwards-12

For my Final Project, I want to create a generative landscape that loops in a entertaining and delightful way perhaps some interactive features with the mouse.

Two projects that I got inspiration from is from Leander and Holger’s projects.

Leander ‘s project Basecamp (2014)

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Leander’s Basecamp project is an ongoing loop of pyramids that show stripes of colors as the background changes.  I really like the very predictable nature of the colors and changes. I wish there was an element of people walking around to indicate that it was a Basecamp, but I do enjoy the simplicity of the program.

 

Holger Lippmann’s Project NoiseScape 4 (2016)

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Holger’s NoiseScape is a rework of an ongoing script.  It morphs slowly into a kind of “romantic” landscape painting.  The technical basics are still very simple; rows of ellipses with some 2d noise and different color arrays.  I admire the simplicity and spontaneity of different random lines as the more structure loop of Leander’s Basecamp.

 

I hope to incorporate simple colors such at Leander’s Basecamp, while adding an element of spontaneity.

Shannon Case Project Proposal

For my final project I would like to make an interactive animation. I would like to draw images and create different short animations when different keys are pressed. I would like to also incorporate sounds for when these images are played, and maybe have some interactions with the mouse if time allows.

I am thinking of creating different animations with different sounds similar to the keyboard example you gave, but I would like to combine this sound element with hand drawn elements. I think it would be really interesting to juxtapose the hand drawn with the computer generated.

I am also considering making this into some sort of game, but I haven’t really thought much about this yet and would like to just try and get the animations done and working first.

I have already started on a few series of drawings, like the one below:

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Diana Connolly – Looking Outwards 12

For my project, I take inspiration from Flappy Bird and Super Mario (Underwater). Flappy Bird is a game in which the user controls a bird as it’s flying to the right, and moves it up or down to avoid hitting obstacles. The underwater Super Mario game has you control Mario’s location as he’s going right or left in the underwater landscape, and you have to make sure to not hit any of the monsters in your way or else you’ll die. Please see some gameplay of each game below:

Both games are “side-scroller” games in that the storyline of the game progresses as you move horizontally across a landscape. Both games have the player move up or down to avoid hitting things that could kill them. This is similar to my project, because I want to make a game in which a player plays as a scuba diver underwater, and the landscape is moving past them horizontally. The player has to manipulate only the vertical position of the scuba diver in order to explore the side-scroller world and avoid hitting the rock cliffs that exist above and below the scuba diver character.

Looking Outwards 12- Sofia Syjuco

In this last Looking Outwards, I looked through projects in the infinite-runner and side-scrolling genres of games. These would be especially interesting and relevant to my final project, because I intend to create a kind of infinite-runner/side-scroller game.

http://www.canabalt.com/

The first project that I was inspired by was the game Canabalt by Adam Saltzman for the Experimental Game Project. I thought this game was very interesting because, while thematically it’s a pretty simple game, its aesthetics and strict color scheme make it a very visually appealing game, and add a sense of drama. I really admire the way that art can not only just make a game look ‘good’, but it can actually play such a deciding role in whether the game’s experience itself is good. The graphics don’t have to be hyper-realistic, it’s all in the artistic sensibilities of the artist. The only thing I think that was overlooked was adding more appeal and interest to the game itself – jumping over buildings as a suit-clad office worker looks alright, but quickly loses luster.

http://www.swordandsworcery.com/

The second project I looked to for inspiration was Sword and Sworcery, by Superbrothers. It’s not an infinite runner, but it is a very beautifully created side-scroller. I really admire the art of it, how nostalgic it is even when it isn’t exactly what retro games used to look like – it still retains some feeling of the past. I want to use Sword and Sworcery as an art inspiration for my project, and study it for how I can incorporate visuals into my side-scrolling game. As my project will be a game that many will remember from childhood, I want its art to suggest something nostalgic and fond memories.

Both of these projects are very different in terms of what kind of games they are, and what the user experience is, but I think that I can learn a lot from the both of them in order to create the kind of game that I’m imagining.