The document provides reflections from a student on their upcoming video game animation final major project (FMP). They plan to create a fantasy RPG video game animation to improve upon concepts from their previous project. They will focus on animating the overworld and battle scenes with more fluid character movements. The target audience is teenagers and young adults. It will first be released on the Nintendo Switch for exclusivity. Character designs and a lava-filled cave area are described in detail. The protagonist Arwynn leads a party of characters with different personalities and abilities. The antagonist is a dragon-like creature called the Hydragon.

1. Pre-Production
Joe Duffy

2. Pre-productionReflection:
What are you making?
In my FMP I am producing a Video Game Animation.
The game's genre is a Fantasy RPG that takes narrative aspects off my previous project
as I would like to improve upon the concepts presented by the first animation.
The techniques I will likely use in this project include proficiently animating the
overworld and hopefully get further into the battle, especially on the characters so
that they flow nicely instead of being jolty. I would like to practise my skills at pixel art,
by having detail that can be maintained through different frames of animation
therefore bettering my organisational skills of the layers of art I make so I don’t get
confused while making the animation.

3. Reflection:
Why?
The purpose of making my Video Game is to pass into the next year!! On a more
serious note, I hope the project can improve my animation skills, with more flow.
However I don’t have the clearest visual plan of how it will progress with time
shortages so the fluency may not be up to my own standards. I want to to prove that I
have learned the techniques from the previous project to make the same concept look
better, even if it ends up only by a little.
In terms of it being more literal, I would like to produce a Video Game that sees
appeal from a decently wide range of people so to produce more sales. I would do this
by giving the game a range of ideas that could interest different audiences that can all
merge into one type on this game.

4. Reflection:
Who is it for?
For my Video Game I believe my target audience would be in the teenage to young
adult range, from around 15 to 26, as the RPG elements would find it difficult to
engage a much younger person with the narrative style and appear far too confusing
for an older person, with the multiple options within a fight, especially the elderly.
I would say the game has a slight edge toward the male demographic as there is a
more Fantasy orientated theme which stereo-typically fascinates boys more, with the
mythical beasts and battling that are emphasised in this scenario. However, I believe
that all genders can appreciate the game and girls can look up to the females of the
party, of which the leader is, so they feel like they can be leaders themselves.

5. Reflection:
Where will it appear/on what?
I would expect the game to appear on all consoles and PC at some point but doe to it’s
ever rising popularity and on the go exclusivity, I may be swayed to start off the game’s
release only on Nintendo Switch.
The early release might insight some buzz and be seen as important, somewhat like
Cadence of Hyrule is seen as crucial to the Indie Developer scene with its Switch
exclusivity. Therefore the sales may increase by being first on a very popular console
and maybe with the release on other consoles new content could be added to make it
feel worth buying, even if you have it on another device. This would be like
Undertale’s re-releases where small new areas or battles are added just to appear as
the definitive addition.

6. Style Sheet: Area
The location for the portion of the game I plan on
animating is inside a lava filled cavern. As this is the case,
the base colours of the area will be on the warmer side like
reds, oranges and yellows to give off the sense of heat to
the player. These colours would mostly be exposed via the
lava flowing below the path, as a sign of constant danger to
the player, but would probably reflect off surfaces to make
some ambience with torches flame too. As we are inside a
cave, different tones of brown will be visible, giving the
place a real earthiness as the walls and floor are cracked up
to add history to the place. I might mix both of these
colour schemes by having lava leak out of molten rock,
giving the cavern a natural appearance. Speaking of
natural, to add a more vivid colour palette to the rock
cover walls, I plan to add crystals to the surface in bright
greens and blues and perhaps even red. I want to really
push the naturalistic aspect so the player is surprised by
surreal segments of the game as well as bring more
dynamic colour options to make the area more
memorable. I want to add an element of fantasy within the
location before the antagonist is met so I think a skeleton
of a Dragon looking creature embedded in the cave side
would be a spectacle to look at. I want to make the size
very big to provide some scope to the player, to keep them
interested in the surreal aspect of the game. The worn out
beige colouring would be based off ancient human
skeletons, relating to the Ancient descriptions from my
Research PowerPoint.
Hex Code:
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7. Area Art

