Game Design

I am so excited to get started on my game design.  It's been a long journey to finally get to this part of the class.  We finally get to start making our game.  But before we do this, we have to present our game demos.  I absolutely cannot wait for Tuesday, which is when we are presenting our demos.  We get to dress up for it and everything.  This class has been amazing and I wish I could take it again next year. 

Switching Teams

Today, my original partner and I switched teams.  We are now part of Jacey's team, the White Hawks.  We have changed all of our information and are now helping out with the game demo and each others learning logs.  I think this will be a positive change for all us because now we are able to help each other in our strengths and weaknesses.  Our topic before was endangered animals.  Now, our topic is bullying.

I think this link, http://www.endangeredspecie.com/, tells a lot about our topic. I like this link because it tells you everything you really need to know like why should we save endangered animals or what animals are endangered in specific areas. I choose this picture because I thought it was significant to our topic. This picture is a collage of some of the endangered animals of the world.

Flash Topic

The two main flash topics my partner and I will use in our game is the rectangle tool and the text box because our game is going to be a series of minigames. The rectangle tool will be used for the next buttons and some of the games. The text box will be used for the next buttons, the titles,some of the games, and the directions and intros. I think are learning topic is good and I think our players will learn a lot from our game. We could improve our game by putting more action in it so the player will pay more attention to the game and be more involved in it.

A Link

My partner found a good link that shows you everything you need to know about some of the endangered animals of the world. http://www.ypte.org.uk/environmental/endangered-animals-of-the-world/24 This link was very helpful for our knowledge of these poor animals. It was a very interesting website and very educational.

Scenes

The scenes in our game tells a lot about the topic. In our game you have to drag and drop the animals to their correct habitat, match an animal to its correct name, and answer some interesting facts about endangered animals. The facts offer information such as why some endangered animals are endangered. Players will be sure to learn a lot about endangered animals from this game. WV Animals Rescue Squad was one of the games in the Playing to Learn assignment that showed the players a lot about their topic. In that game, you learn about three different types of animals. From playing this game,  we learned that we should let the player become more involved in the game, it would teach them more about endangered animals.

Sound

My partner and I haven't decided if we are going to use sound or not.  In the end, we probably will. But I guess it all depends on what we decide, we may decide to not use sound. I'm not sure yet.  It would probably be a good idea to use sounds that imitate the sounds of endangered animals.  For example, when they put the animals in their correct habitat, the only will make the sound that it makes.  By doing this, I think it would enhance the work put into our game.  It would also make players want to play the game more. 

Knowledge on Our Topic

My partner and I have learned a lot about our topic in the process of making our game. We have learned about the endangered animals in our game. We've learned things such as why they are endangered, where they live, and what we can do to help them. We chose this topic because it seemed like an interactive topic that children would be interested in learning about. If I could talk to "knowledge producers" I wouldn't have anything to reccomend to them because I have learned a lot and am very satisfied with the knowledge that I have acquired.  I feel that I could improve my learning process by paying closer attetion to what I'm learning and concentrating harder.

The two main flash topics my partner and I will use in our game is the text box and the rectangle tool because our game is going to be a series of minigames. The text box will be used for the next buttons, the titles, the intros and directions, and some of the games. The rectangle tool will be used for some of the games and the next buttons. We have a great learning topic.  It is appropiate for the players that will be playing our game and it is very simple.  The game is not confusing at all.  To improve our game, we could put more action in it so that the player could be more involved.

Drawing A Scene

We have just completed the drawing a scene section.  It didn't take very long, since it's pretty simple.  Researching the information for our game was also easy.  We mainly used Wikipedia and other internet resources.  The knowledge that we gained was also very useful for every day information.  There were plenty of new concepts that we have learned so far in the process of making our game demos.  Such as the concept of the endangered animals species list.  This lists every animal that is already endangered and also animals that are in danger of becoming endangered. The information that we have learned from our research has greatly helped us throughout making our game.  

