Off The Map: Gothic Literature At It's Finest

Our university encourages the Off The Map participation, with good reason; it's a great competition. It produces some fantastic pieces of work from aspiring Game Artists and just being a part of it is fantastic.

So, within our course, we've split into groups and we've been producing our own levels fitting with their brief; The Gothic. 

The brief focused on 3 main sources:

- Edgar Allen Poe's The Masque of the Red Death

- Fonthill Abbey

- Whitby

I'd studied Gothic Literature for 2 years so this was like music to my ears. 

If you're interested in reading more, then head over to our group blog, The Poefessionals, to see our progress and check our our project on Crydev as well. 

However, I'll post up the flythrough here, and a few screenshots. If you have any questions, feel free to contact me.

Life Changing Or Career Building: Why I'm Apparently Wasting 3 Years Of My Life...

Let me start this off by saying I'm not a trained educator and I have no experience within the Games Industry.

What I do have, however, is experience within the education system, and experience on a Game Art Course.

The question asked to me is essentially:

Do graduates need to be highly trained individuals to get employed within the industry or do they just need to be creative with a good liberal arts background?

Different developers require different skill sets when it comes to the Games Industry, and Game degrees are a point of great controversy among many developers. I've read multiple articles telling me how unbelievably useless my entire degree is. Then I've read others that have told me it's a great idea. "When hiring junior developers, I can't think of a single time where their educational background has been a factor in choosing to hire them." says Raphael Van Lierop, the Creative Director at Hinterland Games, in an article from gamesindustry.biz, " I'm often asked whether I think aspiring developers should go to the game degree schools vs. getting a traditional education in a field like computer science or fine arts, and I always say go for the traditional degree, because you're going to get a much more well-rounded experience and it's more about building the foundational skills you need to problem solve, communicate, and apply critical thinking skills". I suppose this line of thinking is true. You can, technically, learn how to be a games designer in your bedroom. Get hold of the software, watch some internet tutorials, read through forums; it's relatively simple to get started and that is why the indie games market and the mobile markets are booming. People are just making games for fun in their rooms.

However, there are many benefits to a degree, depending on the quality of the degree I suppose.  In fact, I'm a huge proponent. Then again, I haven't gone into the industry yet so, my tune may change.

Sure, I could learn all of these things in my bedroom. I could just sit away from the world, learn how to model some stuff and that would be it. BUT. I would miss out on such an experience, and that is really what Games Design courses, or at least my Game Art course, offers students. It's all soft skills.

The fact of the matter is, learning how to model and texture doesn't prepare me for what the industry will be like. The studio environment that I can immerse myself in has helped me more than any internet tutorial. Learning from my peers, talking about our projects, sharing interesting articles and blogs with each other and critiquing each other's work. It's a great learning experience that really gives you something that bedroom learning won't.

As well as the 3D skills, there is a huge emphasis on art. The masters are important, we learn about colour theory, composition, life drawing and anatomy among other things. We are encouraged to be creative, to think outside of the box. To make the briefs we get and the projects we do fit us so we can show our best work.

Working in my bedroom is not going to improve my knowledge of project management. It won't improve my ability to schedule. It won't teach me how to work in a team. It won't teach me how to delegate jobs. It won't encourage me to be creative and innovative, teaching me new ways to problem solve. I will miss out on all of this if I just sit in my room. My University degree, however, has taught me all of these things, with the help and support from those who have been in the industry. Those are things you don't get from working alone or doing a different degree.

It is true that many of these soft skills can, perhaps, be learnt from other courses. But then there are the industry connections we have through the University. The great thing about being on our course is we are surrounded by people who have worked in the industry and worked their recently. They understand what is expected of graduates, they know the current techniques and newer workflows. The briefs we are given are professionally written and some are even given to us by developers. These prepare us fantastically for the industry and what it will be like when we go into industry because we understand the standards and what we can expect when it comes to briefs. We are also lucky to receive talks from developers currently in the industry. They will often come around the labs and talk to us about our work and give us tips. This can also allow us to network, one of the most important things within the industry.

So, returning back to my original question:

"Do graduates need to be highly trained individuals to get employed within the industry or do they just need to be creative with a good liberal arts background?"