8. Style Sheet: Characters (General)While, at least in terms of scope, the cave area of the FMP has changed a lot
while keeping the essential aspects of the previous animation project, I don’t
believe I will change much, if anything about the characters who fill that space.
This is because I firmly believe that each design and colour coordinated with
them is far too successful in my eyes to only use once. With the added time in
production, I should hopefully be able to make each individual appear even
better and more fluent than ever before... hopefully.
In terms of the story beats, in my original animation the characters didn't
possess a great range of movement but I hope to express the character's
personalities a fair amount more purely by movement. For the time being, in
the overworld I want to have the characters walk, look for signs of danger and
then run with each part showing their unique attitudes. As I did with the last
project, dialogue boxes would be the forefront of expression. I would like to
give the face shots a bit more movement in not just the eyes and mouth but I
am still hesitant on full blown voice acting. While I believe I am amazing at it
(except for most of the time, especially with the higher voices of the females),
it takes a lot of time to properly sync up the voices to the animation so if push
comes to shove I may potentially have to take ideas from other games like
Undertale and Animal Crossing with no real language.
As for the antagonist, I would like to give the Hydragon a bigger role in the
overworld portion than in the last animation it was in. At that point I was
desperate for time so I could only show a little of the snout and eyes but the
best possible outcome this time would be the same as my wishes to do last
time. These wishes were a full render of the creature juxtaposed from the
heroes to give it size perspective as well as a frontal profile shot to show a
more detailed version of the Hydragon. When it comes to the full render,
Pokémon Black and White are most memorable for me, when the Legendary
Pokémon of the game appear with an imposing roar to boot.

9. Style Sheet: Arwynn The main protagonist of the game is named Arwynn, dereived
from Arweinydd in Welsh that means Leader. In my mind I see the
character's main point is to be put into the role of leadership despite
never wanting such a role. I tried showing this in her model by
expressing the face as worried yet somewhat determined to
prove herself, with the eyebrows being the fierce indicators of this iron
will. Arwynn's design is far more reminiscant of Japanese manga, as a
more subtle was to show how she appears far more different than the
rest of her braver group as well as allowing me to give her more
emotions to work with, especially considering the size of her eyes.
I wanted the dark brunette hair to look unkept as a way to emphasise
how unready Arwynn is to take on any position of power while adding
the tuffs on the top to corrlate with her Japanese influence. As I wanted
each character to carry their own distince colour for the most part, I
made the decision to give Arwynn blue, as in the fiery area they move
through, it seemed to contradict how the colours would be and make
her seem out of place. Speaking of this, she wears a navy blue jumper
and puffy sky blue coat which feel very out of place in such a location
but they can also signify how she tries her best to prepare for different
environments, despite the regular looking clothes she wears. This can
be seen with the brown boots she has and kind of baggy, darker beige
trousers that don't restrict movement.
As a last piece of design to portray how she appears to be an outsider,
she wields a large and sophisticated blade that doesn’t fit her own
appearance. It's red colour bounces off the coat's blue along with its
long silver end and it's menacing eyeball in the hilt is a far cry from the
pretty cutesy look of Arwynn.
I think, as the leader, she believes she has a duty to try and get along
with her two allies even if they are constantly arguing with each other. If
things get too heated she will attempt to cool things down but it can go
often without much success due her shy nature.
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10. Style Sheet: Fletcher
For the Archer, Fletcher whose name derives from the Spanish for Arrow
of Flecha, I wanted his design to scream out his personality. The character
is perhaps the most different in personality as he is brash, overly
confident and has a large ego. Due to how expressive I wanted him to be,
I first focused on how his face appeared. I decided to give him a broad
grin to off to the player that he was highly confident of himself and then
thought it would funny if he had a mask as he believed he was a Super
Hero. I further exemplified this aspect later on. With the base face pretty
much made, I had to think of what kind of hair someone with this much
of an ego might have. I came to the conclusion that he try to act as if he
didn’t care what his hair looked like, with random curls popping out but
made sure the curls of his beard were immaculate. I chose that he had
ginger hair as it is so eye-catching that he would love the attention he
would get from people looking it. As I mentioned before about the heroic
type of clothing he would wear, I decided to go all out by designing an
overly fancy costume, adorned by a long cape to emphasize the hero
concept. I chose the obvious reference to Robin Hood in terms of colour,
with most of the clothing being different shades of green, but deciding to
add small segments of a greenish-yellow to add to the bright and not so
subtle colour pallet of the Archer. The bow itself matched the yellow
patterns along with its primary aqua blue as a more individual colour.
With his attitude, Fletcher often gets into arguments with his
counterparts, primarily Celeste. This is because he is head strong in what
he believes is right which is often reckless while the Mage is more so
methodical and would prefer to plan out the following moves. Despite
how I have made him look, the Archer isn't a bad person. He will do good
and protect the people he travels with, even if he says he only does so to
show off how heroic he is. I think if the game was full, I would make his
full arc a journey of accepting to work and listen to his team as well as
acknowledging his flaws.
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11. Style Sheet:
Celeste
For the final of our protagonists, since the other two are more physically
attacking, I thought that a magic user would be a unique part of the cast. As a
note of warning, this character's design was produced before anything else so
feels, to me at least to be quite out dated so I am in the middle of trying to
improve it. However the end result may not be completely drawn up until after
this PowerPoint is posted so if any description seems off from the art shown,
that’s why.
Unlike the other characters, Celeste's name doesn't derive from any language
(but I did try to find a fitting name this way), instead being based off the
mountain and name of the game its in, being well... Celeste. I chose this because
the Mountain in the game has mystical powers that could been seen as magic
and I thought the name suited the design I had made. I wanted her personality to
be one of usual calm to show to the player that she is at peace with the magical
part of herself, but that she can be hot headed if she's agitated a bit too much. As
a way to express her slight façade of being in total control of how she conducts
herself, she wears a large, black hooded sort of over coat with intricate pure
blue patterns set about it along with a chain around the neck to keep the hood
tight. This coat makes her look sophisticated and kind of omniscient compared to
others. An emerald medallion is at the centre of the chain as a reminder that she
has mystical artifacts. The Sorcerer wears a light beige shirt with darker brown
lines going down its cloth, with it's simple design being a contrast with her rival,
Fletcher, clothing. Speaking of this rivalry, without intention I made the colour of
her large trousers magenta, which is the opposite to green, being Fletcher's
primary colour, on the colour which does subtly represent their relationship
well.
After completing her redesign, I would like to add that her coat now had yellow
lining and cuffs and the chain emerald is now a necklace since the coat is a lot
freer around the head. She also had a collar on her shirt which shows her
sophistication more.
Hex Code:
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12. Style Sheet: Celeste
The boots and face have faced the most change in the new adapting of the
character's design. As the boots are more defined at this point, I will describe them
first. While the footwear has kept its blue-purple colour, the original design was
fairly basic, with the only intricacies being a sort of rim around the top. I think this
was too similar to how Arwynn's ended up so instead I made them much larger to
match how her coat extends outward. The back of the boots fly up to the knee
while the front remains just in the middle of the calf. The boot has added details
like zig-zags and dots to resemble the rest of the clothes patterns. For the face, in
my original concept art I gave her a pretty generic facial expression, but at that
time did include freckles to tone this down, and the plaits of the hair looked off,
although I know for a fact it will remain silvery-white. I want to give Celeste a
smirk to express her confidence and make the eyes more expressive as they looked
stagnant before. However at the moment, I cant find a face I could present from
any type of angle or unique hair. I've thought that wavy hair could be the way to go
but I have very little time to find the right combination so I may have to work with
the original for the production unfortunately. After coming back, I decided to use a
hair style based off Princess Zelda and a face that's inspired from Elsa who both
coincidentally use magic. With this new hair, decided to move her hood onto her
shoulders to make the head clearer to see.
As I mentioned before, she has a complicated and fraught relationship with
Fletcher but tries her best to keep relaxes, with basically no success. She tries to be
a mother figure to Arwynn, as she thinks she is by far the most mature and
understands they have to work together, even though she thinks her plans are the
best. Her arc would be to resolve any issues with Fletcher and work as one at the
end, with them both realizing they are more alike then they wanted to accept.
They might even well... you can take a guess!!

