Motion Capture

Last Friday the programming team did some preliminary work for the motion capture we will be doing for the models we have been creating.
What we actually did was to physically go through the movements of almost all our characters. Travis videotaped the movements so we could review them later.
At present it seems like we will need over to a hundred different animations.
Besides allowing us to determine the number animations and how each should look, we also came to realise the need for the motion capture of Kali to be acted out by a female. Tim has kindly contacted an associate of his to see if some actresses may be interested in helping us out.
Once we had finished planning out the movements for our characters we captured some test animation to try out in Torque with our test model.

Otherwise work has continued on the creation of models and the rigging of our test model. Personally I have investigated into other engine modifications and have carried out some testing on the melee mod we are using. Collision tests have suggested the mod doesn't work as expected; i.e. between the nodes at the weapon tip and the weapon hilt are not being detected.
I've started to look at the code and to see if changes can be made to get better performance out of the mod. Strangely enough it appears that the actual collision detection is taking place in TorqueScript, whilst the C++ changes mainly relate to animations.


*UPDATE*
Further testing has revealed their is no problem with the mod, the time interval for damage for the animations was set to too short a time. The mod works by defining an amount of time that the weapon can do damage for each animation, unfortunately the time interval for one of the animations was set too low, meaning that by the time the weapon collided with the enemy the weapon was no longer set to do damage. A simple increase of half a second allows the animation to work. When we capture our own animations we must exercise care to have a time interval that will ensure the weapon is active for the entirety of the animation.

Classwork\Research

Researched Dynamic Webpage and Server Requirements. Had a look into the Torque Game Engine newtorking information. Also looking for Information on Clustering Topology.

Tim 23/2/09

This week I had to re-get printer rights and print out my blogger's check list again. I then went around and made sure I checked off as much blogs as everyone has done, most people are up to date with their blogs.

late entry: Miroslav

Worked on the website created the login in system

late entry: Miroslav

Worked on the website created the signup system

late entry: Miroslav

Worked on the website created index page with news

Pravesh 2/23/09

looking for people who are administrators or have created game servers and game websites !!

This week end

This week end I will try building the actual cluster... I think I will try different type of virtual software (VMWare, VirtualServer, Xen, VirtualBox, ...) looking for the best options...

WinServer 2008 Installation

Proceed with installation of Window Server 2008 (Enterprise or Data Centre) to test the Clustering Service.

Microsoft documentation

I found Microsoft documentation about virtual clustering:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/virtualserver/deploy/cvs2005.mspx

I found it quite interesting... it's about 2003 server but it think switch technology should not be that hard

23 feb 2009

Started working on the 2008 enterprise servers, first machine went wrong during setup due to incorrect configured settings. Virtual machines were installed on vmware and required approximately 16 gig of space. 2 server machines were procduced in the end. Daryl worked on 2 servers machines as well.

sites used as guides
http://www.svrops.com/svrops/articles/Win2008VM.htm

http://www.pythian.com/blogs/1461/building-a-windows-server-2008-cluster-part-1

timmeh's 16/2/09 - Late Entry

Today I made a blog checklist to keep track of my duties of being a blog moderator. I ran into some problems when I couldn't print. I had to ask Karl for print rights and then I came back to try and print and still couldn't. So I did the obvious... and restarted my computer. It then worked, I printed the checklist's by the time I finished the checklists and printed them out it was time to go.

hii guys

researched on Ventrilo:server and client requirements and i have realised that Version 3.0.0 is now compliant with the Microsoft XP Themes User Interface.

Team A

Last week Team A worked on our Website and researching web servers, Today we are working on installing our windows server 2008.

Team A ;D

asdas

Researched information on setting up webservers. No problems were present at this time. Some ideas for hosting ventrilo have been thought further investigation is required though.

Concepts of the Gods

Alberto has done some excellent new concept images for Ra and a revised concept for Ares.
I really like the sun with the snake in the Ra concept. A model with this would allow us to use some cool particle and shader effects.

Monster Design: Demon

(left) concept art











(right) Model Screen Shot







This is just a quick model, with some shading and no texture (along with the scythe he will wield); it is not complete or textured so please be mindful :)

Character models need a little more time as we still need to design them completely as well.

Going to be working on more prototype models of monsters for us to smash or (in this guy's case) be smashed by.

This particular model is not based off any schematics, simply off some content art.

Nick~

UnderGod

To all

The name of the game has been decided

UNDERGOD

That be all fer now

------------------

\m/ Parkway Drive \m/

Torque Engine research

Today me n the other members of team B decided on what we need to research. we had to reasearch the system requirements to run torque engine. we got the information that we needed on the website www.garagegames.com
i also registered myself on www.FPSadmin.com ask questions with administrators who run game servers n who can help us with our project.