Why can't we be both? Why can't courses teach both? My degree is doing it, so it's clearly possible. I'd like to think of myself as relatively highly trained for 2 years of experience with any 3D software at all; I can use 3DS Max, Zbrush, Cryengine, UDK, Photoshop and numerous other programs. I can express my ideas and come up with interesting concepts an ideas as a response to a brief. Sure, this is stuff I probably could have done before, but being in the community that is my course, I've received so much support and help that I can tell you right now, I'm infinitely more skilled that I was 2 years ago and I've learnt so much more about people. I can now present in front of people, a couple of years ago I would have rather died, but now I almost look forwards to talking about my ideas and work. I can actually schedule and I'm working hard to improve my time management skills with the support and help of my classmates and tutors. I'm also creating networks and I'm exposed to developers who offer internships and jobs. I've had my creativity and my knowledge of the arts improved tenfold over the space of a year. It's crazy.

These things are all things I wouldn't have been able to do in a different course. So, the answer to the eternal questions of whether or not Games course are actually useful and whether or not they are teaching the right things, just follow my course.

Of course there are still people who will argue "Well you can learn project management ANYWHERE, come on". I say one other word to you.

Portfolio.

Developers will hire people for their portfolio. If your portfolio is good then you probably have a job. So why would you turn down three years of constant portfolio improvement with advice and opinions on that work from industry professionals? It's the perfect time to improve your skills and work on your portfolios while not having to worry about getting a job or going to work.

Look, in my opinion, we should be encouraging both. Both the liberal arts and important 3D technological skills are both important and, at least from my experience, my university course has helped me with both.

It can be done, I swear.

Sorry this has been a little... ranty and not very picture heavy but I have a lot of opinions on this... especially after reading repeated articles about how I'm wasting £27,000 and 3 years of my life.

Links used:

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2014-04-23-teachers-lounge-insider-views-on-games-education

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2014-04-22-should-developers-go-to-school

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soft_skills

http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1018066/Game-Educators

Creativity, Craft and Talent: Three Things I Wish I Had More Of

I really didn't want to watch this... How the hell do I begin to even explain the concept of creativity?

I suppose we should start with a definition. The Oxford Dictionary defines it as "Relating to or involving the use of the imagination or original ideas to create something". Unfortunately that description hasn't made this any easier to write. In fact, John Cleese's words ring more true when it comes to this post; "The reason why it is futile for me to talk about creativity is that it simply cannot be explained"

But lets talk about it anyway.

A common misconception about creativity is that it is just about drawing or dancing or making music. There is SO much more to being creative. Like the definition that Oxford Dictionary gave us, it's also about imagination and original ideas and those are not just limited to painting a picture. Problem solving requires creativity and a lot of what we do as game artists is about solving problems. Coming up against boundaries and figuring out how to get past them, as well as creating beautiful assets and stunning visuals.

Being creative has always been something that I've taken pride in. In primary school I was always the girl people would come to for drawings. I can still remember when I would sit on a potty in my front room with a little table, a crayon and some paper. However, when I got to secondary school, that creativity was pulled out of me, and pulled out of me hard. My school completely disregarded art, barely any funding was given to our department and we weren't taken seriously. Because I was "clever" I had always been encouraged to do essay subjects or maths and sciences but any kind of creative subject was discouraged and written off as not useful. The worst part was, even in my art class, my creativity was stifled. Unless the art you were producing was the type of art that the teachers liked then you were screwed. There wasn't a lot of room to look at stuff like Game Art then. When I'd announced to my teachers that I was going to study Game Art Design I was told multiple times I was making a mistake, it wasn't English Literature so it was looked down upon.

After watching Sir Ken Robinson's TEDtalk on schools killing creativity, I completely agree with him. He made some fantastic points. My favourite quote from this talk is "The consequence [of our current education system] is that many highly talented, brilliant creative people think they're not because the thing they were good at in school wasn't valued, or was actually stigmatised". This talk happened in 2006 and these words are still true. How much does that say about the state of our system? Game Art, in particular, has been stigmatised because video games themselves have such a huge stigma surrounding them. People seem to assume that you spend all your time playing, but they don't realise, like all creative subjects, it's a huge amount of hard graft that you need to put in.

Sir Ken Robinson - Do Schools Kill Creativity?

Elizabeth Gilbert - Your Illusive Creative Genius

The thing about creativity is it's about NEW IDEAS and IMAGINATION and using those to create something. Looking at the Games Industry right now... innovation isn't everywhere, especially in AAA titles like Call of Duty. In fact, in my opinion, sequels are a big problem in the industry. (Well... I say that, while still gushing all over Dragon Age Inquisition... ) My biggest problem with sequels is the lack of innovation. Innovation is the product of creativity and titles like Call of Duty haven't really added anything new other than improved graphics. There isn't a lot of creativity there because you're missing part of the creative process and you're missing the innovation. New IP however, titles that are trying to bring new ideas into the industry are barely given any publicity.