13. Style Sheet: Hydragon
Funnily enough for the antagonist of the game, the name was one of the first things I thought of before most
anything else in terms of the game's narrative. The idea of such an imposing creature, I think, would be a
great foe to have to take down.
The main point of the visual structure would of course be the mixing of a Dragon and a Hydra to create
multiple heads on a winged body. With such a strong concept, I just needed to make the appearance
threatening enough to be considered truly villainous. To begin, I had to understand how the necks would
branch out with looking too clustered. I eventually figured a depth of field would be necessary, having one of
the heads appear in the background while two remained in the foreground. I have tried to give each head
some personality through how they look without appearing too differently from the main design. I chose to
have angry, sly and insane individual heads as I thought about the kind of people you wouldn't want to hang
around with. Another more literal difference I wanted each head to have were the horns they had, so they
could be curly like a ram, straight as a unicorn's, or somewhere in the middle. I had gotten the faces mostly
completed, with jagged edges in the skin, sharp mismatched teeth and ears close to the horns. However I
the eyes had a couple of test runs as I believed they were potentially the part that was most threatening to
look at. I landed on pitch black eyes with a piercing yellow pupil, making them appear very scary as they
look like they always have their gaze on you. As for how I made them emote, I gave the anger one a deep
frown and spittles of fire out of the nostrils, the sly one has a large smirk with bellows of smoke out of the
nose and finally the insane one has their tongue hanging out.

