We received the theme and brief and formed our team. We had a meeting to discuss ideas, and decided that a 2D arena fighter-style game would be the best to aim for given the short time we had. Other members of our team all had experience with using 2D pixel art in UE4, so this seemed the best choice for things to run smoothly, and in the spirit of the genre we decided to use the NES colour palette.
The theme for the game came from a joke about a panda cooking game which we decided to run with, diversifying it a little by making it about various different kinds of bear chefs. We finished the day by assigning roles for the project; as I had the least experience in pixels but some in animation, we decided I would do vfx for the project as well as fill in other gaps that might arise as we went on.
Day 1
We decided that as we were making a fighting game we could have each of the five of us design a bear to include. I chose to make my design in pixels as practise for the rest of the work I would be doing.
I then started on the fx, starting with the most essential part which is the water at the bottom of the level, and then moving on to the attack effects
Continued with the attack fx, trying to make them look fairly fluid using pixels was a bit of a challenge but I found ways of making it work, and I think the final effects look really great.
After I was done with the fx I moved on to character portraits for the menu, which we split between two of us. I kept them fairly basic in the interests of time and the nature of the pixel look.
I also made a button for the menu and a transition screen, the latter we unfortunately couldn't work into the final game but I think turned out well.
Day 3
With all of the fx done I used this time to add polish to the game, making a splash screen, logo, and some small UI elements, as well as a control screen.
I didn't realise that I'd accidentally mixed up the PS4 and Xbox controllers in the control screen until the submission day when people expressed some confusion when playing. Fortunately the controls are basic enough that people quickly figured out which joystick was the correct one.
Submission day
Although our team didn't win any of the categories, I think we made a very successful game in the time allowed. People seemed to really enjoy the competitive element and the spirit of humour we'd approached the game with, and though the controls could use a little tightening up to feel a little better to play I think we had a pretty strong core gameplay loop which could be expanded on.
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