[x]

There are a few different reasons for this "sequelitis" that the games industry has at the moment. A lot of it has to do with making money because, hey, that is the purpose of  business. A lot of it, however, has to do with the players. Gamers demand sequels to their favourite franchises and show companies that beating a dead horse is acceptable because they will vote with their money. Don't get me wrong, though. Sequels aren't always bad. Some games are written with a trilogy planned out, or they visit something different and interesting. A lot of games are popular because of their interesting stories, like Dragon Age (I am really excited for Inquisiton). The difference is some sequels are able to actually innovate and introduce new ideas to their games, where as others just rehash the previous game in the franchise. Those kinds of games are killing a lot of the originality and creativity the industry had.

However, there are a couple of things that might be able to pull us out of the reboot era that we seem to be in. The first one is the next generation of consoles. Mike Williams wrote a really interesting article about this on gamesindustry.biz. Mark Nilsson, the producer on the Need For Speed franchise, made a really interesting point about the power of the new machines. "It makes us think differently," "Every time there is a transition we start thinking about what would be possible. We are not locked into old boundaries anymore. From that we get great innovations like AllDrive. The systems are giving us power to do more, more AI, more particles etc. Just turning everything up really."

[x]

As I touched on earlier, boundaries are an interesting concept when it comes to creativity. Some people argue that they improve your creativity, others argue that they restrict you and, I suppose in some ways they are both true. In terms of the technological boundaries that you have to take into account when designing a game, they can really reduce your creativity. Like Jonathan Blow said "Creatively, we build and we assume that we have enough power in rendering." Creatives just create so when you've made something you just assume it'll work and if it doesn't, you've got to break down that thing you made and occasionally reduce it in technology. The technology might not have the power to do what it is you want. 

HOWEVER, these boundaries can pave the way for some incredibly creative solutions to these problems. Creativity is about new ideas and these new ideas often come in the face of adversity. Problem solving is just as valid of a creative skill as being able to paint a picture. Engineers will create new game engines that can handle more advanced and detailed models or effects, and will create new consoles with improved abilities to handle the graphics. Overcoming problems with new ideas, which can, in turn, leads to new ideas within the games. The same rings true when I look at my briefs that are set for at University. The more defined the brief, the more creative you have to be because you need to overcome the boundaries that are set to create something unique. It's a big, beautiful, creative circle that leads to new and interesting changes within the industry.

[x]

The problems come when people don't want the change and that's when we get stagnation. However, Indie developers are saving us there. With services like Steam Greenlight and Kickstarter, new companies are able to come into this industry or reboots and sequels and bring us new IP with refreshing approaches to gameplay, stories and visuals. They will take risks, unlike many bigger developers who are willing to just carry on down the same, stagnant path and, let's be honest, creativity is all about taking risks.

So, to sum it all up, creativity is weird. It encompasses so much. It's hard to write about and it's hard to define. Within the industry, the reboot era that we are stuck in is stifling the creativity that made many of these AAA developers so successful. But with the introduction of new consoles, the ability to explore new ideas and techniques, and the Indie Games market becoming more and more popular, I think there is still hope for us.

Then again, this is all just my opinion. Like John Cleese says "Telling people how to be creative is easy, it's only being it that's difficult"

Just, watch it. 

Links used:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creativity

http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/creative

http://www.fmvmagazine.com/?p=12161

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2013-11-27-how-ps4-and-xbox-one-will-yield-better-creativity

http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity#t-1031961

http://www.ted.com/talks/elizabeth_gilbert_on_genius

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AU5x1Ea7NjQ&feature=youtu.be

Specialist or Generalist: It's Time To Think About My Career -cries-

The Games Industry is really weird.

There are a variety of different companies from AAA developers to little Indie studios and they all require a different set of skills. Well, I say different... Slightly more/less specialised depending where you go.

To understand why that is, you need to look at the positions that are available within the industry and which companies require which positions. Early on the in industry, game artists needed to be good at everything because there were so few and far between. You needed to generalise. Now, however, the entire industry has changed.

When looking at the jobs that AAA developers offer, you can see a trend. For example, if we look at DICE's vacancies, we can see that the job titles are all very specialised. Lead Character Artists, Level Artists, VFX artists, 2D artists, not even including all the Software Engineer jobs, the Game Engine Engineers and the Marketing. This is exactly the same when you look at the Bioware career opportunities. The job descriptions and the responsibilities are very specific.

One day...

Within the AAA developers, specialised jobs are key. Often, the teams working on these games are in the 100s so there is no need for everyone to be able to do everything. This means that the artists that work there will be specialised in one area, whether it be character art, environment art or visual effects. For example, the team that worked on Grand Theft Auto V was over 1000 strong and they worked for 5 years so there was no need for generalising. Because of the huge number of people working on the team, they will be split up into various departments that will work together on different areas of the game. One team might have responsibility for one specific level.