Planning Your Game

My partner and I work very well together.  We split up the roles so nobody has to do anymore than the other.  So far, we haven't had that much trouble with any of the assignments.  Most of them are just time consuming.  The hardest assignment yet has been the mini-game project because it was really confusing.  The thing I look forward to the most working with my team would just be having someone there to help me with everything.  I work better collaboratively so it really helps.  The greatest challange about collaborative work would probably be making decisions together based on each others opinions and getting along.  My partner and I don't have a problem with getting along.  And as far as our opinions go, we both seem to consider each of our opinions fully so I don't think we'll have any problems.

Finishing the Mini-Game Project

It is such a relief to finish the mini-game project.  It feels amazing to know that I'm done with it.  I don't usually play games in my free time.  This topic doesn't really give me a new perspective about playing games cause it's just so complicated and confusing.  But, it is definitely a relief to be finally finished with the mini-game project.  It took so long.

My Progress in Globaloria

So far, globaloria has been pretty good.  The only thing I don't like is how confusing it all is.  For example, the mini game project.  I really don't like it. Most of the time it doesn't even work when you put the code in. I don't have any patience so you can imagine how frustrating this is for me. I'm sure I'll get the hang of everything soon, though.

Research Links

These are the links I used for my research.

• 1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endangered_species
• 2. http://en.wkiipedia.org/wiki/Overexploitation
• 3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Restoration_of_the_Everglades

This is an extra link I also used for research.

http://www.eearth.tv/?p=245

Game Genre

I previously wrote about this, but I am now editing it.

 

My partner and I are thinking about doing a strategy game.  Our strategy game is going to consist of a series of mini-games.  For example, word searches, matching, etc..  We are also thinking about an action game.  We think that this particular genre would be a lot more challenging to make but also more exciting to make. We will eventually have to decide but I think we are leaning more towards strategy.

Mini-Game Project

Yesterday, we started on the mini-game project. It was difficult for some of us to get the template to open. Finally, every one got it open and we began. First we added each object to the library. By doing this, we can delete the rest of the items from the slate but if we need them, they will be avaiable in the library.  Then, we played around with it a little bit so that we could get famialrized with it.  The mini-game project should help us out a lot in the long run. But hopefully, it goes by quickly.

Goals.

Setting goals is very important.  Everyone should set goals and try their best to work towards accomplishing them. Four goals that I have for this class would be keeping my learning log updated, putting forth plenty of effort, helping others, and keeping myself on task. 

• A lot of times I forget to update my learning log at the end of the day. It doesn't take that long, so I'm going to work on trying to remember everyday to update it.
• Sometimes I feel like I'm not putting enough effort into my work.  I think if I put my effort into my work, my grades will better reflect the work I've done.
• I'm usually always confused on what we're working on or what we're doing in this class, but sometimes I actually know what I'm doing. I'm going to work on helping others with their work.
• It is extremely hard to keep myself on task in this class, which is why I get behind a lot. This is also something I am going to try very hard to work on.

I also have some bad habits.  A couple of them would be putting off blogging and talking a little too much.

• A lot of times, I put off blogging because it's not the greatest thing in the world to do. I am planning to break this habit and blog when I am supposed to.
• Also, I am going to try to break the habit of talking too much, I think this is what is keeping me from blogging.

Videos.

After watching the BrainPop videos, I learned that you should always be very careful about what you post on the internet.  You should never post things such as your name, your gender, or your school.  You should always have your parents check the people that you are talking to on the internet and what websites you are on.  It can be very dangerous, so you always have to take precautions and use correct internet safety. My plan for keeping my learning log updated it to make sure I post what I accomplish in class everyday.

Christmas Break

My break felt like it went by so fast!  I wish it would have lasted a little bit longer.  I had an amazing Christmas, I got pretty much everything that I wanted.  The day after Christmas, I went back to Morgantown with my sister and her boyfriend for about a week.  While I was there, we went shopping, to the movies, played basketball, etc..  I got back home on Friday and Andi came over for New Years.  The next day, I went to my mom's house.  On my last day of break, I went to the mall with my dad and then came home, cleaned my room, and got ready for school and practice today. Overall, I had a very good break.