Finished game and overall thoughts (13th May)
- Ben Nichols
- May 13, 2021
- 5 min read
Overall I am really pleased with this game and feel the best way to test the games success is to compare it to the success criteria set out in the pitch.
Success Criteria from Pitch document[1]
Success Criteria review:
The image above shows the success criteria that I had for this game, with the main points being that the game should be educational and easy to interactive with and navigate. From the feedback from the questionnaires that I was given it is clear that this game is an effective method of teaching people about nature and by using a blend of sound and interactable gameplay, people saw this as an effective means of teaching. People stated that the game offered an immersive experience and that they liked the look and feel of the environment, though it was also noted that the game could have used additional features such as maps and key instructions on the screen. Saying this however I feel the game is a success when it comes to delivering an interactable and easy to navigate game but could use these additional improvements to complete the experience.
Sub-Success Criteria review:
With the environment looking like North Melbury Wood I feel like this game fell short, though saying this I feel that during development I realised that this isn’t a critical component of the game and that the main purpose of the game (as stated by the success criteria) was to provide a fleshed out educational experience.
Comparison photos:
As you can see from the comparison images, the environment doesn’t look like North Melbury Wood, though it is clear from looking at the images where the inspiration for the environment came from and what it was trying to mimic. Even though this doesn’t resemble the real life location I still feel that by using/visiting North Melbury wood as a reference point for my work, I was able to create a landscape far more unique and realistic feeling then if I was to create a forest just based off my own thoughts. This project has really shown me the importance of referencing images and real life locations as this will vastly improve the work that you produce and as a level designer I definitely learnt the importance of this practice.
Moving on to the last point, which is the level of detail in the environment and to have an atmospheric game. With this I have a mix of opinions, on the one hand the game has enough detail in the forest and vegetation though on the other hand pathways and some of the borders could have been fleshed out and polished. This being said, the more detail that I would add the greater the performance would be hit, so getting the right level of detail without affecting the performance was key. I believe that despite some odd looking pathway textures and wonky trees, overall the game creates and atmospheric and immersive environment and from the feedback that I received from play tester everyone was impressed with the look and feel of the environment and have all said that it added to the overall experience.
Overall thoughts on Development :
Initial Development time line, from pitch document[1]
With the above development time line I was on track with the majority of the points and deadlines that I wanted to reach. The major deadline that I wasn’t able to meant was getting an early test session done, this would have been really useful with pointing me in the right direction for certain elements e.g. adding in a map. Though the project wasn’t in a position up until the final week to do a real play test, this was mostly due to the fact that elements of the game such as the UI took a lot longer then expected to put into the game and required more polish to achieve the feel that I wanted. Apart from this I would have liked to have added a bit more polish to the game such as fixing some lighting issues and texturing issues. Overall though development on this project was mostly on track and the only real thing I would do differently if I was to do this project again, would be to manage my time better between this project and my other assignment for my group project, which was scoped way to big and meant that I had to dedicate more time to that then this project. Apart from this I’ve learnt a lot developing this game and techniques to apply to make development a lot more time efficient in UE4, the main lesson that I have learnt especially in terms of level design is that bigger isn’t better and that by scaling environments down allows for more quality of life checks and testing to be done along with generally better performance in game.
What I would do if I had more time:
If I had more time on the project I would have first fixed up the lighting issues, texture issues along with implementing changes suggested by my game testers such as adding in a pop up map that the player could look at and key mappings on the main game screen and most importantly making adjustments to improve game’s overall performance. With the game polished I would then try and get more testers for the game, a wide range of ages would be best for this project especially kids, this was something that I purposely left outside of this project as there is a lot of ethical considerations that would be required and handled before sending off questionnaires to children, though with this being said I think having kids test this game would be extremely useful as kids tend to have shorter attention spans so they would be the most likely to quit the game if it was getting boring, this would show me the level of immersion that my game has. From a commercial stand point I stated in my product pitch that the National Trust [2] showed interest in this game and if I was to take this game to a commercial setting I would start of with pitching the game to them and getting there opinions on future improvements, I know that they are particularly interested in teaching people about the local plant life. With this being said it was a planned to add in additional species such as insects and plant variations to add more depth to the game, which is something that I would definitely add if I was to do more work on this project.
Overall thoughts on the game:
Overall I am really pleased with how this project turned out and knew from the moment that I added in the varying animal sounds that the game really worked as an educational tool. I think the project fore fills all the criteria that I set out to achieve and with the blend of sound, an immersive environment and easy to navigate user interface the game creates a really atmospheric and immersive experience for players to get lost in. This is definitely a project that I have learnt from and is the project that I can most see potential for from all my projects so far, I think it approaches education in a new way and more importantly a more fun and interactive way that makes you want to learn more about nature.
[1] Ben Nichols, Pitch Document, Private collection
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