In the world of Indie studios, however, it's very different. Teams often consist of only a few people. Occasionally, like in the case of Super Meat Boy's Team Meat, it's only two people. This means that artists in Indie companies often have to be able to do everything, or at least a little of everything. You don't have anyone else to rely on for your UI design so you need to understand it. Occasionally you'll need to know how to do some basic animations and rigging because it's cheaper to hire someone who knows a bit of rigging rather than someone who doesn't. Applying for a job in the Indie games industry is all about showing you can do it all.

Valve take an interesting approach to their roles and responsibilities . In fact, the way they approach it is the "T-shaped model employee", shown in their employee handbook, which makes for a pretty interesting read. We're taught about this in our classes and lectures at university as well.

 

Be awesome at one thing, be good at everything else.

Due to the nature of the games industry at the moment and the huge boom in Indie game development thanks to sites like Kickstarter, the ease with which people can get hold of software to develop their games, and the mobile market becoming a huge source of revenue for aspiring game artists, Indie developers are quickly becoming the source of jobs for graduates. It doesn't help that, if you look at any job description for many AAA developers, most require you to have however many years of experience in the industry as well as a game shipped.

As an aspiring student, this is all incredibly important to me... Knowing the nature of the industry before I aim to wedge my foot into the door means that I know how to tailor my portfolio.

 Maybe, one day, I'll be able to get enough experience and have shipped enough games for Bioware to want me...

A girl can dream. 

Links used:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Theft_Auto_V#Development

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Meat_Boy

http://www.valvesoftware.com/company/Valve_Handbook_LowRes.pdf

http://www.bioware.com/en/careers/#current-openings

http://careersearch.ea.com/austin/art/jobid5017495-bioware-austin-vfx-artist-%28contract%29-jobs

http://dice.se/jobs/level-artist-2/

http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2010/10/super-meat-boy-and-the-rise-of-micro-level-video-games/65082/ (image)

Interaction Design: Everything BUT The Oculus Rift, Sorry To Disappoint?

Interaction design is an interesting concept and the questions I've been provided with have given me some food for thought. See, I want to talk about the Kinect, the Oculus and the Wii and how we are now using ourselves more as the controllers. HOWEVER, another question was asked in the brief for this task.

" Games are inevitably complex entities demanding constantly changing inputs and responses from the player. Given that Call of Duty is more demanding than Word, how do the designers enable such complex interactions relatively ‘intuitively’? Are these interactions in fact intuitive at all?"

For some reason I suddenly want to talk about UI design because this article on Gamasutra that was written by Anthony Stonehouse is absolutely fantastic in explaining the different concepts of UID. UID is such a cool topic because it's about psychology based as well as artistic ability. Menus and HUDs and such are always designed thinking about player interaction, especially with mobile games. We previously had an talk at university from Richard Tawn, from Exient, who went into detail about the UI design behind the game Angry Birds Go on mobile devices and it was fantastic and really informative. Use of colour and the size of buttons are all carefully decided and tested. It's weirdly interesting.

Angry Birds Go [x]

Angry Birds Go [x]

The other question that was asked however was this:

"Game engines can handle complex physics simulations, but have traditionally been hindered by the limitations of screen/keyboard/mouse interaction. What effect could the rise of the Wii and the new generation of motion controllers have on game design? What about the impact of 3D technology?"

This leads me on to all the various types of controllers that the games industry has bought to us. Basic two-handed controllers, joystick, steering wheels, pedals and keyboard control schemes are all big examples. Even light guns and other arcade game controllers are interesting to talk about. Obviously, motion sensors are now a big thing with the improvement of the technology see with the Wii, then Kinect and now the Kinect 2.0  with the Xbox One.  One that is often overlooked in terms of interaction design is touch screens however.

Touch screen gaming has really come into its own recently. Originally introduced with the Game Gear (though it flopped), the Nintendo DS really bought it forwards into the forefront of gaming. This allows for a different kind of interaction that you get with a controller; it's far more of a visual experience. This has paved the way for the booming mobile gaming market that relies solely on a touch screen experience. It could be argued that it's a more interactive and intuitive experience than gaming with a controller ever has been.

For example, The Room, from Fireproof games, has been a huge success with multiple awards, selling over 1.4 million copies as of March 2013 [x]. Clearly, the touch screen mobile experience is inviting in a whole new group of gamers and proving them with a unique experience to that of consoles and PC. The way in which you interact with the objects within the room has a realistic feel, with the objects reacting to your touch. UI Design has a big part to play in this as well as your interface is something that players have to interact with via touch. The constraints of the technology are what make is so interesting in the case of games like The Room, and clears the way for some interesting and innovative design choices within games.

