Score system and Checklist (2nd May )

Since my last post I have been making sure that all the animal noises have been working properly and that they bring up the appropriate widget e.g. As I approach the fox a fox noise will play and the widget displaying information about the fox will appear. There are now officially ten species in the game: Blue Tit, Chaffinch, Red Fox, Robin, Black bird, Jack Daw. Roe Deer, Wood Pecker, Grey Squirrel and have just added the last which is a Wood Pigeon. With this in the game I started to focus on how I was going to display progress in the game, as stated in my previous post I didn’t want to have a score system in place, but after a discussion with my tutor we both felt that there needed to be some way to display how many more animals the user needs to find. Although I still feel like having a score system does add an unnecessary competitive element to the game, my tutor made a very good point that it also adds to the satisfaction side of finding the animal and seeing the score go up (as the score is out of 10 (0/10)) along with the player being able to see their progress and be able to predict how much longer they will be playing the game for.

Testing Widget and score system

As shown in the image above there will be a counter that ticks up after you find each animal and trigger their widget. Having looked at the game with a score system I agree that it would be appropriate for this game mainly due to the fact that it gives the player an indication of their progress. Also if I was in the future going to target this game to schools as well, having a clear indication for how many more animals you have to find would be good for a kid as if there was no progression being displayed they would likely lose interest as they wouldn’t know how much longer the game would be or if there was an end condition. So by having a score display I will not only be adding to the satisfaction of finding a animal but also showing clear progression and give a clear indication of how long the game will take you to complete.

Showing Win Condition

Check List:

With this score system in place I also wanted a more natural scoring system as well so I decided to add in a Checklist system where when the animal has been found a tick will be displayed on the checklist (image below will better display what I mean).

Showing Working CheckList

As you can see from the image above once the animal has been found a tick will appear next to their name clearly showing that the animal has been discovered. There are currently two ways this checklist can be bought up, the player can either access it via the pause menu or via a key press (Currently by pressing ‘c’ though could change). Also in the image above you can see the text block button next to the Blue Tit icon, I am planning on having it so that the player can click on this button and it will re-display the information about that animal, this will add to a more user friendly experience. Me and my tutor also discussed instead of having a tick maybe have a system where the images start off as greyed out templates with no names just question marks and then when the player discovers them the templates above show along with the name of the species, this would definitely add more satisfaction to finding all the species.

As shown in the images above there is still a lot of work left to do with the UI which is what my main focus will be for now, adding and improving both the user interface and the user experience. One element that me and my tutor have already discussed is splitting the screen into thirds having this as a way to display information.

Rule of thirds image [1]

How I could use this system

This is definitely something that I will be thinking about when creating the UI. As it will make for a far more fluent experience when navigating the UI.

What’s left to Do:

I have 2 weeks left for this project, in this time my main focus will be on user experience and adding juice to the game, in which I mean making it as smooth and as satisfying as possible when the player is playing my game and discovering animals. Specifically I will aim to have the UI polished up and some of the animal sounds changed and then I will move on to making the environment more realistic by adding in varying terrain elements and foliage to the game. Though my main aim will be to make the game as fun and interactive as possible

[1] Yi Chen, Composition 101: Rule of Thirds in Photography with Examples, June 10 2010, Accessible at: http://www.photoble.com/photography-tips-tricks/composition-101-rule-of-thirds-in-photography-with-examples/. [Accessed: 02/05/2021]

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