WEEK 5 - Multi-tasking and the Journey of the Lion Puzzle

At the start of the trimester, we set our goal to complete a rough draft of the game by Week 10 (in order to give it out for audience testing). This means that we are halfway through to our first results! Which also means that we should (hypothetically) be done with 50% of the game! Things don’t look too good, again…

For this week, I had set a personal target to finish the texturing of the TANK character. However, as I opened the 3D file for unwrap, I noticed that the vertices were all jumbled up on the inside. It would have been a literal nightmare if I unwrapped it in the way it was. So, I had no choice but to make adjustments as required. Firstly, I detached the skirt from the body. Then, using the shift tool I manually adjusted most of the vertices. I also realized that the model had triangles and five sides, which I had to fix once again. With all these problems arising, I did make sure to inform Ahmed about it. I adjusted the thighs as well, so that the skinning becomes a lot easier and took into account other variables like the spacing of the loops and vertices for the uv mapping. Basically, I made a lot of refinements. See screenshot for evidence.

A video was recorded on OBS recorder showing how i adjusted and modified the model for proof. This is just a screenshot of it, since the file is too large to upload. It took around 2 hours to properly edit and fix vertices, and another 1 hour to unwrap and UV map correctly.

Finally, after all this hassle, I unwrapped it through pelt mapping and took a while to place it neatly on the map. I cramped it up as much as I could to make full use of the map space and to allow for higher detail. I couldn’t afford to procrastinate more on learning Substance Painter, so this week was finally my chance to learn it. However, I first applied base coat colors in Photoshop and then imported it as a PNG into Substance.

Base coat colors applied on Photoshop. The tattoo on the arm was designed by Ahmed.

Moreover, this wasn’t the only thing I was working on for the week! I was assigned to work on completing the concept art for the ANUBIS as well as needed a rough draft on the color scheme and clothes/accessories. See below for detailed annotations on why we chose each feature. Swipe to see slideshow.

Done by me on Photoshop.

Our idea was to have two variations of him: one as the player and another as a stone statue to use as map assets around the temple. I had to fully flesh out the ANUBIS from head variations to clothes variations. I also needed to work on a completed character concept art for the ANUBIS - This is still work-in-progress but as I showed it for feedback, I was told that it is not important to be still working on the pre-production phase and can be completed later after all the production work is done. See below for character development ideas.

Done by me on Photoshop.

Aside from all this, I was getting a bit frustrated with having to constantly make small adjustments to the first puzzle texture that I was working on from week 2! It has been four weeks and I am still unable to complete it! It’s not that I am slacking off in any way or am unable to do it. It’s just that the adjustments to the proportions, color schemes and overall minor detailing (my OCD was killing me) was making me dread the completion of it – I was personally tired of it. But I guess, from all the feedback I received, it did help to make it better and more unique.

See below a time-lapse video I made (with the help of the games programmer Ahmed Hajjo) on how I used Substance Painter for the first time to paint over the details on the model.

For this, I used Substance painter to paint the edges and give it a better appeal as I could view the texturing done in real-time. I experimented with Substance Painter brushes and presets in this way, and it helped to boost my expectations for the TANK. I really multi-tasked this week!!!

However, by Saturday I was only able to complete the ANUBIS concept art development and the lion puzzle texture on Substance. I wasn’t able to do much with the TANK textures as I was still on the lookout for some helpful YouTube tutorials. I personally did not have the time or sufficient knowledge with the software to complete the textures by Saturday. After all, since it is a huge character, it did make sense to extend the texturing phase to two weeks (for Amos as well, not just myself!) It is my first time being exposed to a completely new user interface, so I should have been a bit more easy on myself!

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Journey of the Lion Puzzle

Since it took me around 4 weeks to complete this puzzle from concept to finish, here is a detailed breakdown of what changes it went through.

#1 Initial sketches

Concept sketches of the Lion Puzzle done by me on Photoshop.

On the left is an initial visual draft of what type of puzzle this will be. The puzzle was initially set to be placed in a brick wall with a lion tattoo texture over it. The Lion symbolizes one of the letters as a hint for the last level code which is JASAPAL (a word - which makes absolutely no sense - that was construed together from all our initials). The Egyptian Hieroglyph for "L" is a Lion. Hence, the bottom right sketch shows how the puzzle will be jumbled and the player has to rotate the blocks to the right image (that they will have to figure out on their own).

#2 Lion Painting

This Lion Painting was done on Photoshop and Sketchbook by me. As you may see, the first design wasn't quite working well with the proportions, and the armor was looking pretty off on the shoulder bones. Hence, I reworked on the design by building a proper skeleton for the proportions. As seen in the middle image, I changed up the clothes and accessories to better suit our recurring theme of bandages. I used a grey circle as a boundary for the puzzle canvas. Lastly, I was told that the red and blue colors look very similar to the Thundercats (1985) and that the face of the Lion looks very much like Simba from The Lion King (1994). Hence I changed up the mane to a darker golden brown, but kept the blue since it holds symbolism for the game.

#3 Modelling

Screenshot of the 3D model done on 3Ds Max by me.

#4 UV Mapping and Texturing

The first two UVs were done and edited on Photoshop. It was a struggle to make the textures seamless (around the chamfered areas and the corresponding sides) so I imported it as a PNG into Substance and worked on it from there. The third UV is an export from Substance. To watch a snippet of the process, refer to the video above.

#5 Rendering

The final render of the model with textures.

This is a final render of my 4 weeks worth of work. We have imported and tested it out on UNITY and it works like a charm. Additional normal and height maps will be done and implemented soon.

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In addition, I am also in charge of maintaining the social media accounts and have been updating it frequently. We also received some good logo designs from our graphics designer this week. Below is a screenshot of our chosen logo and Instagram Account.

In conclusion, I believe that I have done quite a lot this week and this sense of "boost in productivity" has made me feel a lot more confident in our progress towards the final. We will still be pushing ourselves harder this upcoming week to ensure we have a great deliverable!