Final Product, Feedback & Evaluation

Final Product

Feedback

For my feedback I got a few friends to try out my demo and then I got together with them and did a focus group and discussed what they thought about it. These are the notes I jotted down.

Movement:
The smooth movement and rotation is nice and works with the game idea very well. The rotation sometimes slows down a lot and it seems to happen inconsistently. Fixing that would be helpful for platformer parts of the full game.

Axe:
The axe throw is alright but it needs some work to make it easier to use and look better. Sometimes the axe doesn’t auto aim for seemingly no reason which makes it difficult to use. This inconsistence would make combat very annoying to play. The axe would look better if the axe spun in a more consistent way rather than spin around randomly. The colour changing for the axe is nice but it would be better if it had some effects. For example it’s on fire if the fire ability is active.

Research Evaluation

The research I conducted really helped with many aspects of the project from the theoretical to the practical. My primary research where I played and analysed the Tomb Raider Survivor Trilogy really helped with creating new idea for powers but it also allowed me to understand what I enjoyed from the action adventure genre and what I wanted to incorporate into my VR action adventure game. The focus group I conducted really helped with refocusing the original idea. It helped me find the core idea and mechanics that I wanted for my game which allowed me to create a clear view of what I wanted to achieve by the end of the FMP. The secondary research where I analysed game reviews for Tomb Raider and God of War helped with further developing my idea by showing me what I needed to include in my game to meet players needs. Forum and Reddit posts helped with solving my practical problems that I found during production. If I were to do this FMP project again I would have conducted a second focus group in the middle of production. I had many issues during production that meant I went off schedule very quickly. This made it very difficult to know what I should work on next and made production slow down a lot which caused more issues. If I had done another focus group I think that would have helped with refocusing me and would have allowed me to create a new plan that I could have followed. I believe that would have greatly helped with the second half of production as by then I felt very burnt out and frustrated with the production side of the project which made it hard to get things done. I would also do more research into the fundamentals of VR in Unreal Engine as having a greater understand of how the basics work would have made everything a lot easier. Research solved many issues but it also highlighted many. My secondary research where I watched a YouTube video tutorial on how to get a Leviathan Axe mechanic working for a third person flat screen game in Unreal Engine highlighted the most issues for me. It showed me that a lot of the things you can get away with in a normal flat screen game don’t work in a VR game. I wouldn’t be able to freeze the character movement when recalling the axe in fact I had to deal with the fact the player could move where their hand was. I had to deal with the forces applied on the axe by the player when they threw the axe and guide those forces to hit a target. To solve these problems I simplified what I wanted from my mechanics to make the easier and more consistent. This didn’t completely solve these issues but it did help with making them easier to handle.

Evaluation

I think the movement works very well and is what I wanted from my game. The axe auto aim feels nice but needs some quality of life changes. A better system for judging where the player wants to throw the axe would make it feel more natural and easier to throw. Maybe something that works with the throw direction and the looking direction to create a more smooth and predictable auto aim throwing. The power changing looks good but I would like to have special effects in addition to the colour change. This would make it look better and make the powers more recognisable.

I spent awhile experimenting with getting a system in place to handle smooth locomotion. I went through many iterations of systems before I landed on my final system which I found in a YouTube tutorial. This YouTube video actually led to me adding a jumping mechanics which I had forgotten about while planning my project. This jumping mechanic is very important as I want to add platforming sections to my games and include platforming in some of the puzzles.

A key area of development was when I finally got a stable and consistent system working for the smooth locomotion. This was a huge leap in the development as I had been stuck for a long while trying different methods to get a system working consistently in the way I wanted. I was able to achieve this by watching a YouTube tutorial on how to get smooth locomotion working in VR for Unreal Engine. The video also got me to add a jumping mechanic which I forgot about while planning my game. Getting this completed allowed me to move onto other parts of the project such as the auto aim throwing.

The product matches with the initial theme well. I was able to get the movement system I wanted working with the addition of jumping which fits perfectly with the initial theme. The colour changing for the axe also fits perfectly with the initial idea. Though it would work better if there were special effects that went along with the colours as this would make the elemental powers more recognisable and fit with the initial idea better.

The product has developed a bit since the initial conceptual ideas. As previously mentioned it has developed a jumping mechanic that was not initially planned. It also gained an additional elemental power through researching the Tomb Raider Survivor Trilogy. This elemental power was a nature based power that would allow you to shoot out vines from the axe and use them to pull things towards you, set in motion contraptions and also swing from ledges. This power would have added additional mechanics to platforming and puzzle solving making both more interesting and complex.

I don’t think I managed my time very well on this project. I spent far too much time thinking about things theoretically rather then putting things into practice. I also spent ages just trying to get the basic mechanics working which left no time to get some of the more unique and exciting mechanics working and in the game. At the beginning of the project I should have spent a lot more time trying to find a video to help me with getting smooth locomotion working rather then thinking about theoretical solutions. I think this would have led to more mechanics being developed in the final demo.

With the mechanics that I was able to get working I think it fits the intended audience quite well. With an action adventure game you want smooth and natural movement to give you the freedom to explore and interact with the world the way you want. This allows you to get more absorbed into the world. I think the axe throwing mechanic in terms of how the auto aiming workings is pretty good as it doesn’t require any extra HUD or button pressing that could bring you out of the world and experience.

I think the comments from the focus group I conducted for my feedback are valid. They had similar comments and observations to me. Fixing the spinning of the axe so that it’s less random would make the axe throwing feel and look better. Special effects for the different elemental power is something that I have commented on before. It would make the powers more unique thus making it easier to recognise the different elemental powers. It would also just make the axe look cooler and feel better to use in the game.

I have developed my skills in Unreal Engine quite a lot especially when working with VR and the Meta Quest system while working on this project. I’m now able to create a smooth locomotion system that is good and consistent for a VR game. I can also create a auto aim system for throwing in VR that is natural feeling and non intrusive in terms of giving you extra buttons to press or HUD elements popping up. I can now work with material instances to reduce the size of Unreal Engine projects which is really important especially when working on a standalone system like Meta Quest.

Things I would adapt to improve my project would be to control the spin on the axe when it is thrown to make it look and feel better to use. I would also change how the aim direction is judged. Rather than just using the direction of the throw I would also use the looking direction as well to create a hopefully more natural and easier to use system. The current system means that a high percentage of throws don’t auto aimed and just fall to the ground which really pulls you out of the game.