Again, Gamasutra has a fantastic article about the designing for touch screen devices and I'd highly recommend giving it a read through if you're interested at all in this topic. They also have a good article about The Room as well.

You may have noticed I've been skirting around the topic of motion control and the Oculus Rift's VR technology. It's been talked about so much, but it's most definitely worth a mention because that is where gaming is heading.

I've got experience with the Wii and both of the Kinects. Motion control is something that still needs A LOT of work put into it. However, the potential it has is incredible. A lot of people actually hate the idea of motion controls. Difficult to make it work without the controls being completely useless or without having you looking like an absolutely idiot. "Games shouldn't just look more real but they should feel real, too, yeah? Out with buttons. In with realistic movements. No, no, no. Terrible idea." says Stephen Totilo from Kotaku and, in some cases I agree. However, you cannot deny the pull that motion control has had in increasing the popularity of the games industry. The Wii bought in so many people who had never previously been interested in games because of that interactivity and because of the promise of something unique. Is the same with the Kinect. The Just Dance franchise is incredibly successful but there are few "hardcore gamers" who are interested in it. Clearly, however, motion controls are onto something.

Just Dance 2014

After reading, yet again, another couple of Gamasutra articles about motion controls [x] [x] (seriously why are you reading my blog, just read their stuff, it's awesome), I came across a man called Douglas Wilson, who has an interesting view on motion controls. He is the man behind the game Johann Sebastian Joust, a multi-player game that utilises the motion controls in an interesting way. 

Just... watch the video:

Johann Sebastian Joust

This man has got some incredibly interesting theories. While many designers swear off motion controls, he's all for them. In fact, he believes that the only way they will improve is if everyone bands together and talks about the problems they've encountered when designing for these games, so they can find out what works and what doesn't. 

My kind of man.

The problem with designing control schemes surrounding motion is that we're still designing those controls with buttons in mind. "[It revolves] around a binary kind of input – either you did the "correct" gesture or you didn't. The system would miss the gesture you swear you performed correctly; the system would register the gesture you swear you didn't perform"(Kris Graft) This causes clunky controls that the "hardcore" gaming community just make fun of, which puts companies off designing for it. "The beauty of physical movement is that it's rich and complex,""That is to say, physical movement is very 'analog.' Many of the best physical games figure out how to let players move in expressive ways, rather than prescribing exact gestures." says Wilson. Therefore, the control schemes that we design needs to be more organic rather than "analog" and we'll get somewhere.

God, this man knows how to use words.

Anyway, another thing attributed to the negativity surrounding such an innovative technology is public expectation. "The rhetoric goes that motion control is supposed to be like the Holodeck or virtual reality," says Wilson. While the Oculus Rift is starting to provide some VR control within the industry, he is right. People are expecting Star Trek Holodeck and we are NOWHERE near that yet and people are disillusioned as to what they are getting. They expect immersion but they just have clunky control schemes that need more research and more work because the industry is still stuck in the mindset of button-pushing.

I know Lt. Barklay... I want a holodeck too...

Now I've finishing crying over how awesome Douglas Wilson is, I'll wrap it up.

" What effect could the rise of the Wii and the new generation of motion controllers have on game design?"

Well. Motion control still has SO much potential but we are so far away from where we need to be in terms of technology. As my main man, Doug, says " "It's about getting people to do stupid crap with weird plastic controllers. … I don't think the industry really put in the time, research or thinking to make radical new stuff." 

We need more research into the control schemes with a more organic, fluid approach before we get the most out of the technology we have. In terms of interaction however, it's clearly doing something right with games like Just Dance and Kinect Sports. People enjoy them an get involved, immersing them in the games. A little more work needs to be done to bring that to the "hardcore market" however.

I didn't get time to talk about the awesomeness that is the Oculus Rift... Guess that means another blog post soon.

Links used:

http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/AnthonyStonehouse/20140227/211823/User_interface_design_in_video_games.php

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_controller

http://gamasutra.com/view/news/205434/Designing_better_controls_for_the_touchscreen_experience.php

http://gamasutra.com/view/news/185397/Could_The_Rooms_success_predict_a_new_trend.php

http://www.fireproofgames.com/the-room

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Room_(2012_video_game)

http://kotaku.com/motion-controls-the-most-popular-and-most-broken-idea-1445766816

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/203365/harnessing_the_power_of_motion_.php?page=1

http://www.jsjoust.com/

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/201841/Three_factors_that_stand_in_the_way_of_motion_controls_future.php