14. Style Sheet: Hydragon
The body doesn't have many parts, as I thought
the general Dragon body didn't need much
more to look like threat, with its claws feet and
scaly back, and it makes it clear to the player
what they're up against without any confusion.
I chose a deep red as the primary colouring as
it fit the volcanic area where it resides as well
as it being reminiscent of dried blood so
violence is brought to the player's mind.
However I did want a part of the body to stand
out from the rest, so on the wings I introduced
a sky blue to contrast dramatically with the
rest. I could also make the joke that the wings
are meant to be use in the "sky" but I digress.
In the game, the Hydragon is set as a sort of
guard against leaving the cavern so it sets it
home at the exit to make sure no one leaves.
The protagonists must defeat it so they can
continue. I may include dialogue to give it more
depth but leaving it as a wild beast may add to
the threat level.

15. Style Sheet: Fight
The battle arena would set place in the same location as the overworld, that being within the molten
cavern. To distinctly remind the player that this is all connected I will add landmarks that have been
seen in the background of the overworld. For example, I plan to have an ancient skeleton in the wall
during the walking section and I would put at least the cracked, beige skull into the fighting
environment. This alongside some red and orange lava trickling on the floor and dark brown, rocky
textured walls. I may also include stalactites and their opposite to create some depth and added detail
to the area.
As for the characters, I will place the good guys to the left while the big bad comes in from the right.
The Hydragon will fly in first, showing the player it’s horrific image before they can do anything to stop
it. After a few moments, the heroes in jump in, positioning themselves above each other. I will have to
quickly decipher how much floor space it needed so the characters don’t smother each others design.
I will have health bars appear beside the characters, to make it obvious to the player of what risks to
take. I will also have the super metre placed near the bottom of the screen to avoid being too
obtrusive while still being visible. I think that I will have a sort of wheel select screen to choose what
to do, with non-selected options being slightly transparent to avoid clutter. Speaking of options, each
selected character will have a white rim around their model to signify their selection. As this will
hopefully be my first time getting into the complexities of the fight, I haven’t yet got a super clear
image of what the moves will look like, nor how much damage they should do, so I will have think
about these important parts while completing other parts of production.

16. Storyboard:

17. Script:

18. Music/SFX:
Audio How is it made? What is it's purpose?
Foreboding
Cave Background Music
BeepBox To set the mood of the area by providing an
ominous feeling to the player.
Panicked Action Music BeepBox Putting the player on edge, this fast paced track
should fit the panicked run of the characters.
Energetic Battle Music BeepBox Increasing the intensity of the battle, making
the player feel more pushed for time to play
well against the antagonist.
Walking Over Rock Recording Footsteps
Maybe to GarageBand
To add a case of realism to the surrounding
cavern.
Running Over Rock Recording Running maybe to
GarageBand
Adds to the realistic terror of the characters.
Voices of Characters Recording Script Reading to
GarageBand/BeepBox
Shows the characters personalities more so
with audio to match their lines.
Weapon/Healing Effects BeepBox Gives each move more gravitas, making the
player feel the impact of each blow or
defensive move.
Option Movement and
Selection
BeepBox Gives the player acknowledgment that their
choices have been made in game.
Victory Jingle BeepBox Spells the victor of the battle, making the
player feel truly like a winner.

19. Budget:
If I were to produce the game, I would need a budget, not just to make the game, but to
research the key aspects to make it accurate. As the location of the game is set inside a cave, I
decided to look at the pricing of one of the most famous caves that would look at for
inspiration. One of these caves is the Mulu Caves of Malaysia. It’s giant size would definitely give
me a better idea of the scope of the environment. The price to visit the caves is 10 Malaysian
Ingots which translates to a surprisingly cheap £1.89.
Another aspect of the game I would like to look into is medieval weapons with the fantasy
setting and a couple of the characters having swords and bows. It’s a good thing the cave visit
was cheap as it seems most steel swords can range from £90 to up to £2,000 for the very
complex designs, which ironically are more fantasy orientated blades like World of Warcraft.
Bows are not much cheaper if I am to buy a professional one. For these bows, they lie in the
range of £70 to £150 so these weapons would require a high budget to pay for.
Voice actor pricings vary quite a bit. If I was making a smaller game, getting cheaper actors from
universities or theatres would seem ideal, who would cost around £150 a day… and that’s the
cheapest! Actors under the union have a contract which requires to give around £600 a day on
top of £90 toward retirement. Finally, the most expensive and famous actors cost, at a
maximum, £1880 a day which is insane! From all this research, I’ve decided the most expensive
voice actor I would realistically afford is cheap union actors, and even then that would need a
very high budget.
Hypothetically, if I bought the cheapest weapons, bought a cheaper union actor for a few days
and paid a visit to the Mulu Caves, the budget would be around £2,230. A very pricey game, but
considering one sword would be nearly as expensive as all of this, it’s a decent amount of
money.

