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This is the final product that I was able to produce in that said time. My game is still very buggy however, I didn’t have time to fix this.
If you like, you can also try it by downloading here. Just extract the archive, and run the executable.
The original ideas vs the idea that I followed through with was very different entity. The idea started as a cinematic however, this idea shifted due to the shortened time as I spent too long creating the cars. Therefore, my idea shifted once again to an open world explore game where there will be AI’s that go on road and follow traffic regulations. I thought that this would have been easier however, I was deeply mistaken. Why? Well this was because unlike humanoid AI, Car AI was completely different to how I thought it should have went. I then noticed the time scale on the project getting really close to dealing and therefore I had to make it so that it followed a simple track. This was because it was too late to back out of plan B and too late to come up with something new therefore, plan C was to create something out of what I already had.
So how did this effect me and my workflow. At first it was like there was a wall in front of me which I couldn’t overcome however, I prioritized the a finished product as a prototype rather than a flushed out game.
However, this wasn’t in vain. This is because I managed to pick up many new skills throughout the time.
With so many skills that I picked up on the way I can say that it was fun developing the project.
The original plan I had was to create a cinematic experience taking things from movies such as Fast and Furious. This would have been integrated with numerous shots from different angles. Still featuring both the MX5 and Mustang. This was to show my progression within the college and feature both my favorite and my friends favorite car. Strongly using the symbolism of how far we got.
However, I didn’t follow through with this idea because I didn’t think I had enough time to completely learn a new skill and that I wanted to rely more on the skills I already had and to refine them to be better.
My plan B was to still use both MX5 and Mustang this was because I wanted to have some visual differences within the open world map. I was going to use a landscape spline to draw the road then I would have cars that followed the laws of driving with moving pedestrians however, the car AI was what stumped me and I knew if I carried on there was a good chance I wouldn’t of had any playability.
Okay time was crushing me at this point. I didn’t have a “finished product” so what was my plan? Well I already had a semi AI follow the track as well as 2 completely modelled cars. I also had the cel shader. So out of the tools I had already what was the best course of action? Well to keep using them but at a much lower scope. So with the logic I had already I made a simple track as which was mostly made for “testing”.
I found many bugs within the game such as some collisions being off. The car spinning out of control making it hard to use and AI going of the track.
So before we go into what I think went well and could be improved on in the future let’s hear what other people have to say about my project.
Unit8-FeedbackForm
Unit8-FeedbackFormAns
Looking at my feedback a lot of people have found those bugs which impacted the responses dyadically therefore, I completely understand where they are coming from and that for the time we had for this project more planning and management would of been needed.
I strongly enjoyed learning how to create cars within Blender as well as the owner of those tutorials actually providing me with like each update I posted. This made me more willing to carry on as making the car was hard but not impossible.
I also managed to do my first adventure into C++ which allowed me to create my own plugin. This was a solo endeavor but, I had AI on the side providing me with help when needed. This was also able to overcome the obstacle of the college not having VS 2022 installed on the college computers.
I was able to learn industry standard workflows such as how to make a cel shader, using the correct color pallet. I managed to gain much experience learning about this.
I managed to create a greater understanding of Unreal Engine Blueprint system. This was because I learned about nodes such as when you should create a function or event, how they are called and why it functioned the way it did.
So where did I go wrong so bad? Well let’s start with the scope of the project. No matter which plan I used trying to model 2 distinctive cars was a large time hog. Sometimes I would feel unhappy with the desired car and would often go back to change it. Though the silver lining being that I was able to learn how to make cars and where I’d like to improve in the future.
I was also to hesitant on the cel shader as that was a big selling point into the project that I wanted to create. This often caused me to feel unhappy with what I created and took 3 solo attempts and I finally had to admit it was over and therefore, I had to use a YouTube tutorial. It wasn’t that I was ashamed on using a tutorial but rather I wanted to try and do it by myself and was too stubborn to relies I couldn’t do it.
The main thing which cause the project to fail was the scope this was because I had 2 giant ideas thinking they would be nice to do as I would pick up new skills on the way but turned out I was putting too much strain upon the scope of the project and had to rely on a get out of jail card which was to use the tools I have already created.
I also once again struggled on time management. But , this time for a complete different reason. It was because of the scope thinking I could model 2 cars and make a final product I was mistaken. I have never modelled a car before but thought it would be easy. I wouldn’t of been able to model a car if it wasn’t to OZGUR SARAL so thankyou. His tutorial helped massively.
Something that I wasn’t expecting to interfere with the project was technical issues. This is because both college and at home have PC which are powerful enough to run Unreal Engine. There was many problems such as long save times this was a huge hit to my motivation as some saving sessions would take over 10 mins. FPS was another issue I don’t know how this came about due to the simplicity of the game however, in the end it worked out.
This project has taught me some important lessons. Such as how things that can appear simple at first can be hard to integrate. How it is important to follow the plan. Why it isn’t god doing something completely different to what you intended.
Although the project didn’t go to plan at all. I wouldn’t say that for the experience gained. Which to me as a developer is important. This is because I learned many new skills, delt with obstacles along the way and how to go around them in future. These skills I believe will help me a lot in the future such as plugin creation, and growing in the modelling field which is where I want to focus on in the future. So no I didn’t manage to hit any of the goals I wanted however, it has been very educational.
In future I would research before thinking of my idea. How? Well with the help of the internet I would be able to hunt down any sources of which I want to implement and how long they would take to implement. This would help with the scope and time management of the project.