News

Updated our PBWiki (some more information about the Window Server 2008 Clustering Service), catch up with the readings. Also waiting for the ISO of 2008, to do some testing.

So Clever, Whatever?

To the programmin stooges

I added a Technical Documentation folder for us to use

this includes like of Psudo Code/ Rough Code / Actual Code/ ...just general code stuff.

I've already posted some rough AI ideas that we could consider.

Let me know which ones are primary atm, so i can start with Psudo Code.

------------------

\m/ METAL 4 LIFE \m/

Website Ideas

Hi guy's,

I am having to leave class early today but have just put some info up on our Awesome A Team Wiki regarding ideas for the website. Please feel free to make comments or add any input as feed back would be great. Bye for now Cath G

Hieu Nguyen

Research about how to confogure game server "Windows 2003"


Run game

CPU Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 @ 3.4 Ghz	Motherboard MSI P6N SLI-FI	Memory mushkin 2GB (2x1 GB) DDR2 800	Graphics Card GTX 260 Core 216 896 MB
Hard Drive Seagate 250 GB x 2	Sound Card HD 7.1 CH Onboard Audio	Power Supply Ultra 600 Watt	Case Antec 1200
CPU cooling Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme	GPU cooling Stock	OS Windows XP x32

09/02/09

Mostly checked out the requirements of Windows server 2008 as well as research on the method that the people that did the same project last year used i.e. clustering etc. and posted them on the wiki. I feel that the networking side is lacking direction...

blog post

16/02/2009

hello guys
Today I did reserch on torque Game Engine Advanced requirements:examples of the subtopic is:

C++ Compiler

All platforms require an installed C++ compiler in order to build the engine. TGEA is compatible with the free Microsoft Visual Studio 2005/2008 Express and Apple XCode.

Jakubowski at 12:39 pm on Feb 9, 2009

Jakubowski said
at 12:39 pm on Feb 9, 2009

Hello there everyone :)
Today i researched information on building a game serverand stuff about dedicated servers.I have been assigned as web server developernow i'll do some more research there and hopefully come together with the gang to clarify our objectives :)
till next week,
the adventure will continue..........

Progress update

searched some templated for a game society website.

created a template site

http://botg.aowc.net

found an interesting site

www.battleofthegods.com

Today i did

Today i found out some more information on the torque engine and how we will implement it into our windows server 2008 cluster. I also had a look over our network diagram and how that will also effect our cluster, libero and i went to mark to get the server image so we can install it and give it a test run

09/02/2009

Researched information for server 2008. Started a page on wiki that defines information on server 2008 and its specific requirements. Continued research on clustering networks. Some complications did come up : internet was starting to decrease in speed that or not load the webpages and Fred accidently deleted my page.

Concept Development Update

This week the programming team has continued concept development and started on the actual creation of the game. Currently we are looking into melee combat mods, AI pathfinding, building a preliminary terrain object, constructing a prototype user interface system, and planning the functions required for our enemy AI.
As far as the game concept is concerned the only major development was the decision to include a fourth pantheon of gods, so we could have a hybrid class character. We have decided to use the Hindu gods with Kali being the hybrid class character's god. This also means we will now have a female character, albeit with four arms.
As far as a final name for the game goes the following have been put forward:

• Death Valley
• Mark of Hades
• Undergod
• Apotheosis

Besides the work of the programming team we have also been lucky enough to have Tim do some concept artwork of Kali and Loki for us.

A* Pathfinding

Hey guys, I needed to make a blog post and everyone from the old project knows I like to include a screen shot so here's one of the A* path finding I've been working on. It basically means bots can navigate around the landscape without running into rocks, building or anything that mite block them.

Hello there everyone :)

Today i researched information on building a game server
and stuff about dedicated servers.

I have been assigned as web server developer
now i'll do some more research there and hopefully come together with the gang to clarify our objectives :)

till next week, the adventure will continue..........


Posted by Jakubowski at the BotG wiki

Research Work done this lesson For Awesome Ateam

Pages added to Wiki for reference : Creating clusters in Windows Server 2008 , Failover Clustering in 2008, Windows Server 2008 Screen Cast, Contacted a Web Designer for some Site advice.

Posted by Catherine at the BotG wiki

Website Requirements

Check out https://botg.pbwiki.com/Online-Presence for information on what is required for the website. If further details are required please contact me.

New in Team A !

Julien - New

Today, I joined the Team Awesome A.

I created my Gmail account.

