November 29th - December 5th, 2021
Yosemite was fantastic. There's just something about being separated from it all and existing in nature. Sitting at the end of a hike with a gorgeous view and just...thinking. I get a lot out of free-thinking when going on trips like this. With all distractions removed, I tend to think about whatever project I'm focusing on at the time. During this trip, I thought heavily about two projects: Game Design Journey and teaching what I know. Things started to click out there. Whatever path this is I'm on, it feels like the right move. Almost like I've been on autopilot for a while, and now I'm taking the wheel.
While we were out there, I thought it would be fun to design a drinking game that could be played by two players. So I bought one of these crappy dollar store guns with suction cup darts.
Using this new toy, I applied the rules of SKATE to landing trick shots. It was fun, but only for a few sips. I got to thinking about the fundamentals of what makes a good drinking game. I found this excellent post that breaks it down:
My favorite quote: If you can't describe the rules of your drinking game in a tweet, it's too long.
Simplicity improves anything but is challenging to achieve in any craft. Game design is no exception.
Check it out! This week we have attack animations and fuzzy hit detection for interacting with objects!
One method of checking if a player interacts with an object is ray casting. This is when you shoot a line into the world to check if it collides with anything. This is very convenient for shooting a sniper rifle, for example. It’s not as nice when trying to open a treasure chest:
Fuzzy hit detection gives players wiggle room when interacting with objects. You can use a sphere to achieve this like so:
I'm not very optimistic about next week, but I'll spend it on the Unreal Engine Course if I find the time.