Conception and implementation of a 2D-game-character and their animation.
Overview
- Type of project – Video Game
- Context – University Study
- Type of Game – VR Game
- My Postition – Character Design, 3D Modeling, Rigging, 3D Animation, General Game Design
- Software used – Autodesk Maya, Photoshop, Substance Painter, Unity 3D
- Team – 5 Team Members
- Production time – 3 Months
- Date – Sommersemester 2018
- Status – Finalised
- Coach – Prof. Susanne Brandhorst, Prof. Thomas Bremer
In our game trailer you will find ingame scenes and footage of players trying our game.
The character I created and animated makes their appearance from 1:05 to 1:20 and 1:50 to 2:08.
Description
Plantarium is a peaceful gardening VR Game we created based on the task to realise a game, that uses the advantages of the htc Vive VR System.
Given the constraint „VR ONLY“ we defined a 3x3m VR space the player should be able to use entirely. We started our project with being very openly about ideas that occured. Our ideation was about finding out the possibilities of VR with the htc VIVE System and soon we agreed, that we wanted to take advantage of the system’s big spaces achieved by placing trackers.
We analogue prototyped by taking the VIVE controllers in hand and moving through our defined VR-space, trying out which motions felt good and interesting. The player should always have the possibility to decide where to go and what to do without being forced, but rather by being encouraged by an interesting environment. We found gardening a very fitting and natural activity to trigger this wide range of motion – plowing, watering, plucking fruits from trees and bushes and digging out crops.
To give the player the feeling of not being completely alone, we had the idea of adding a character that would accompany the player without intruding their space.
gameplay
In a garden consisting of VR-Space sized parcels the player can cultivate a variety of plants, which take up different areas in different heights and require a wide range of motions to be harvested. The player decides if they just want to play with their harvested fruits and the environment or if they want to make use of the Longterm Tradingsystem to trade their fruits for tools and even more parcels. They also can interact with a local resident, who comes by from time to time to happily trade some of the players crop for new fruits.
This way a very unique garden can be built.
"Capybird Animation"
Here you can have a look on all of the animation clips in one go. Just switch from “Static Pose” to “Take 001”.
If you’re mobile and can’t find that switch, tilt your phone and it should appear.
"Capybird" DESIGN
Additional asset Design
Tree grove to act as view-stopper in the game.
The 2D effect is achieved through flipping the normals of the leaf canopy.