Worklog for AlternativeRealities

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Asylum - Base level complete(Posted 2002-09-09)
The first level (Cell block A) is now complete, except for furniture. Although I'm still trying to find a solution to the lightmapping.


Paul Huckstepp - AlternativeRealities
http://www.alternativerealities.co.uk
http://www.argames.co.uk

Asylum - Bring in the Builders(Posted 2002-08-24)
After a short break from coding my attention has turned towards building the rest of Cell Block A. I've released a couple of new screenshots that show the more complete corridor outside the first cell. Weapon yielding is working well and I've textured the basic broom stick handle, still trying to get the player model look better and I hope to scan some fabrics in for the texturing soon




Paul Huckstepp - AlternativeRealities
http://www.alternativerealities.co.uk
http://www.argames.co.uk

Asylum - Weapon Yielding Part2(Posted 2002-08-05)
Hurray, Weapon yielding is in, following some queries on the forums I sorted out the parenting issues with the weapon. I didnt realise that when an object is parented to a child object in a 3ds mesh it inherits a 0,0,0 coordinate from the object, i.e. not a world coordinate. Once I realised that I could finally snap the object to the right hand. Next step is the animations for the attacks (melee and ranged) as well as the construction of the first floor.


Paul Huckstepp - AlternativeRealities
http://www.alternativerealities.co.uk
http://www.argames.co.uk

Asylum - Weapon yeilding(Posted 2002-07-28)
For the last few weekends I've been attempting to yield weapons (in the game that is) unfortunately I'm having a few difficulties with parenting the weapon to the right hand, for some unknown reason it doesnt want to know. I've coded a temporary work around but its not 100% perfect.

In the meantime, heres a screenshot showing the Anxiety Engine with an paranoia rating of about 40%




Paul Huckstepp - AlternativeRealities
http://www.alternativerealities.co.uk
http://www.argames.co.uk

Asylum(Posted 2002-07-15)
For the last few weeks I have been concentrating on furthering the research into texture mapping and lightmapping for the game environment and was as putting together the functionality for the inventory panel.

As it stands at the moment the game engine now allows usable objects to be picked up and dropped. When an object in the inventory is clicked a brief description of the object now appears in the bottom section of the display. I have also added visual cues on screen for objects that are in range and can be picked up. Objects outside of this range will display there tags in red, objects within range that can be picked up appear in white.

I am very pleased with the way the inventory is working at the moment and hope to add the use and journal functionality soon, however the journal isn't a vital component of the game just yet.

The anxiety engine is now complete. There was a small bug that was fixed this week; if the anxiety level was at 80% and the player then moved immediately in to a safe zone the fogging effects would get stuck leaving the player in darkness.

So whats next, the next stages for me is to try my hand at the lightmapping, I hope to be able to use lightmapping to improve the appearance of the asylum, and add depth by casting shadows, also, I'm about to try to implement the yielding of weapons.


Paul Huckstepp - AlternativeRealities
http://www.alternativerealities.co.uk
http://www.argames.co.uk

Asylum(Posted 2002-07-10)
Seeing as Asylum is my second Blitz3d game I thought I'd add a worklog to the Blitz website.

Screenshots available : www.argames.co.uk

ASYLUM DEVELOPMENT UPDATE - 19/05/2002
Asylum is still going strong, after another successfully few weeks I have completed some of the troubling collision code.

I have now worked out a system to transfer elements from the main level scene and export those out seperately, this is for doors, lights and any object that can be moved or pickedup.

Although it doesn't sound very exciting, I have managed to get my first door working, doors have always been a bit fiddly and my first attempt left the door constantly swinging round and round, however I have now finished the animations engine and I now have a door that opens correctly and then closes when the player is far enough away from it. I'm extremely pleased with the final result.

Ok, so whats next; My next task is to create an exporter for the level area and the elements so that its more automatic. Also, I'm about to start working on the cut-scene engine, this will allow me to get the openning sequence started and will help move the story along during the game.

Thats all for now, I was hoping to get a screenshot together for this issue but sadly the game hasn't progressed visually enough for that.

Main coding complete on FPS - 04/06/2002
Over the last few weeks I have been concentrating on a number of aspects regarding the development of Asylum, these have been: Texturing solution: to make life easier when it comes to texturing the many objects in the game, I'm currently investigating texturetools.com Tru-V r2 3D Exporter: I have successfully created an export system to allow me to create level structures directly within the 3d modeller, this will allow all the data require for Blitz to be stored within the 3d model itself and then split into the various data files when needed. FPS Code: The FPS is now practically complete, I will add new features when they are needed, the major change in this version is the inertia, it has now been brought down to a much more playable speed. And I can also say that looking down in Asylum does reveal your feet!

First major coding session - 06/05/2002
Asylum development is back. This last week has been very productive, I've penned some new ideas for atmospherics and I have also begun to code the FPS engine for Asylum.

The FPS side currently has a fully working mouselook, character animation, collision detection, up-and-down slopes and stairs, and Jumping. The jump sequence was particularly complex because of the multiple heights that the player can assume, ie jumping from a flight of stairs means that you have further to fall. In the end I calculated the Y Axis Normal of the scenery collision detection, this can only every be pointing at an angle of more than 0 and so must be the floor, it worked fantastically.

The next step is to get crouch working and then the Right-Click inventory. I am also actively working on the texture maps for the characters, if any one knows of a good texture mapping web site please let me know.

ASYLUM Main Site : www.argames.co.uk


Paul Huckstepp - AlternativeRealities
http://www.alternativerealities.co.uk
http://www.argames.co.uk