With the third thesis presentation, I felt delighted with the results of the day. After struggling for the earlier part of the semester, I finally found myself having refined my idea and its presentation. However, I’ve continuously faced with residual problems that came from the original scale of the project. I’ve also been dealing with issues that arose from Unity itself, and with the quality of life changes that I had placed on the back burner due to said issues.

In regards to the game, it’s now as close as I as I can get it to my original vision. There have been some downscaling, but it’s not too far from the basic premise I had in mind. One thing I’m glad I was able to do to improve the presentation of the project is the appearance of the fighters the players use. The appearance of the characters in the game has been something that I have been unsure about since very early on. I don’t consider myself a lousy artist in any respect, but I realized three points in regards that told me it wasn’t going be a viable option for this project. The First point: Even If I was able to improve my drawing skills to a level I would have been satisfied with, I didn’t have the time to do so, far from it. The Second Point: If I tried doing something draw that could fit the timeline I had; It would have looked out of place with the rest of the presentation. Finally, if I made something that with drawings, it would have looked the same as any other card game, thus making my game blend with other games of the genre.

I first tried made some prototypes regarding this using Vector Art and Pixel Art. My main inspiration for the approach I was aiming regarding the character design came from some art from artist Tato (https://tomatatoro.tumblr.com/). I remembered seeing in some videos about character design mentions of his work doing redesigns of Overwatch characters. I took not his points regarding character palettes and thought that it would be a good idea to choose colors for both players to differentiate them better. The primary purpose idea would be to use a basic template of white, black, and orange or blue, depending on what side of the fight summoned the fighter.

The tests on both methods didn’t pan out. Pixel art, while I have good experience with, didn’t fit the rest of the game. Not only that, for them to be cohesive, I would need to make it big enough to the point it was like drawing, so it would have been a time sink. I wasn’t satisfied at the time with the Vector Art either, but that had more to do with the fact it felt flat with the character design I was making for it. Finally, I considered the idea of using 3D Models to represent the characters, but that obviously wouldn’t work. Until I had the idea to use blender shapes, for which the process is rather straightforward. It just took making exciting, recognizable profiles on Quads with Unity and then using Vertex Morphing to animate them. This allowed me to quickly and efficiently be able to make different characters, and also be able to give them the motion to help them stand out.

Finally, I also finished a gameplay element that I hadn’t had the time to make fully functional, and that is the functionality of the Arrows found on cards. The arrows were made to visualize and simplify the function of card effects, making it easier to understand by just needing to see the specific card to see what their arrows do. However, another element that I did to streamline was making it that to use the effect of a card; you have to attack with said card. This gave me an excellent way to balance cards by their attack power. Cards with 0 attack could have a substantial effect, but it would make the player have to give up attacks.

With all of this, and the final presentation coming, it’s becoming harder to juggle all the work I have to do with everything else. I’m on the last legs of the project, and the only hurdle I’ve been facing has been bugs found in Unity 2017 (specifically a bug messing with the function of Multi-Displays). I have finally managed to do an admittedly risky fix for it, and that will hopefully be the last of my problems with the software. The only thing left is to finish the project and all the documentation needed.

At this point in development, I’ve managed to go through a rough patch, and things have been getting better. I’m at the stage in which the game is working on a functional level, but it’s not in a state in which its presentation correctly conveys how it works. Currently, I’m facing the problem of fixing how the presentation of the game and how I will do the setup of the game. I need to find a way for me to convey the mechanics of the game properly.

The stage of the game for the second presentation was one in which most of the mechanical aspects of the game were working correctly. The game’s flow is going as intended, but I am looking into speeding things up after more testing. The more significant problems were the presentation of the game in general and some technical issues. In regards to the technical side, one of the significant changes I had to do what the shift from online to local multiplayer. I underestimated the difficulty I would find trying to make Unity Networking work for the game. That said, the game wouldn’t work on one screen since players need to be able to keep information from one another. The most straightforward solution was to use an external monitor, that way both players would be able to have their screen without worrying about any networking issues. The only problem I’ve found with external monitors is that the function used in Unity to use another monitor, so I will need to use a computer using Windows for the show.

The other big problem for my project is the game’s presentation. This is mostly about two points, the aesthetic of the game itself and conveyance to the player. To address the first point, let’s talk about the type of aesthetic I’m going for. As I have stated previously, a lot of the inspiration for this project has been from trading card games. Those games usually possess a fantasy/medieval style for their characters and presentation. I wanted to do something different, so I chose to go the opposite route. I decided to make the game take place in a world in which network technology has advanced to the point that is has become a world all of its own. This cyberspace, however, has brought chaos, as governments struggle to keep up with technological advancements.

This gives me a good opportunity to talk more specifically about the rules of the game and how they work. The idea is that players are hackers, hunting down viruses and other, more malicious, hackers to keep the network safe. To do that, players use creatures called Avatars to fight. A match of Waraira works like this:

• Players create a team composed of 10 Avatars. They can use up to 3 copies of a specific Avatar.
• Players start the match with three random Avatars from their team, which will compose their hand.
• Each turn in Waraira is divided into three stages: Setup, Assault, and Battle. Players engage in these stages at the same time, so you’ll be able to see their actions, and they will be able to see yours.
• During Setup, players bring out Avatars from their hand into the field, choosing where to position them (Left, Middle, Right), and if they’ll be in the front or back.
• During Assault, players choose from their Avatars on the field who will attack the opponent’s forces. You can only attack up to the number of avatars on your field, and you can attack your opponents left, right, or middle. If one of your opponent’s side is empty, you can attack them directly to deal damage to them.
• During Battle, the actions both players chose in Assault will play out at the same time. An Avatars is destroyed if their HP drops to 0, they. If a player’s HP is dropped to zero, they lose the match.

The Basics of this have already been built in the game, but I still have work to do on how they are presented. Attacks from cards happen without any impact, and the UI isn’t clear enough and needs a bigger font size. But the core idea of a more focused card battle game is there. The main thing I need to do is to polish the experience and to experiment ways to convey better what the player can and must do.