Concepts and principles relates to useful things you can do while working on a project. Some of these things are...
Simplified Understanding - Trying to make things easier to understand. For example, if you were creating a blueprint in Unreal Engine for the function of a gun, you would try to make the blueprint easy to understand. This is important for the games we are creating, because it will make it easier for our tutors to understand it when they mark our work. This could also be useful if you're working professionally and need to share things with your colleagues.
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| Unreal blueprint. |
Reusability, Efficiency, Maintenance - When creating a game, you will have to create assets. Assets are essentially objects, sounds or 2D sprites that will go into your game. In some cases, you could reuse assets. Keep them the same or change them a bit. This links in with the next two categories which are efficiency and maintenance. If you reuse assets, you are being more efficient and making the process easier for yourself. Also, if you have perfected something (such as a blueprint) and you reuse it, you won't have to maintain it much or tweak it, which also saves time.
Real-World Modelling (RWM) - If you're making a game, you will typically want some things in the game to work the same way as they would in real life, an example of this is gravity and physics. This is basically what RWM is, making sure that things in your game are realistic, and match with the real world. Obviously some games deliberately go against real laws of physics and other things, so RWM isn't always necessary.
Collaboration and Sharing, Communication - Assets and other things related to your project can be shared with people you're working with. For my Killer Klowns game I am working in a group with Josh and Kori, and we have each been working on different assets. Since we are working together we will be sharing assets and using them in our levels. I have been working on weapons, and Josh and Kori have been working on Klowns/character models. Working on different things helps with efficiency and is one of the perks of working in a group. This is also links in with communication, which is very important if you are working in a group. You need to share ideas and help each other out.
Quality Assurance - Games need to be of high quality, especially if you are planning on selling them.
Game Objects
Game objects relates to assets and other things that you put in your game. Some of these things are...
Sprites - Sprites are 2D images that are used in games. They can be characters, scenery, objects etc.
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| A sprite from Terraria |
Characters - Characters are the people within the game. Some games have a very detailed characters with lots of backstory, others have anonymous characters that the player doesn't know much about.
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| The boy from 'INSIDE.' An example of a character we don't know much about. |
Weapons - Weapons are used for attacking enemies, or so that the enemies can attack you. Different games have different types of weapons. Call of Duty uses guns, but games like Skyrim use melee and magic spells.
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| Casting a spell in Skyrim. |
Rooms - A room is the name used for a game level, which is like a giant room. The player enters from the previous level, completes the new level and then leaves to enter a new room. Rooms would most likely be separated by loading screens.
Walls - Walls are used to contain the player and other characters within the level. They won't always be shown as a normal wall, and could be shown as giant mountains around the level that the player can't get past. There are also things known as 'invisible walls' which are walls the player can't see. These can be very annoying if used incorrectly but they can also make a level look nicer.
Scenery - Scenery includes things like buildings, foliage, mountains etc. Some games such as Battlefield have destructible environments, which react to how the players act during the match. If a player shoots rapidly into a wall, it will be permanently damaged for the rest of the match. Buildings and vehicles can also be completely destroyed.
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| A destroyed building in Battlefield 3. |
Instances - A game instance is a separate, private area that you enter to complete a specific task. For example, in a game like World of Warcraft, you and your party may enter an instance to fight a boss as a group, with no other players.
Rewards - Games can reward players by giving them achievements or in game unlocks for completing certain tasks. For example, the recently released game Resident Evil 7 has rewards for the player finishing the game within a certain time and by completing the game on the highest difficulty. The player can get things such as infinite ammo by completing these tasks.
Power-Ups - Power-Ups are items you can pick up in games that give you a brief buff (stat increase.) A well known example is the Star item from the Mario games. It gives Mario brief invincibility and increased speed, so you can run into enemies and instantly kill them.
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| Mario invincibility star. |
Object Properties
Colour - The colour of the object. This might change if it takes damage. Colour can be used to make things stand out, such as collectables.
Size - The size of the object. This could also change during gameplay. E.g. Mario. If he takes damage after eating a mushroom he gets smaller.
Speed - How fast the object moves. Might get faster if it picks up a power-up/buff.
Movement - How the object moves in the game.
Sounds - The sounds the object makes.
Health - Health basically shows how many hits you can take before you die. It is typically shown as a red bar that depletes as you take damage. In some games such as Call of Duty, there isn't any health bar and instead blood appears on the screen when you take damage. The more blood on the screen, the lower your health is. In modern games health usually regenerates over time, but in games like Quake you have to pick up health packs.
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| Modern Warfare 2 low health indicator. |
Lives - Lives show the amount of times you can die on a level before you have to restart it from the beginning. Mario is a good example of this. In the middle of a level you get a check point, if you die after that you respawn at the check point. However, if you die too many times and run out the lives, Mario will be sent back to the world map and will have to do the level again from the very beginning.
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| Mario x 3 lives. |
Actions and Events
Mouse and Keyboard Events - A mouse and keyboard event is something you add to a game that allows the player to play the game. For moving forward, you'd add and event and assign it to the W key. When the player enters the game and presses W, their character will move forward.
Create - When an object/something is created in the game.
Destroy - When something is destroyed in the game, and example of this is Minecraft, where everything can be destroyed.
Collision - Collision stops objects from going through each other, and makes things solid. If you put a wall around a level you need to make sure that it has collision events with the characters, otherwise people will be able to walk out of the level. The same applies for most objects. Without collision levels wouldn't function properly at all.
Timers - Timers are used for timed events within the game (countdowns etc.)
Scoring - As the player kills enemies in a game, their score will increase. Score puts a player higher up on the leaderboards or could give them certain rewards/achievements.
Inheritance
Parent/Child - A parent object is a main object that you create. To be more efficient you can duplicate this object instead of creating another from scratch. The duplicated object is known as the 'child.'
Inherited Behaviours and Properties - Features that the parent and child object share.
Overriding Events - An overriding event is when and object has to react to a change in the game world. E.g. a bullet going into someone and creating a hole.
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