What’s New?
- Dynamic Menu Background
- Intro cut-scene that introduces players to their objective before they start the game
- Shorter and easier tutorial
- Scene Transitions
- Updated vibration on controller when attendee is being chased by guard
- Attendee running is determined by the magnitude at which the analog stick is pushed forward, not whether the analog stick is pushed down anymore
- More sounds: unlocking safe and entering in combination
- WiFi icon hover above tablets (only visible to camera op) that disappear when tablets have been hacked
- Camera op has limited ability when highlighting objects (the highlight outline disappears after a couple seconds)
- Attendee body outline only visible to team’s camera op
- More house decorations in hallways: vases, paintings, tables
- Updated jewel look
- Switched controls so that ‘A’ is the main interaction button for both camera op and attendee players
- Updated UI font
- Pause menu is no longer buggy
- Added delays to door hacks (can no longer spam opening/closing doors)
What’s the Motivation?
The main motivation for this week was fixing many of the bugs from the last milestone and making the overall player experience much easier and more intuitive. The tutorial from the last milestone was overly long and complicated, had too much text, and had a game-breaking bug. Previously, when both teams would finish the tutorial, the tutorial would not transition to the actual game. Players had to start the game manually by triggering the pause menu and selecting ‘End Tutorial.’ Most playtesters were unable to figure this out, and when they did, sometimes the pause menu would become noninteractive, and playtesters would be stuck in the pause menu.
On this iteration, we improved the tutorial significantly. The tutorial originally played out similarly to the real game. It had a guard and quite a few rooms. This meant that there was a lot of gameplay in the tutorial and lasted like a shorter version of our game. The tutorial also had a lot of unnecessary texts for controls which also were quite buggy. The tutorial in this iteration was changed to be a mix of a ready up screen.This means that we had to push as much information and gameplay controls as possible in the shortest amount of time. The ready up requires the basic functionalities of both players on both teams to be tested before ready. New players pick this up quickly and experienced players can spend under a minute.
Between our scenes, we added transitions. Most of them are simple fade in and fade out to black. However, we included a diamond fade in for most of our big scene transitions. Switching cameras fades with a circle shape, similar to a camera shutter. In between the tutorial/ready up and the main game, we added a cutscene to introduce the map.
Vibration was buggy for our last build and has been fixed in this build. When the player is actively chased by the guard, the player’s controller will vibrate. In addition, running controls are slightly different. There is no need to press the stick to run. The walk and run speeds are decided based off stick magnitude. This was particularly beneficial to controllers that have poor analog sticks making it hard to press.
Various more sounds have been added and the audio listeners in the scene have been fixed. This means that sounds are now more audible and less muddy.
There have been numerous changes to the camera operator. First, the cameras have been adjusted to be able to see all the tablet spawns within its crosshair/laser. Upon each tablet, we added a sprite that shows its state. If the tablet has not been hacked, then an icon will appear above it just for the camera operator. This makes it easier for the camera operator to identify tablets that need to be hacked. The operator can properly tag and highlight tablets as well as the guard for a short duration.The operator also has been reintroduced with a player outline so it is easier to identify the player in rooms with multiple player models.
The house interior has some minor additions such as paintings and tables in some of the empty hallways. The pickup is now a jewel that is shaped as such and is shaded as such instead of a bright yellow cube. This is to make the interior more engaging and also the objective more inline with the interior of the house.
Control schemes for both all player types have been worked on. The interact button for the attendee is A instead of B which is the more natural of the buttons. The camera operator uses all 4 of the buttons so it makes it hard to come up with the best scheme. This will be part of our playtesting.
The UI has been revamped. The font has been changed, colored, and outlined. This improves readability and give a little character to the game. Minor touches such as font expanding in and retracting out give it a smoother feel. Safe cracking UI is much larger and more readable. The start menu has been changed to be simpler and include more overview of the map/game. The pause menu has been fixed up so that only the player who pauses the game can control the menu and unpause or choose a different option.
Another minor thing that has been added is a delay for door interactions. This number needs to be tweaked as we playtest the final week. The door cannot be interacted with for the second after its last action. This may, for example, help the player escape from the guard. If a team closes the door right in front of a guard, the guard must wait that one second to be able to open the door again, giving the player a better chance at running around.
What’s Next?
- Add more diverse NPCs with more dynamic animations
- Add ending animation for losing and winning team/cut-scenes
- Enhance house exterior so it looks like teams can actually escape
- Moving over to a 4 monitor final build version
- Adjusting balance in regards to tablet spawns, guard patrolling, and escaping events