20. Resources
Equipment/Props/
Costume Needed
Locations Needed
Computer College/Home
Photoshop College/Home
Premiere College
BeepBox College/Home
Perhaps Voice Recorder (Phone probably) Home
GarageBand College
The resources I require to do the production work are
accessible at home and college since I don’t need to do
any kind of filming all over the place. I tried to make sure
I could do any work at home as I could at College for the
most part, as this gives me more accessibility to work
more efficiently.

21. Contingency Planning
Potential Issue Solution
Accidentally Deleting Work Saving periodically and to different locations
(Cloud, USB etc.) after completing any
substantial work so if work is shut down before
saving is possible, little to no work is lost.
Forgetting to Finish Work Set personal reminders (via phone) and have
trusted people to remind you of specific parts
that were missed or were left to start other
production work. This will make sure that all
work is kept on top of.
Malware Corrupting Computer Make sure to set up and that all anti-virus
programmes are up to date to avoid any
potential issues include deleting work or
modifying it after completion.
Becoming Ill If becoming ill, take time to make sure body is
healthy so production can continue quickly. If
the illness is bad, try to work from home to
avoid having to catch up.
Bad Weather If the weather is too hazardous to get to College
through, alert Tutor and try to do work from
home. If it is possible, try to get a lift to College
to avoid the weather.

22. Health and Safety
Potential Issue How will the issue be avoided?
Back Aches Remain upright on the chair to stop potential
slouching and therefore reduce risk of back pains.
Ear Damage Lower the volume when listening to any audio
work so the ears don’t get damaged, making it
difficult to hear.
Leg Irritation Take timely breaks to walk around before or
during annoyance to release any unwelcome
agitation.
Muscle Fatigue To avoid having bad cramp, stretch out your
fingers to give them time to rest as well as
improve the articulation.
Eye Strain Periodic breaks to relax eyes, to avoid any actual
damage that could be permanent being afflicted
on them.
Weariness Give some time to rest the body and mind so that
when recommencing work, you have gained
focus and can be more productive.
Electric Shock Avoid leaving water close to electrical appliances
like computers that could spill and cause possible
electricity related hazards.
Nauseous Feeling To remain concentrated if the room is making it
difficult to breathe in, go outside to take some
fresh air.

23. Production Schedule
Week Tasks
1 Creating Overworld
 Use drawing to set out layers of the overworld
 Create multiple versions of layers to move through
slides
 Make sure each part has consistency
Character Motion
 Make correct character proportions to world
 Start making different stages of motion for walking
Reflection
 Depending on production pace, daily or weekly
reflection on production
 The positives and negatives about the production
and why
 What I plan to do for later days and my thoughts on
the process so far
2 Character Motion
 Complete walking (perhaps running) animation for
all characters
 Add dialogue boxes for sound to be added later
 Check that animation runs smoothly
 Fix any issues that could occur once implemented
with overworld

24. Production Schedule
Week Tasks
2 Battle Sequence
 Make transition segment between world and fight
 Create monster model to be interacted with
 Maybe make profile of monster for scrolling text
 Create base background of battle sequence
Reflection
 Depending on production pace, daily or weekly
reflection on production
 The positives and negatives about the production
and why
 What I plan to do for later days and my thoughts on
the process so far
3 Battle Sequence
Background
 Could possibly add a few alternating parts of the
background e.g. jewels, lava etc.
 Make sure there is enough space for character
models
Character Movement
 Put characters in accurately to the background
 Add slight movement to idle characters
 Produce attack movement and hit animation
UI Enhancements
 Add HP, Options etc. to scenario for more depth
 Create layers for selecting different options

25. Production Schedule
Week Tasks
3 Last Animation Parts
 Make sure world and fight flow seamlessly into one
other
 Make end sequence to fight
 Clean up pacing or incorrect looking parts
4 Audio Implementation
 Create music and sound effects for the product
 Maybe create speech using my speech and a voice
modifier on a programme like GarageBand
 Correctly size the length of the audio to link with the
visuals
Cover Creation
 Analyse cover arts for inspiration
 Make art to scan for cover
 Add usual cover aspects e.g. barcode, console
name, age rating etc.
 Write blurb for back cover
 Take screen shots of game to put on back
 Put copyrights, controller type etc.
Complete the Product
 Post animation on YouTube
 Put video with cover on Blogger and post