Play through video

 Video for Semester 2 graveyard play through : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIwXz89T7OA&fbclid=IwAR2QrOXErRhoufkjVEtFDQszx0D2mvcGVw3gfbEMFvGa5NEEINm5ReIVHvA&ab_channel=YasmineBrough

Reflection

 Conclusion and Reflection 

During this project, I feel I managed to achieve my goal towards testing, as a means of exploring more ways that I can use the 'Sense of the self'. I feel I have learned more from this semester then my previous both practically and in theory. 

I intend to carry on this project to my third semester, but focusing it towards a final piece that strings all the things I have learned into one demonstrative piece. I aim to do one play through rather than multiple test levels as it is not experimental in that same way - it is a culmination of my tests. 

There are problems with my testing, similar to other projects. Due to the current situation, its difficult to get players to play test so my tests feature a small sample size, which means I can not set up a specific 'control' group in the way that I would like. My playtester sees both the first and second levels in tandem, which could skew their feelings and results. I've learned some interesting ideas and observations through this, even if the results aren't very thorough.

Graveyard levels Test

 Testing 

I got a player to play through both levels and then interviewed them. 

In the first level, the test player stated that it was quite a somber atmosphere. They felt that the indirect nature of communication from the owls only made them want to talk to them more, driving them forward. The player noticed after the first two sets of spirits that they were only speaking with each other. She felt the atmosphere was quite bleak but somewhat relaxing. 

In the second level, she noticed instantly that they were no longer in pairs and this time were alone and could be interacted with. After a few conversations with the owl spirits, she noticed the heads were following her and stated that she was instantly unsettled. She added that this was the main feature that made her want to run through the rest of the level. She feels she had a strong reaction to this because she had gone a while in a false sense of security, and the change was noticed naturally. Catching that movement in the corner of her eye made her feel more unsettled. 

I asked which of the two levels she preferred for atmosphere and emotional impact. She said that it was by far the second level, however she does not feel that she would have gotten the same impact if it was not for the first level setting that atmosphere up.  This was the part I was most intrigued in, as realistically other than in a testing format, repeating the same area in that way is not standard practice for games.. However, there may be ways in which I can use that tactic to set up a similar response in a singular map. 

Owl Graveyard Final Scene

 Graveyard scene completed

level 1

First level entrance. By Yasmine Brough

Discussion between first pair of owl spirits. By Yasmine Brough

Lonely owl spirit. By Yasmine Brough

Bridge leading to cross road. By Yasmine Brough

last owls discussing narrative. By Yasmine Brough

level 2

Second level first owl interaction. By Yasmine Brough

Owls Heads turn to face player. Background town. By Yasmine Brough

Building my final levels, I noticed that I could see the practice level in the background as a sort of silhouette. This gave the impression of further life and energy in the world, which I realised was something that had been missing in my scene. I decided to add this intentionally and build a small house scene in the distance. 

I could expand on this further in future projects with an external environment, adding towns or mountains in the background.

Owl spirit scripts

  Level and scripts

    

Furthering my designs of the level layout, I created the draft scripts for the stories and figured out the locations that I wanted for the player to meet the owl spirits.

First Level

The first level is the level where I want the player to meet the owl spirits that communicate with each other, rather than the player. I'm interested in testing the level of interest the player shows towards picking up on the narrative and what atmosphere this creates in the transition area. 

First level map By Yasmine Brough

First level script By Yasmine Brough

Second level

 The second level is where the owl spirits will be on their own - able to see the player and be interacted with. The owl spirits can speak directly to the player now. However for the script I still want certain aspects of the narrative to be interpretive; such as who the player character is. In this map the owl heads will always face the player and will turn to face them no matter where they are. This makes the owl spirits in this level a lot more focused on the player directly. I am interested to test the players emotional response to the contrast between the two. 

Second level map By Yasmine Brough

Second level script By Yasmine Brough

Practice map

Practice map By Yasmine Brough

Putting my assets in to UE4 I created a small test area so I could see how everything looked together and to work on the blueprints. 

Owl Spirit By Yasmine Brough

The owl spirit in the test map was originally 'lit' in UE4, giving off more shading and different hues on the mask that I felt were quite effective tonally. However, I changed this to be 'unlit' while building my first level because the appearance became more striking. The pupils gave off a better effect in this way, and the mask being bright white drew attention towards the owl spirits. 

