Sunday, October 31, 2010

Arms of Pewter

Today i finished the basic plot outline for Legacies of Mistborn: Episode 1. It will be about the half skaa bastard of a plantation noble who has a weakness for the illegal skaa fights that were mentioned in the books but never actually described. The main character, Duke Dirtfist, will be a fighter who secretly uses pewter to his advantage. Thats about all i can say without giving the plot away, so you'll just have to wait for the game to come out. :)

It should be fairly short, but that is more or less the point of splitting the game into episodes.My vision for the different episodes is to slowly add features to the concept of a mistborn game. This way i introduce the powers one at a time, with small games, get advice and critiques to help me improve them as i make them. That way the last episode will incorporate all 8 basic metals and hopefully players will be familiar with the various mechanics.

This can lead to problems as well if i expect players to have played the earlier games. I will definitely have to incorporate a decent tutorial for the mechanics without making it too boring for returning players. It is definitely a challenge and i'll have plenty of time to think about it.

I do have a bit of an idea for an overarching plot that will connect all the mistings together and the mistborn character as well. It would really be easy to make the connection obvious, but im going to try and keep it at least a little non obvious.

I feel really good about this project and i cant wait to finish it and pop that into my portfolio.



So it goes...

Monday, October 25, 2010

We are the Guild, BWA HA HA HA

Today, I became a villain, an icon, and the leader of all humanity. At least in Trade Secret. 

So today I had to explain the structure of the gameworld to the level designers and everyone else on the team. During my explanation of the first in game cutscene, i happened to do a two second motion that made everyone laugh, and declare me as the main villain. I simply move my arms in a motion akin to "The Twist", only much more muted, while i said "Bwa ha ha ha, We are the Guild!" They all proclaimed i should be modeled and animated doing that very motion for the game, and they declared me the Guild Master.

So i'm not only the Combat Designer and the Writer (or as i like to call myself, Loremaster), but i am now the Guild Master. So i'm going to write myself in to be a steampunk Dr. Robotnik like character, and i will make sure it is in the final game. So let that be a lesson to all you in game design. Make your team laugh, and they'll put you in a position of power.

Oh, and the next person who says Hey-Oh! is getting kicked in the shins.

So it goes...

Sunday, October 24, 2010

Trade Secret Update and Legacies of Mistborn

Trade Secret is doing pretty darn well lately. Our team size has gotten quite big, and at 23 members, we apparently have the largest team UAT has ever seen. Our project manager, producer, and other leads had a meeting with the schools marketing department recently and were assured that if we get sponsorship to GDC San Francisco, they'll send all of us.

I had fun volunteering at Austin and I plan on volunteering at San Francisco as well. Hopefully some of our more sociable members will spread the word much more effectively than i ever could. I've never been a good salesmen, but hey, that's what producers are for, neh?

I'm very much looking forward to working on this project more. I recently had an idea for a very cool new feature for the game that is simple to implement but will just require a lot of new content on my part. I'm pretty excited to do a bit more visible work, since much of the story elements aren't portrayed by cut scenes or dialogues. I'm not sure how much i can say, so i guess I'll have to be mum on more details.

There is another project i am going to begin very soon that i dont have the same restrictions. I'm excited to announce my plans for the game Legacies of Mistborn (LoM), based on the novels by the very talented Brandon Sanderson. This is an unofficial fan game and i will do my best to bring the excitement and feel of the Mistborn universe to a new medium.

I plan on splitting the game up into several small episodes, each featuring different characters with different allomantic abilities. Once i have the first episode to a point of testing or critique i'll post a link, and eventually once its completed i plan on sending a link to Mr. Sanderson himself.

Thats all for the time being. Hopefully i'll start to update more regularly, especially when i get my portfolio up in the next months.

So it goes...