James Battersby

News

Research Based Product Development

Posted: 20th August 2010

Hmm, been a while.

Well the main reason for this is because I have been very busy working on my research project which is looking into the intrinsic integration of education in games - you can find out more in my portfolio. I'm about two thirds through the development part of the game and its going well. I recently received some feedback from my supervisor and got some great advice on how to improve it once I've got the main gameplay sorted. Its still rough around the edges but I will be adding all sorts of effects to it soon enough. A lot of the work has been made simpler by using scanned copies of existing assets and using SFML as my graphics/media library. Should be able to get a really polished version by the end of September with research results.

Otherwise I've been climbing a lot in the Peak District and pushed my leading grade up to Hard Severe which has prompted thoughts about getting an SPA qualification but that I'll leave for the future. I'm off to Wales for the Bank Holiday weekend to try out some good multi-pitch climbs - really looking forward to that, it'll make a change from the short single pitches we have here (they're great but you can be left with wanting more).

As far as my career is concerned I am beginning to look for roles - I don't finish until the 30th September but I'm very keen to get my foot into the industry somehow and fulfil a life ambition. Exciting times!

Ark! Complete

Posted: 7th July 2010

After four weeks of continuous development we have finally completed our prototype of Ark! for our Integrated Development Project. The game was originally pitched for the Dare To Be Digital competition but unfortunately we were unsuccessful in securing a place in Dundee. Nevertheless we persevered and persuaded our lecturers that this project would we worthwhile and more relevant to the careers we are pursuing. Unfortunately we lost a programmer in the process due to him being on a separate course but we gained an additional artist. This required the project to be re-planned and a few features had to face the axe unfortunately in order to ensure that we had a quality product at the end of the project.

It has been extremely good fun working on this project and what really pleases me is that we haven't made a quick and dirty prototype - we could easily continue development on this game and scale it to be a fully fledged product without having to drastically change anything. It also runs smoothly despite the fact we haven't tried to optimise it at any point so far which is something we would should we add more complex features into it. You can download a copy of the prototype from the project page as well as other design documents etc.

Ark! and The Lakes

Posted: 10th June 2010

Ark!

We've started out Integrated Development module and are now working on building a prototype of Ark!, the game we submitted to the Dare To Be Digital competition. Its good to know that we haven't wasted two months of preparation and are now working on something that the lecturers are already impressed with. Its a great experience for us as well as we get to practice the development cycle of making games and seeing how it all fits together - its very satisfying when it does. We're not using a pre-built game engine either - we're using a combination of Ogre3D, OpenAl and our own gameplay design to run the game. Its very exciting times and I'll be updating the appropriate project page over the coming weeks.

Climbing

Unfortunately the vast majority of my climbing partners have gone home for the summer and I'm left without much to do. However before they deserted me we had ourselves a trip to Borrowdale in the Lake District which was a fun learning experience. Climbing on limestone is very different to grit: it has better holds but it polishes very easily making it difficult to hold and worse (as I discovered first hand) to place gear in. We managed multi-pitch climb up Little Chamonix which was a fantastic experience, I seconded few tricky climbs and I spent one morning setting up top ropes for the less experienced climbers. I've also had a recent trip to Stanage Edge and experienced sunset climbing (perhaps the nicest way to do it) all the way till 11pm when it was pitch black (the head torch I have was only just adequate). As a result I'm now finding partners on Climbfind which is an excellent site for that very purpose so hopefully I'll still be able to get some practice in before people come back in September.

End of April 2010

Posted: 30th April 2010

Apologies for the total lack of news but I have barely had time to breathe this month. Things are now calmer and I have a better view of the next few months at least.

Dare To Be Digital

As I mentioned in my last post I was part of a team called Heavenly Duck Studios that submitted an application to attend a competition in Dundee for 10 weeks to build a prototype for a game we called "Ark!". We did manage to get through to the next round with mostly positive feedback - our biggest change as result of this was to move from the Xbox to the PC as they said it would require mouse control. The next round was to face a panel of industry experts and pitch our idea in more detail at Wolverhampton University. As soon as we got the news we started working on the presentation solidly and pitched repeatedly to colleagues and lecturers (many thanks by the way) until we were satisfied with the quality. Along we went and despite some interrogation being continuously aimed towards me we left feeling we had done the best we could and that the reaction was good. Over a week later (yesterday in fact) we got news that unfortunately we wouldn't be going to Dundee.

While we learnt a lot about how to pitch and evolve game ideas (much like any studio would do whilst searching for a publisher) the feedback we received from the pitch (I think) hasn't given us anything to learn from as 90% of it is very positive with phrases such as "good roles and strong team", "good humour" and "receptive team". I would have preferred the feedback to be damning so I have something to go from it but maybe this is an indication of how competitive the places were. I could go into political theories of limiting the number of teams from the same university but I think that would be rather childish of me. Congratulations to all those who did get through - you thoroughly deserve to!