Level Designs

 Level Designs

     The first designs for the graveyard layout were very square. I liked the idea of keeping it this way so that the environment looked spacious despite having a more linear path through it. I designed it this way so that I could keep everything feeling enclosed and have everything more spaced out. However while researching graveyards I felt that the ones that were more spacious felt empty. Although this in itself can be a good emotion to convey in the scene I started to realize that I would have to block the player of from the majority of the scene to keep the tone between meeting each owl spirit. This encouraged me look further in to graveyards that had more obscure shapes.  

First Graveyard level designs By Yasmine Brough

First graveyard level designs By Yasmine Brough

Image From Graveyard Records

   

After seeing images such as this, I loved the imagery of the graveyard being in sections. This helped keep everything more spacious while having little scenes in each area. In the image of this gate, for example, I really liked the way the path wasn't directly forward and was to the side. This meant the first impression would be of a little uninterrupted area. I updated the designs for the level to match this form of layout. 

Layout re-design By Yasmine Brough

Design and model Progress

 Owl 3D design 

Owl spirit designs. By Yasmine Brough

     I started modeling out some of the concepts. I played around with the Idea of a different stylized mask. However I liked the original mask a lot more, so used this one for a base to construct the final one. I modeled two versions of the bodies that I liked, The hunched one and the vase shaped one. The vase shaped one looked the same from all angles. Were as the hunched one looked different every angle and I liked this effect so that's the one I went with.  

Final owl spirit model. By Yasmine Brough

Grave prop progress. By Yasmine Brough

                                             Texture Tests 

Texture test gravestone. By Yasmine Brough

Texture test grave stone. By Yasmine Brough

Texture test gravestone. By Yasmine Brough

Spirit Designs

 Spirit Designs

Wan Shi Tong Knowledge spirit from Avatar. Image from Fandom

The design of the owls have been inspired by the design for 'Wan Shi Tong' from 'avatar the last air bender'. I feel the owl spirits are fitting for the environment, and believe they will be effective in directing the narrative of the level.

Owl design By Yasmine Brough

I want the owls head to be able to follow the player and unrestricted in the same way an owl would rotate their heads.  The first design of the owl is made up of a more obscure heart shape to look like a ghost body. 

Owl Design By Yasmine Brough

The second owl design is a more physical form. Instead of a spirit body has more of a physical form, in a feather coat overlaying a large hunched body. The lantern this spirit carries is connected to the head to keep the arms more tucked away. 

Owl Design By Yasmine Brough

The third design is a mixture of the first two, but I was going for more of an unsettling demonic appearance. I like the empty expression as I feel like this can be unsettling in the level. However may effect the players judgment on were/ who the owl spirit is talking to. Although I like this design more, I feel this would effect to much the players understanding of the owls communication.  

Owl Design By Yasmine Brough

Graveyard Corridor designs

 Early graveyard props design 

Designs for props. Gravestones. By Yasmine Brough

Designs for props. By Yasmine Brough

Designs for foliage and props. By Yasmine Brough

Church design By Yasmine Brough

Church Design By Yasmine Brough

Entrance Design By Yasmine Brough

Looking into color By Yasmine Brough

Colour Designs By Yasmine Brough

The Graveyard corridor

Graveyard Transition area

          For this project I am wanting to create an atmospheric graveyard scene. Focusing on more abstract assets and further developing the emotional impact of  ''the sense of self'' and exploration within the scene. With the combination of these I am hoping to create an overall emotionally impactful atmosphere. 

Image from ArtStation. By Darren Benton 

       For this scene I want to design I am wanting to lean into a stylized abstract nature. Creating textures that have a more hand painted style to them. Originally I wanted to make the scene white with black silhouettes. After further research and discussion with peers I have realized that there are a few problems with doing it this way. Such as the effect of depth on the environment and models. 

 

Raven Art By 5erg

      

However there are ways around the issues in the use of techniques such as water colors and ink. The different tones of the black gives a sense of depth while still maintain contrast. Although I could go this direction, keeping the black and white. I still feel that I want more color depth. So for my project I am wanting to create some of the assets as silhouettes, such as trees and hills in the background. however for the assets that are closer I want colored textures, but with a murky over tone to them. 

Inspiration

 Inspiration for next transition area 

           In this next project I want to further my previous project 'the sense of self'. Using inspirations from other artistic mediums to add emphasis and explore the emotional reaction gauged by the player. 