I got nothing special to do.
So I did nothing .... ^^

But next week I'll start ...

What miroslav did

Today (09/02/09) i planned out how to make the wiki look, i thought about the colours, layout and some cool java scripts

Undertaker Theme

Aru can you please turn it down........or off

Its appreciated ^_^

Peace!

Today's blog post

This week we were sorted into our project group roles and I got assigned to researching. I researched information on Windows 2008 specifications.

DaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrryL's blog

Hey Bloggers
Today, I have been researching information relating to cluster for windows server 2008, something about Failover, whatever that is... still reresearching...
We have assigned our fellow members of the "AWESOME A TEAM", there task/s.
i had a problem with this blog page, my gmail was listed wrong with a spelling error but thats normal.

xoxoxoxox :D

today's class

pravesh - researcher

watched an episode of life !! + did research on windows 2008 server !! windows 2008 server seems to be the same as win 2003 server. there is just some changes done to the GUI and more features hav been added to facilitate network management

timmeh's Monday 9, Februrary 09

Today Joseph was elected team leader of Team Bee. We were organised into different project roles. Emma and Elvin were assigned to going around and helping people who are stuck or who just need help in general. Mirsolav was assigned to website moderator, Pravesh and Emma were assigned to researching, Joseph and Libero to clustering and I to blog moderator. After our group huddle was over we went our separate ways to begin discussing and beginning our project duites for this week.

Nick's Prospects

First blog post (pretty much ever) - don't attack me.

Made alterations/suggestions to the design concept; uploaded.

As we'll be using Kali, Loki and Ares as our main pantheon characters; I would like to gather some reference images (to be paired with the concept art we already have). I'm keen on getting into modeling our characters or atleast one; any adept drawers who wana have a go at it post some images or hand in sktech work :)

Our main focus at the moment will be the melee system however; as it'll most likely pose the most trouble.

First concept art

Here's an awesome sketch of Ares done by Alberto, an old student of Tim's. You can see some more of his work at bertoloco.deviantart.com (though it hasn't been updated in awhile).

I figure we can kill two birds with one stone by using the same model for the gods as for their champion. The gods really only need exist in the background and as such we can create a high-poly version of Ares Champion, tweaked to look godly and capture some images. The images could then be used on billboards that have some sort of shader effect and possibly a particle effect.


On another note Travis asked about the possibility of some sort of introductory movie, seeing as how the motion capture lab now has rigid body stuff working. After some breif checking on the Garage Games website I found that TGEA supports Theora video.
Unfortunately creating a movie using Max is likely to be too time consuming. Alternately we could try capturing some gameplay video, but this also has problems as last semester we had a some troubles trying to capture video. A third option is to create a small level where bot versions of the Player Characters fight against the Boss or a small group of enemies. It is possible in fact to have this level simple running behind the menu interface for the game so that until the actual level a player has chosen needs to load (of course in our version there will only be one choice).

Also of note is the fact we will now be adding the Hindu pantheon of gods as a fourth selection. Dependent on time this would allow us to have a hybrid warrior/caster class character. Whether we will actually implement this class is questionable, but our UI and documentation will reflect the change regardless (i.e. the Hindu gods will appear on the character select screen but may or may not be actually selectable).
Currently I'm thinking of having Shiva, Ganesha, and one other as the Hindu gods. Shiva's champion would be a Hybrid class character of some type and Ganesha would be some sort of heavy type character of some class.

Programming Wiki

Here's a link to the Programming Team's wiki.

http://botg.pbwiki.com

High Concept

Here's the rough concept for the game.

Battlefield of the Gods is an action RPG centred around a inescapable valley filled with undead creatures.
Players take on the role as the champion of a god of their choice. Gods from several different pantheons (e.g. Greek, Norse, Egyptian, etc.) are available for selection. The class and abilities of a player are determined by the god they choose to serve.
The object of the game is to destroy the undead creatures in order to halt the resurrection of a dark entity of destruction, known only as the Unnamed, sealed in a crevasse at the centre of the valley long ago by the gods.
Players may choose how to play: they may team up; fight individually; or fight against both the undead hordes and each other.
Eventually after a number of waves of monsters have been defeated the Unnamed arises from it's crevasse and players must destroy it's physical form to allow the gods to reseal it.

Intresting Blog

Bloggalicious

New Blog -yey-

Ooooh, new blog ;) yey.

First Post.

Welcome to the 2009 Project for the Diploma groups at WEST COAT TAFE in Joondalup Perth Western Australia, to check out our last effort take a look at Minitanks. Brett will probably introduce the project soon enough. But the above title is kind of a hint.