Month 15: Artificial Intelligence, Real Time Animation, James Durall, Otronicon, the Global Game Jam and Plunder

A lot has happened this month. The classes have been very informative. In Artificial Intelligence, Jeremiah Blanchard taught us how to make realistic NPCs and different techniques AI programmers use to make their game fun and interesting. In Real Time Animation, taught by Shawn Kendall, we got to see things from the artist’s point of view and what they have to deal with to get their 3D animations in a game. James Durall (THQ) also came to the school to share his knowledge with us. Otronicon also rolled around again with interesting technologies and the Global Game Jam rocked out another year.

In AFI, we learned about many techniques used to get a variety of different behavior from our agents. We discussed decision trees, finite state machines, path planning and genetic algorithms. To top off all that juicy learning we also held a RoboCode tournament on the day of the final where everyone pinned their bot against each other in one-v-one and team battles to find the AI champ. I also programmed a simulation ant farm to test out writing genetic algorithms and the effect of randomness. It was a wonderful experience and I had a ton of fun in this class.

In RTA, we learned about the different animation techniques we can use to get the desired effect in our games. We talked about vertex morphing, articulated animation and skinning. We worked with state machines to change our animations and used blending to create seamless transitions. We also worked in MEL to load animation data from Maya. It was a nice change of view and a good experience to see the challenges of getting animations to work properly in real time.

James Durall came back to Full Sail to share his journey and experience with the students. He told us about all his different jobs (some of which included lots of writing, designing and developing) at all the different companies, some of which went out of business abruptly. He told us that having a good/clean online presence is key to getting recognized. He also told us that reviewing the products of a company before you show up to an interview is important (playing their games, using their tools). He also mentioned how to gain your teams respect by having programming background and being a good communicator. He was very informative and encouraged all of us to work hard and do our best.

Otronicon was very cool this year. It had all the technologies it had last year and more. There was some good gamer art which blended old school with new school. The military was back and had a operations table set up with people on different computers working together to complete a virtual mission. There was also a virtual shooting range. EA Sports brought by their Virtual Playbook which allows correspondents to interact with virtual versions of players in a simulation of a play. It works by rendering 3D images over the live feed. There was TVs set up with the Kinect and PS Move and a room set up for DJ Hero. There was also an interesting device from Russia called the Virtusphere. The user puts on a headset and steps into the sphere. They see a virtual world and can walk around it by walking in the sphere. It is a very dizzying experience to say the least but a very cool technology none the less.

The Global Game Jam was fun as always. Everyone worked hard to produce games along the same vision. This years theme was “Extinction”. Our team made “Dynocide: Hu Killed the Dinosaurs IV: Cou De Gras”. The game was about riding your motorcycle through a prehistoric landscape, killing all the dinosaurs. We used Unity and learned a lot about the game object component model. We all had a great time and can’t wait to do it again.

Download the Game Here!

I am part of the education pirate game, Plunder, at the school. I program and do research for the game. It has been a rewarding experience I have been working in a team with Unity and have done research on high school standards and virtual education environments. I have enjoyed working on this project and will be upset when I have to stop working on it when I reach final project. We are looking for more programmers to replace our team when we move on so I have my fingers crossed and am willing to train anyone in Unity.

So this month had many fun times and many things to learn. All in all it was just another month at Full Sail which is like being in a 2 year long game jam. Only a month away from final project, I can’t wait to build a full game. Take care and have fun that is what’s most important, o ya and get sleep don’t forget that.