Areas such as fine art are an influence in this process as this practice focuses heavily on abstract and emotionally impactful products. I hope to use the lessons learned in my previous work to create a small narrative that intends to leave the conclusions to the player's own interpretations - much like within the world of fine art.  

Beth Cavener Stichter

“Kept-Variation in Cream and Grey” By Beth Cavener Stichter 

Beth Stichter creates animal sculptures that convey human emotions. Using other beings, other then humans, for a strong emotional impact is effective as people find it easier to relate to complex or difficult feelings when it is more as a representation. This means that her work can convey a lot of powerful emotion and encourages people to talk about these topics more openly. 

Okami

Art based games such as 'Okami' use similar premises and art based styles. 

Image from Wikipedia 

The black and white ink style in 'Okami' adds to the dynamic and free style gameplay. 

Ori 

Ori and the Blind Forest has stunning visuals which is one of the main factors that made this game stand out so much from others. Mixed with the narrative and it makes for a very emotionally impactful experience. 

Image from Wikipedia 

The Unfinished Swan 

This game uses ink projectiles to paint in the white surrounding areas so that you can make your way through the map. This alongside the narrative work very effectively 

Image from gamespot. Image from  By Justin Clark

 

Library scene Reflection

 Conclusion 

    From this project I feel that the visuals definitively impact the emotional connection and impression on the player. Transition areas could be improved simply by improving the visuals in the environment. The flaws of this do still exists for the industry though and so would remain unreliable to use consistently (especially for companies or games with less funding) as this issue is not quite as relevant for AAA games that can justify these costs and time expenditure. 

    The visuals for this scene improved but still had flaws that I would like to address in future. Such as the plant pots. To save on poly count I left a small gap in the top for the plant stems. However, this left gaps that light could get through, which reflected underneath the pots and further affected the lighting in the environment as a whole, causing incorrect reflections. 

  From this experiment I have learned that the visuals do play a big part in the emotional impression on the player. For my next corridor I would like to explore the idea of improving the visual impressions while also tackling the problem of time and funding problems that this causes. 

Library Play through

 Testing 

Library scenes By Yasmine Brough

   For the test I got a player to play through the old and the new scene and asked and interviewed them on the emotional response from them both separately and then as a comparison between the two. 

First Library

  For the first (older) scene, she described it as very plain and basic visually, however could tell what the items were meant to represent; especially with the narrative aid. She did feel that the emotional impact and intrigue of the narrative and desire for exploration were impacted by the visuals. She detailed that it was a small space with lots to interact with, however felt this was detrimental to the transition area as it was an overwhelming amount of information to take in, in such a small area. This, she said, was problematic as transition areas reflect the pacing of other areas as well. Making the player want to avoid exploring with these things would possibly reduce interest in the world that it is supposed to be promoting. 

Second Library

  The second one she felt was a lot better in both layout and visuals.  She stated that despite this version of the scene had more in it, it felt less overwhelming due to it being more spacious. The rounded effect and corridor going upwards gave the player a good sense of direction with freedom to explore. As an aspiring lighting artist she felt that the colors and lighting gave this scene a much better sense of magic and wonder. However she did feel that the red rug in the center was distracting and disconnected to the magic theme as the contrast disconnected it with the theme.  

Final thoughts on comparison

   I asked her; in regards to her thoughts on the two scenes, how did she feel the visuals impacted this. She believed that the first scene would have improved a lot with more visual details like in the second. However she stated that the overall design and layout along side the visuals all contributed to the improved atmosphere. 

Conclusion and Reflection

After this project I feel that the visuals can impact the overall emotional impact gauged by the player to a degree that the other areas I was testing have been affected. My current style of project is reflected by the visuals, in that since they are tests rather than produced works, they have a more abstract feel. This however does not mean this style is inevitably detrimental to the projects. In projects such 'a sense of self' I used this style in a different way, inspired by games such as the 'Beginners Guide' that use abstract visuals as a way of enhancing the emotional impact. In my next project I am going to look more in to this concept. 

Finished Scene

 Library scene complete

Library By Yasmine Brough

Library By Yasmine Brough

Library By Yasmine Brough

Library By Yasmine Brough

Library By Yasmine Brough

Library By Yasmine Brough

Library By Yasmine Brough

Library By Yasmine Brough

Library By Yasmine Brough

Library By Yasmine Brough

 The final renders of the Library scene. They contained the same premise of narrative with line trace giving a description of an item.