So, past week and half I've been reading in to Blast Theory Games. These games are very similar to what our project is hoping to accomplish. I'm currently researching the ins and outs of gaming in both virtual space and real space. The idea I'm working on at the moment is how to keep parties on both ends of the game entertained and cooperative. Many of the Blast Theory games use SMS or mobile technology to have the players communicate with each other, which should be helpful in designing our game interface.
http://www.blasttheory.co.uk/bt/type_games.html
Monday, October 25, 2010
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Update
So, I still have the plague. Lovely. Nyquil has been my BFF these past few days.
When I am conscious though, I've been working on finding previous shooter games in processing. This way I can see how other people have accomplished it and see what problems/issues they had with the gameplay. I've found a lot of examples of "Asteroids" and other shooter games, which is giving me hope. When I'm feeling a little better I plan to test out some of these codes and begin messing with them to get a feel for just what they do. Hopefully this will lead to a working prototype for our game interface.
When I am conscious though, I've been working on finding previous shooter games in processing. This way I can see how other people have accomplished it and see what problems/issues they had with the gameplay. I've found a lot of examples of "Asteroids" and other shooter games, which is giving me hope. When I'm feeling a little better I plan to test out some of these codes and begin messing with them to get a feel for just what they do. Hopefully this will lead to a working prototype for our game interface.
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
Official Proposal
Our initial idea for this project was to make a real-life version of the game Pac-man. Instead of the traditional game controls with a keyboard, the players of the game will move around in the physical space in order to move their Pac-Man on screen. This would be achieved by having a GPS-capable cellphone with the game client and a server side computer that will process the incoming GPS data. Upon further research, we learned that this idea had in fact been done fairly recently, and set out to find another project idea.
After we realized that our Pac-Man idea wouldn’t work, we decided to try another style of game that would offer more of a challenge. The targeted community that will benefit from our project include fellow students who are also interested in integrating mobile phone technology (apps and GPS system) with server side information processing, and students who are interested in game design for phones. This will bring greater mobility in future app/game designs.
The other group community that would benefit from this project would be the incoming freshmen of Sixth College. This project will allow them to examine how technological and artistic developments can work together and consequently affect our lives today.
For this project, we plan to make the game Missile Command “come to life”. In the game, the player is required to defend six cities from oncoming missiles. These missiles will be controlled by a user on a computer using some kind of game interface. (Processing?) The user’s mouse clicks will determine when and where the missiles are raining down from with limitations on the amount of missiles that can be sent. The other half of the game will take place in a physical space. Six people using GPS-capable cell phones will act as the defending cities. They will be required to get to the designated co-ordinates and detonate at the correct time to destroy the virtual missiles. This will be achieved using the cellphones with the game client and a server side computer to process the incoming GPS data and relay the missile information provided by the game interface.
List of responsibilities/apps needed for this project:
1. Game client for phone, done in J2ME, that uses GPS signals to defend the cities.
2. Server, process the GPS coordinates and sends the information to both the display and cellphone client
3. Game interface. Where the user commands the missiles from and the game is displayed.
After we realized that our Pac-Man idea wouldn’t work, we decided to try another style of game that would offer more of a challenge. The targeted community that will benefit from our project include fellow students who are also interested in integrating mobile phone technology (apps and GPS system) with server side information processing, and students who are interested in game design for phones. This will bring greater mobility in future app/game designs.
The other group community that would benefit from this project would be the incoming freshmen of Sixth College. This project will allow them to examine how technological and artistic developments can work together and consequently affect our lives today.
For this project, we plan to make the game Missile Command “come to life”. In the game, the player is required to defend six cities from oncoming missiles. These missiles will be controlled by a user on a computer using some kind of game interface. (Processing?) The user’s mouse clicks will determine when and where the missiles are raining down from with limitations on the amount of missiles that can be sent. The other half of the game will take place in a physical space. Six people using GPS-capable cell phones will act as the defending cities. They will be required to get to the designated co-ordinates and detonate at the correct time to destroy the virtual missiles. This will be achieved using the cellphones with the game client and a server side computer to process the incoming GPS data and relay the missile information provided by the game interface.
List of responsibilities/apps needed for this project:
1. Game client for phone, done in J2ME, that uses GPS signals to defend the cities.
2. Server, process the GPS coordinates and sends the information to both the display and cellphone client
3. Game interface. Where the user commands the missiles from and the game is displayed.
Monday, October 4, 2010
Research
So begins the research process.
We started by paying a visit to C.R.C.A. in the Calit2 building to see if we could get any input on the best way to go about creating this live gaming experience. After speaking with William Huber, we got a few things figured out.
-We could potentially try to make both the cities and missiles powered by cell phone users in the real space.
**We would need to acquire 36 GPS phones to do this, which isn't very reasonable given our student budget.
-We could have the missiles powered by a user on a computer and have just the cities be people with cell phones. This way, we'll only need 6 GPS cell phones.
- We will need a phone client, a game interface, and a server to connect the information.
-We will need to figure out how we want to program the phone --> computer (j2me?)
Things to do this week:
-Talk to Candy about phones
-Start working with basic processing sketches to work on the game interface.
We started by paying a visit to C.R.C.A. in the Calit2 building to see if we could get any input on the best way to go about creating this live gaming experience. After speaking with William Huber, we got a few things figured out.
-We could potentially try to make both the cities and missiles powered by cell phone users in the real space.
**We would need to acquire 36 GPS phones to do this, which isn't very reasonable given our student budget.
-We could have the missiles powered by a user on a computer and have just the cities be people with cell phones. This way, we'll only need 6 GPS cell phones.
- We will need a phone client, a game interface, and a server to connect the information.
-We will need to figure out how we want to program the phone --> computer (j2me?)
Things to do this week:
-Talk to Candy about phones
-Start working with basic processing sketches to work on the game interface.
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