Climbing

As a result of not making it to Dare I will be in Sheffield during the summer and I think I would like a break at some point. As such I intend to go on some kind of climbing holiday in the near future. I even plan to buy some of my own gear in the very near future although what I am not entirely sure - should I just aim at sport climbing or go the whole way and buy some trad gear? I'm tempted by the latter but it is a lot of gear that adds up in cost and since I don't know where I'll end up in 6 months I'm slightly hesitant that I might be wasting money. If you have any advice on either matter please get in touch!

In terms of my skills I took part in a bouldering competition .... with a hangover unfortunately so my performance was very sub-par. It was very entertaining however to watch others do what seemed to be the impossible! My top roping has extended to 6Bs and my lead climbing has now reached 6As. I also did my first multi-pitch trad climb at Lawrencefield (Pulpit Groove, VDiff 4a) which was great fun - definitely have the bug for trad climbing.On the same day we even did some bouldering at Owler Tor and Secret Garden - fantastic day!

University

Been very busy with work especially with the Dare competition hanging over our heads. There was one particular weekend where two assignments were due on the Friday which caused mayhem in the labs. Now most of the lectures are over (for good), I have two more assignments to do before our integrated development project starts followed by our individual research projects. In the mean time I am going through Mike McShaffry's Game Coding Complete which is so far very interesting!

Like I said - I've been busy! I'll hopefully update more regularly in the near future!

March 2010

Posted: 27th March 2010

The last few weeks have been a bit of a blur which probably explains why I haven't posted in a while. A fair few things have happened but I've been preoccupied with living on my own in a big house as my parents are away on a cruise in the Caribbean. The only company I have at the moment is my elderly cat who has a habit of getting under my feet for most of the day which is incredibly infuriating especially whilst trying to cook dinner. He also craps a lot so there is the weekly ritual of emptying his litter tray on the weekends (most unpleasant).

In an attempt to escape this predicament I have been climbing a lot recently. Every Wednesday is spent at the Edge with the Sheffield Hallam Club and for the last two weeks we (Will Ceuppens, Jamie Shaw and I) have been popping over to the Foundry on Friday mornings to try something different. The added practice is clearly paying dividends as I am getting considerably more confident and, I think, skillful (I pretty comfortable completed a 6b+ top roping last week and lead climbing is not as big of a deal as it used to be). For my birthday last month I was given £200 with the explicit instructions of spending it on something and to not let it sit in my account as beer money. As a result I bought myself some new boots (Scarpa Force) as my current (Scarpa Vantage), whilst extremely comfortable, I think are perhaps too big or have stretched - as a result I'm not connecting with the wall or rock as well as I would like. The new ones pinch a bit but they are already conforming to my foot shape and they feel great. I also bought myself a bouldering mat (Metolius Stomp) and a book on bouldering in my area (Peak District: Bouldering - Rupert Davies & Jon Barton). This will now allow me to take advantage of the climbing areas very close to me and give me an excuse to go outside on the weekends. Hopefully soon enough I'll have improved by bouldering and consequently my technical climbing skill dramatically. I was planning to go bouldering today at Burbage South but I seem to have done something to my elbow yesterday at the Foundry - weirdly enough it was a strange blesssing as I realised I would have double booked myself as another friend had offered roped climbing in another (nearby) area. As such, no climbing today but provided my elbow has recovered by tomorrow I'll try out the new mat at Burbage (I want to start ticking off the problems as soon as possible)!

We have now submitted our applications to Dare to be Digital. I am part of a team called Heavenly Duck Studios (the name came from six clicks on a random name generator) and we are pitching a game called Ark!, an Xbox 360 game with a twist on the traditional tower defense game. We should hear early next week if we are to attend a selection event in Wolverhampton at the end of April after which they will decide whether or not we are going to Dundee in the summer. Exciting times all round!

As a result of our concentrated efforts on the above competition university work has been somewhat kicked in the head for the time being. Thats not to say I haven't done any work: I just haven't been able to give it my total focus. Our management module has been put on a short hold as our (very lucky) lecturer went off to attend GDC in San Francisco. In multi-processing we've been grappling with SIMD and most recently had a go with the transputer language occam which seemed surprisingly simple. My flocking application has received the most attention thus far - I have created an application which allows the user to toggle certain behavioural rules and observe the effects. I am currently working on an additional program that demonstrates a predator and prey situation - I should hopefully be able to have something to show at the end of the weekend. I've also been teaching myself a bit of XNA when the time allows - very simple in comparison to what I am normally doing.

Finally as Easter approaches the university is halted for a two week holiday. Rather than make use of the two weeks off my former employer (Rare Creative Group) have asked me to do some freelance work during this time - certainly makes the recent climbing purchases more pleasant to enjoy. Met with them yesterday for a quick catch up and explanation as to what I'm working on.

Read older posts

 1 2 3 >  Last ›