Creative Project
Week 1: Ideas
The Client:
The client is, once again, Unruly Ember. They ask for me to produce an asset for their upcoming project titled "Convalency". Unruly Ember like to produce their games utilizing a "soft sci-fi aesthetic" as well as mainly focusing on the survival and exploration aspect of life. They want to make the idea of STEM appealing to young people (14 - 21).
Key Points:
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Client is Unruly Ember
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Sci-fi & STEM inspiration
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Target is those aged 14 - 21
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Exploration & Survival
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Aim of Project:
The aim for this project is to produce an asset that unruly ember can use in their upcoming game, "covalency". The aim is to encourage young people to explore the STEM sector and get them interested in the subjects.
Key Points:
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Produce an asset.
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Aim to get young people interested in STEM.
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What is STEM?
STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics), is a collection of subjects that are based on teaching real life, not just academic, skills such as the ability to fix your car (engineering), or the ability to use a computer efficiently (technology), for example. STEM is a very practical discipline, it includes a lot of hands on work, such as chemistry, tinkering and computer work. Creating functional things, like a robot, would be a part of stem. STEM is growing in popularity as the years go on, due to our increasingly growing technological advancements. Teaching young people STEM can result in a more efficient and open way of approaching situations and problems and is seen as a great way to learn.
Key Points:
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STEM is Sciences, Technology, Engineering and Maths.
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It's very practical and teaches a different way of thinking.
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It is growingly popular.
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It is seen as great thing to learn.
Research Sources:
Target Audience:
The target audience are young people aged 14 - 21 years old, who have an interest in STEM. This, to me, means that I need to convey STEM in a fun, interesting way that will appeal to young people.
This could include chemicals as they are what a lot of young people look forward to when going into chemistry class, as well as seeing the results of what chemicals make what.
Chemicals are also stated to be very important in the brief so this would fit both of these.
Time Management:
Gantt Chart:
Trello:
↑ Click on the video to view in better quality ↑
The Theme:
The theme for this project is soft sci-fi, soft sci-fi is science fiction which focuses a lot on the moral side of technology. I.e. History, Politics, Sociology, Economics and Psychology. Whereas hard science fiction focuses heavily on the engineering and technology aspects.
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Hard Sci-fi is more solidly planted in real world science and what could, based of current technological progress, be plausible.
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Instead of how in soft sci-fi, it involves the other less physical sciences and is more concerned about the quality of life than the tech advancements.
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Here are some examples:
Hard Sci-fi Examples:
Jurassic Park (1993):
2001: A Space Odyssey (2014):
The Martian (2015):
In this scene from Jurassic Park (1993), Hammond takes the protagonists on a tour of the lab they use to incubate and hatch their genetically modified dinosaurs. In this scene they focus heavily on the science and technology that goes into creating these creatures. It's this heavy focus on technology that makes this film fall under the hard sci-fi category. I chose to look at Jurassic Park as it leans into the mixing of the unknown, that being genomes of dinosaurs in this example.
Jurassic Park fascinated young people to a huge level and bought STEM to light, that is what I aim to achieve with my asset.
In this clip from 2001: A Space Odyssey (2014), this is one of, if not, the biggest scene in the movie. The deactivation of the AI and main protagonist HAL 9000. The fact that this AI was the main focus of the film, is what cements this movie as a hard sci-fi film.
This movie is very focused on space ships and how they work, albeit they are done by an AI in this example, it plays into my asset as you are trying to refuel your ship. Which is similar to how in this clip they kind of "repair" the ship. Even though they do that by destroying a part of it, but the similarity is there.
Here in the movie The Martian (2015), we see the main protagonist use their knowledge of biology and chemistry to create water on an uninhabitable planet. This is hard sci-fi as it focuses on these sciences and that they are needed for the protagonists goals.
The Martian was a heavy influence as he is seen mixing chemicals to try and achieve his goal. This is very similar to the asset I want to make, and inspired some of my proposals. Especially proposal 3 where the player needs to make fire. It is similar as in the Martian, he needs to first find a way to make water, then he actually needs to be successful in making it. In my third proposal you have to find a way to make fire, then be successful in creating it. Both fire and water are survival essentials.
Soft Sci-fi Examples:
Dune (2021):
Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011):
Ready Player One (2018):
In the first 2 minutes of this scene from Dune (2021), we see a vehicle that is used for harvesting spice. The spice is a substance bought by wealthier inhabitants of the planet is helpful to the economy. This is what makes this movie soft sci-fi, it focuses on technology used for the economy and people.
In this example, it is about harvesting a useful substance, this inspired my idea to have to go around and manually collect the resources you need, seen in all my proposals.
In this clip from Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011), we see Caesar, the main ape of the films, speak. Obviously, that would be impossible in real life, however because of a drug tested on Caesar's mother, he gained enhanced intelligence and learned to speak. This is soft sci-fi as it is the genetic and psychological affect on the ape.
In this, we see the affect of chemicals this inspired me to think about what kind of chemical would the player make and what would it be used for, for example, the proposal that has you make rocket fuel.
Here, from the movie Ready Player One (2018), the main character finds the extremely sought after hidden egg. This gives him the game creators immense wealth. In this movie, VR technology is used as an escapism for the inhabitants of the city, and whoever finds the hidden egg in the game, is granted the game makers huge fortune. This is soft sci-fi as it is focused around the economy of the world established.
This example, the player has to go through a lot to get to the end of the quest and get their reward but he faces one more puzzle at the end, which is to not sign his name. This made me think about including puzzles in my assets, this would work well with my scavenger idea seen in my mind map and partially inspired it.
SWOT Analysis:
Strengths:
Working with 3D inside Unreal Engine; Scripting; Problem Solving
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Weaknesses:
Sprite Art; UI
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Opportunities:
To get better at UI, I can learn to add pop ups to inform the player on how to use a mechanic, and attach widgets to actors. This would also be a great opportunity for me to get comfortable going for new things and ideas, my proposals are all leaning into the 3D World mixed with UI which is something I've never done before.
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Threats:
Threats would include, running out of time, aiming to high that it would be unrealistic in the time I have, and also doing something completely different so I would have no prior guidance.
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Theme Mind Maps:
Proposals:
Proposals Survey & Results:
I put my proposals into a survey to gather feedback, for each proposal I asked the answerers to rate the main mechanic for each one. This helps me see which mechanic is the most appealing.
The 1st and 2nd proposal mechanics were the highest rated with a tied average rating of 4.40.
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The 2nd highest rated mechanic was the 4th mechanic, and the least liked mechanic was the 3rd proposal's mechanic.
I also wanted to make sure I wasn't going off track so I asked if the proposals were still relevant to stem, to which all answerers agreed they were.
Finally, I asked what proposal mechanic the responder liked the most.
The most liked proposal was Proposal 2.
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Proposal 1 & 3 tied for second and proposal 4 got no votes.
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The people who liked proposal 2 said that they enjoyed the idea of mixing the right kinds, and amount of chemicals, and are interested in how I will do this.
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So the proposal I will go with is proposal 2.
Finalised Idea:
Since Proposal 2 was the most well received, I will expand on that. The main mechanic will be the mixing of chemicals. I plan to have a system similar to that of the game 'SchoolOfDragons'
I like how you have to drag the elements, and the mixing with the pestle is similar to what I would like to implement, I would also need a similar ui as well. I might have a bar at the bottom which houses the materials and another bar housing the tools on the side.
This is how I imagine my mixing mechanic going for the chemicals, however, simulating liquid like that seems like it would be quite complicated and take a while so I will leave it as an extra if I have time.
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