.

1. Evaluation
Mel Nuttall

2. Research
A strength of my research was that even though it was a bit of a broader
range than I might have liked, it helped give me more ideas to add into my
game that I might not have originally considered. At this point I was still
undecided with if I wanted to have a side scrolled game or one more like the
Pokémon and Zelda style games. To help make up my mind, I made sure to
research both types and styles of game to se which I thought would be
realistic for time but also interesting to animate and have as a concept. One
other style of game I looked at, I knew I wouldn’t have time to animate to
anywhere near that standard but it did give me ideas that I could have
different parts of the concept game where the story plays out in different
ways and the addition of character customisation. I asked about this in my
interviews to further my decision, and ended up putting elements of
customisation and different storylines into my game.
A weakness of my research was that it wasn’t as specific as I would have liked.
If, for example, I knew that I wanted to create a side scrolling game, then

3. Research
I would have been able to go into more depth and detail of what does make a
good side scroll game and what I should make sure I avoid doing. But because
I did research on different styles of games, once I had decided to make the
Pokémon style game, it meant certain aspects of the research I had done
wasn’t of use to me anymore. What I tried to do was get ideas from the other
games as best as I could. If I’d had more time I would have come back to this
point and done more research on the old Pokémon games and the Zelda
games for more inspiration.

4. Planning
In my opinion, I don’t think that my planning went quite as well as I hoped. I
felt like it was rushed from losing time in college, due to harsh weather
conditions, and I wanted to stay on time with the schedule that I had for the
remainder of the rotation. As a result I didn't feel like there was a lot of detail
put into it, especially with the style sheet and the mock-up layouts. I also
wasn’t completely sure about all of the sound effects that I would want in my
game so I had options in there that I wouldn’t end up using or knowing how I
would get the sounds. Fortunately, the contingency plan and the health and
safety was much easier to do and was filled out quickly. If I’d had time, I
would have added annotations to the style sheets and the screenshot layouts
for a more in depth and helpful plan.
A strength of my planning was that I was able to quite easily visualise what
my game would more or less look like so the screenshot layouts were fairly
easy to do. Since by now I knew that I was basing the layout style on the
Pokémon games, I decided to go online and get two different images of

5. Planning
screenshots from places in the various Pokémon games that involved snow
and ice. From there, I edited out parts of the screenshot that I wouldn’t have
in my game, such as people and buildings, while adding in little sprite
penguins that I was going to use for my game to see how that looked. This
helped a lot because I now knew that the sort of look I was aiming to go for
did actually look how I’d hoped and that I’d hopefully be able to replicate the
style in my product.

6. Time Management
Overall, I’d say that my time was managed fairly well. The main problem and
worry when it came to the time schedule was when harsh weather conditions
caused college to have to close. This meant that I missed three days of
production experiments and planning that I had to try to catch up on in a
short amount of time to be able to finish my actual product. As a result of
this, some time was taken off us for evaluation to make sure our product
could be done to a good standard if we needed it. Luckily, I didn’t need all of
this time and still have enough time to complete my evaluation on time for
the deadline.

7. Technical QualitiesIn terms of
movement
animation, the
way I animated
my penguin
moving is quite
similar to the
character in
DinoRun.
However, since
DinoRun is a side
scrolling game,
players only see
the dino facing
either left or
right whereas my
penguin can be
seen facing: left,
right, forwards
and backwards.
The dino in DinoRun also has more of a walk cycle than my penguin.
Since the legs are more visible, they have to appear to be were
moving in a realistic way to move at pace with the background.
On the other
hand, my penguin
doesn’t have to
move at a lot of
speed and it was
designed to look
almost as if it was
waddling so the
only movement
that was really
needed were feet
being more
prominent for
which foot was
forward.
The audio for the two games are quite similar,
using an 8 bit soundtrack in the background,
with added sounds for movement and to
attract the player’s attention. I think that if I’d
had more time to develop my soundtrack
more, I would have it a bit closer to the
quality that DinoRun’s is.

8. Aesthetic Qualities
The art style is quite similar since the Pokémon style is what I based mine on but since my
product’s colours are less bright and contrasting, I added a black border to help distinguish
character from the background. The characters in Pokémon doesn’t need this as there is a bit
more detail so the border outline doesn’t need to be as obvious. This would be an
improvement
I’d make with
more time, to
make the
graphics a bit
more detailed
though still
having the
pixel art style
theme being
clear.
What I like most about my game’s visuals was the penguin’s reflection
in the ice. Changing the blending mode for a copied layer meant that I
could give the effect of a reflection that was visible when on the ice
but not on the snow. Originally I wasn’t sure if I wanted to have it in
my game but now I’m glad that I added that detail in.

9. Audience Appeal
My brief was to create a game for people of my age range, approximately
ages sixteen to twenty. The interviews I did were both helpful and not helpful.
It was good to be able to get other people’s opinions on what makes a good
pixel game to help me make my decision; the old problem was that the two
results contradicted each other in two of the three questions. This meant that
I was still a little stuck on the best way to make my game appeal best to the
target audience, although I knew it meant that however it was made would at
least appeal to some of my target audience.
I think that I did at least appeal in some ways to my target audience since I
used the Pokémon style of game with softer colours and with the element of
customisation for the player, which is what one interview said. However, I also
added in bolder colours to draw attention to what I wanted as suggested by
the other interview.

10. Audience Appeal
Softer more pastel
like colours used for
the background
made it so the game
wasn’t too bright and
contrasting to look at
for extended
periods, but to allow
the bolder colours to
be used to draw
attention and stand
out.
I made use of bolder
colours to draw
attention to warnings
for the player.
I used some bolder colours to help the character stand out
from the background. The border also helps with
distinguishing the two but I wanted to have a balance or
brighter and softer colours.