Hey, everyone! Welcome back to my second week with this whole blogging thing. First thing I'd like to say is: Happy Holidays!
I probably should have started off last week with that, but I don't celebrate Hanukkah or anything else other than Christmas, so I never know when they start. Regardless, have a happy everything, and a wonderful New Year! While everyone will be off having fun, I will be working. Yeah, I know, really lame. However, it gives me some time to work a lot more on my projects. I'm fortunate enough to have a job that gives me enough down time to work on some extra curricular activities.
Speaking of projects, I have some updates on my Killing Floor level. I know I briefly touched on this project last week, but this is the main thing I wanted to talk about. Recently I've been working on a map for the game Killing Floor 2. For those of you who don't know what Killing Floor (KF) is, it's a wave-based survival game. Picture your typical horde mode, and that's this game. After playing the game, I decided I liked it enough to try and make a level with the editor. After a ton of procrastination, I decided to start working on it. So far, I have been working on it for a little over a month here at work.
Over the past weeks, I have been able to complete the general layout of the map, and now I have moved on to the white-boxing and balancing stages. White-boxing is what the designer does when he/she is making the layout of the game. This part of the process has little to no art, and it is purely meant to test the balancing of the game. Only when general balancing and other things are done, then art gets put into it. In the pictures you see below, that is what everything is, it has a test texture, or it's some random object used for testing purposes. Last week, I was successful in adding the enemy spawners and the shops. The wiki and the forums were a huge help in setting these things up. The pathing with the spawners were a little tricky, but after some fiddling I got it to work. Now the enemies spawn, and the boss comes out. In addition, the traders (the place that you buy from in between rounds) switch off every round. So you can pretty much play a full functioning game in this level.
Now that I said some positive things, I will talk about the garbage. There are a lot of things that hold me back while doing this project. The first is my hardware. Since I am working on this project solely on my laptop, things go a bit slow. UDK when running the level is a bit slow, and if I want to test out any new additions like spawning or traders, I have to test it in the game, not the editor. My computer can only run one program at a time. I can't run the game and the editor at the same time. In order for me to test, I have to close the editor, then open the game, then go back into the editor, so on and so forth. Also, the fact that one of my version (the copy and the original) both got corrupted. Not sure how, but they did.
TL;DR working on this project is a pain! But, I enjoy it. If I didn't, honestly, I wouldn't be doing it. I am a firm believer in learning through failure. If I succeeded all the time, then I would have never experienced what it's like to fail, or be disappointed. And in a sense, when I do succeed, the victory tastes so much better. I know it sounds very sappy, but it's true. Ask anyone who has tasted true success, they will tell you the same thing. Yeah, some luck and very good opportunity is needed, but that's life. The amount a person grows for putting up with the garbage is always worth it. No matter how much I curse out UDK (yeah, using UDK, not Unreal 4), I know if I keep going, I'll grow. Same goes for all of you reading this post! I know this gets a little preachy, but these are some things that I am going through, and I intend to share with you as much as I can. Projects are more than having the ability to do something, it's about self growth, and how you handle the project. How I'm handling it right now, I feel good about it. Every week I chip away at it at my own speed, and it's nice. Things are good right now. Aside the fact that I'm in Arizona for the holidays, I could use some family time.
Oh, and before I leave, I want to talk about another short project I plan to work on soon with a buddy of mine. I want to work on one of those Raspberry Pi emulator devices. So far, I have the Raspberry Pi, but I need a micro SD card. To fill you in quickly, basically it's this device that one could modify to make anything, but I'm using it to make a small console that plays a ton of old school games. I'll link it below with the other stuff so you can get an idea for it.
Anyway. I hope everyone who is reading this will have a fun and safe break! Party hard for me, and eat plenty of cookies!
Speaking of projects, I have some updates on my Killing Floor level. I know I briefly touched on this project last week, but this is the main thing I wanted to talk about. Recently I've been working on a map for the game Killing Floor 2. For those of you who don't know what Killing Floor (KF) is, it's a wave-based survival game. Picture your typical horde mode, and that's this game. After playing the game, I decided I liked it enough to try and make a level with the editor. After a ton of procrastination, I decided to start working on it. So far, I have been working on it for a little over a month here at work.
Over the past weeks, I have been able to complete the general layout of the map, and now I have moved on to the white-boxing and balancing stages. White-boxing is what the designer does when he/she is making the layout of the game. This part of the process has little to no art, and it is purely meant to test the balancing of the game. Only when general balancing and other things are done, then art gets put into it. In the pictures you see below, that is what everything is, it has a test texture, or it's some random object used for testing purposes. Last week, I was successful in adding the enemy spawners and the shops. The wiki and the forums were a huge help in setting these things up. The pathing with the spawners were a little tricky, but after some fiddling I got it to work. Now the enemies spawn, and the boss comes out. In addition, the traders (the place that you buy from in between rounds) switch off every round. So you can pretty much play a full functioning game in this level.
Now that I said some positive things, I will talk about the garbage. There are a lot of things that hold me back while doing this project. The first is my hardware. Since I am working on this project solely on my laptop, things go a bit slow. UDK when running the level is a bit slow, and if I want to test out any new additions like spawning or traders, I have to test it in the game, not the editor. My computer can only run one program at a time. I can't run the game and the editor at the same time. In order for me to test, I have to close the editor, then open the game, then go back into the editor, so on and so forth. Also, the fact that one of my version (the copy and the original) both got corrupted. Not sure how, but they did.
TL;DR working on this project is a pain! But, I enjoy it. If I didn't, honestly, I wouldn't be doing it. I am a firm believer in learning through failure. If I succeeded all the time, then I would have never experienced what it's like to fail, or be disappointed. And in a sense, when I do succeed, the victory tastes so much better. I know it sounds very sappy, but it's true. Ask anyone who has tasted true success, they will tell you the same thing. Yeah, some luck and very good opportunity is needed, but that's life. The amount a person grows for putting up with the garbage is always worth it. No matter how much I curse out UDK (yeah, using UDK, not Unreal 4), I know if I keep going, I'll grow. Same goes for all of you reading this post! I know this gets a little preachy, but these are some things that I am going through, and I intend to share with you as much as I can. Projects are more than having the ability to do something, it's about self growth, and how you handle the project. How I'm handling it right now, I feel good about it. Every week I chip away at it at my own speed, and it's nice. Things are good right now. Aside the fact that I'm in Arizona for the holidays, I could use some family time.
Oh, and before I leave, I want to talk about another short project I plan to work on soon with a buddy of mine. I want to work on one of those Raspberry Pi emulator devices. So far, I have the Raspberry Pi, but I need a micro SD card. To fill you in quickly, basically it's this device that one could modify to make anything, but I'm using it to make a small console that plays a ton of old school games. I'll link it below with the other stuff so you can get an idea for it.
Anyway. I hope everyone who is reading this will have a fun and safe break! Party hard for me, and eat plenty of cookies!
Links!
Raspberry Pi Emulator
Raspberry Pi Emulator