Down to the Wire
It’s already April and to be quite honest, I’m not sure how to deal with that. It seems as though my final semester of college is going by so fast that I’m barely able to make time for anything anymore. Enough about my life, though. Let’s do a little talking about Sword of the Sorcerer.
Three cheers for being ahead of schedule! Believe it or not we actually seem to be on the fast track to finishing up everything that needs to be done! I know, it’s exciting, but that doesn’t mean that we haven’t also had some hiccups along the way. If you read my last blog post, you’ll know that there was talk at one point of cutting the Anti-Paladin enemy from the game. To remedy this, we had George (the art lead) cheese some of the final animations so that they worked but still looked good. Luckily, this worked out incredibly well and it looks like the Anti-Paladin will definitely be getting to make his debut within the game in the coming days. Yes, I said days. We no longer have weeks to work on the game as we are required to meet specific deadlines for the Senior Show. In fact, next Wednesday is one of those major deadlines: Beta. That’s right, folks, Beta is due next Wednesday, giving us only five days to complete a list of objectives that are required for this milestone. In fact, let’s take a look at what’s required of us for Beta:
- Second version of Team Poster due on Repo.
- All project-specific goals are complete (as negotiated with Executive Producers).
- Demonstration of revisions (as negotiated with Executive Producers).
- Fully playable and well-tested game build.
- All game features and options are implemented. The game is “feature complete.”
- All design is locked.
- The game can be navigated on all paths. Any bugs that may have closed off portions of the game are eliminated.
- The game is compatible with all specified hardware and software configurations.
- The game logic and AI is final. Programming is complete on the “gameplay” of the game. The game knows its own rules. All AI profiles are complete.
- All controllers work.
- 75% of final artwork is implemented. There should be no placeholder artwork left.
- 75% of final audio is implemented.
- All online modes are complete and testable. This includes game networking and companion websites.
I know, it’s a hell of a lot of stuff. Overall, I can say that I’m not entirely worried about us. However, there are still a few things on the chopping block that need to be worked out, like setting up the wave system to incorporate the two new enemies while still maintaining an effective yet fair difficulty curve. When it comes down to it, we’ve still got a decent amount of work ahead of us but I’m confident that we’ll meet the challenge head on and conquer it, just like we always have.
Thanks for reading and be sure to check back every week for updates on the game’s progress!
Christopher Jeffery 