Previous Project Reflection

Over the course of the last 6 weeks my group and I at university have been working on a 2D battle simulation featuring huge robots battling it out in various locations. Players can select their kind of robot, their armour which effects their defence and accuracy, their primary and secondary weapon and aggression which determines their attack and defense. In theory this may sound enjoyable if you’re into any kind of battle simulation but unfortunately we over scoped the project fairly immensely which led to the downfall of the project.

We essentially developed the game with continued development after the 6 weeks in mind, when we should have really kept the scope within the deadline and add  some other features to the game later on if we did work on the project later on. Although I feel a little discouraged at the moment I would really like to finish the game and redeem myself by creating an enjoyable experience out of what I see currently as a failure. If you are interested and would like to continue reading about my thoughts on the project and what went wrong or right, I have displayed my post mortem document below.

GDS230.1 Post-Mortem Report

“BattleBots”

Peter Debrincat

109907

What went right?

Unfortunately not a lot went right during the development of Battlebots. It was generally a positive experience until the last few weeks where we discovered we were falling behind where we really wanted to be and had to cut down some features because of the time restraints. I will try to explain some of the positive things that came from the development

Group meetings

Every week we would begin class with a group meeting and discuss what work needs to be done and what has been done. We also had a meeting to discuss what work would need to be done during our own time. This helped make sure everything that had to be done was done. Although we did have these group meetings we still fell into the same trap that we did when developing “Sweet Peeps” and there was a gap between collaboration with the programmers during outside of school hours.

The Documentation

We have done our best to document all our ideas and convey how they work through the design documentation and provided some backstory to give some context to the characters, weapons and levels throughout.  This really helped with going back to check why we were doing our work in a certain way.

A great learning experience

One of the major positive things to come from this project is the fact that there hasn’t been many positive things to come from this project. In the last few days I have learnt a great deal about sticking to deadlines and how over scoping can turn an interesting concept for a game into a boring series of cut scenes.

This project has really opened my eyes about managing elements of a project and the fact that I need the confidence to tell someone to their face that they have a terrible idea and that the way they are working sucks to prevent getting a slap in the face when it comes to presenting. I promise that for the next project that I’m not going to let my other team mates walk over me and ruin our project just to prevent conflict that may even be necessary in succeeding in the industry.

What went wrong?

A lot of things went wrong, In fact most of the development of BattleBots towards the end of the project was very negative and could have been handled much better than it had been.

Scoping

The game was generally out of scope for a 6 week period although it didn’t seem like it at first. The designers and I have had a generally good workload that could have been completed in time, we were even planning to complete the animations for the characters a week before the deadline for the presentations of the project at the loop bar but unfortunately the programmers stated that it would be too difficult to implement those animations in by the end of the project. One of our programmers was very little help with the project which set the programming side even more back then it really should have been.

Communication

The difference this time was that I really tried my best to get the group to meet up on other days to make sure that we were all on the same page but my offers were quickly rejected because they thought it was easier to work from home. Although 2 other group members and I had contact with each other without face to face communication we generally had no way to communicate with the other 2 group members, really setting us back.

Project Management

I will admit I have flopped as a lead designer as it was the first time I have had any authority in a project, and the responsibility of making sure that all work was well-planned out. I believe I would have done a much better job managing the project if I was the main authority and the project had to go the way that I that I planned.  My group member was having problems with reaching certain KPIs causing us to follow someone else’s leadership as it was there concept and then they and myself had mutual authority of the project as the lead programmer and lead designer.

Although I tried managing the project as best as I could it turned out my best was not enough at this point in time. I believe to prevent this in the future I will have to research into my duties as a lead designer and make sure that I am covering all that I am supposed to in that position. Also as mentioned earlier I have to be a much stricter leader if the project is expected to be cohesive and working in the future.  

The Game was not fun!

The main negative aspect of the final product of the game was the fact that it was just not fun at all. The programmers had bitten off more than they could chew and it caused some vital things to be left out of the game such as any sense of progression. We had wasted too much time on areas of the game that didn’t contribute to its enjoyment when we could have created something much more enjoyable using a series of simple shapes like squares and circles.

Conclusion.

BattleBots was not a good game by any means but it does have potential to be worked on further to introduce game mechanics that are actually enjoyable. This has been one of the biggest wake up calls I’ve had while studying at SAE and I’m glad it came now and not during my major project for next trimester. The main thing I have learned is to speak out if I believe an aspect of the game will not be enjoyable and not get anxious about having an argument with the person on the other side. I have finally discovered that I will have to get over my passive nature if I want to succeed in any group project and I will take this boost of confidence as a blessing.