Blogs - zhaozhongyi

--Patch Gold--

1. Players are brought back into the race with a speed up after one player died. This make the late gameplay interesting and lasts longer. Player's death will not trigger a "chain of death" now.

2. We improved our water platform with an addition of the bridge texture. It helps lower down the difficulty of those scenes.

3. We implemented the new bear models, icons, and textures. The bears now look cuter/cooler.

4. We polished the character selection scene with the addition of new lerp animations. This help players identify which player icon they are controlling.

5. We balanced the effects of our items and obstacles to make the gameplay more fluent. It also make the game less punishing to new players.

6. We fixed some rare bugs that will cause some bear character not dying even when they are out of the camera.

Moltivations:

Since we want to bring our game to the EECS494 game showcase, we lower down the general difficulty of our game so that new players can better enjoy the gameplay.

We finalize our bear models, icons and textures so that the bears do not look like 3D printed objects anymore.

We polished our platforms and the character selection scene to make the environment better and more professional.

Future plans:

We are making our poster, gifts and triller to help marketing our game. Hopefully we will get a good result from the showcase.

We are planning to submit our game to the Umich arcade machine so that players can continue to enjoy Dashing Bears!

--Patch 5.0--

1. We added bikes & motorcycles to replace the previous apples & golden apples. The bears have a funny getting on the bike animation and riding on the bike pose.

2. New texture for logs & throwing logs are added. Now the objects look more like objects in the forest. The length of the logs are also increased to make them more powerful.

3. There are deers passing across the platforms at some time during the gameplay. Players have to avoid the deers (though the deers are not very good at stopping players). It adds more variations and a bit more danger to the platforms.

4. The tutorial level is more obvious so that players will know that it is a tutorial instead of the real game play. The indications for controls are clearer as well.

5. The character selection scene is more enjoyable. We implemented a better icon for each player and a radar chart for each bear's stats. Now the character selection scene indicates many fun aspects about our bear characters.

6. The text, icons and UI are improved. Now the heart has an animation and a "healing" particle effect to indicate the revive process for bears.

7. The grass texture for the ground is changed to match the art style of our game.

8. We added sound effects for our new objects repectively.

Moltivations:

We added the stats to our bears to improve the boring character selection scene before. Now bears have more characteristics and we expect players to create more memes.

We adde deers that run cross the platforms to improve the forest environment. Our platforms now have more variations and become a bit more dangerous.

We implemented the bikes and motorcycles since players cannot understand the previous speed up items. Moreover, the bikes and motorcycles create more interesting interactions with the environment and other items.

We implemented the healing effect and the new health UI since players could hardly notice the lost of heart previously. Now they should be able to better understand what killed their characters and why they were brought back to the race.

Preview for final version:

We will continue to balance out the items and adjust spawn rate of deers accordingly so they do not feel useless.

We will improve the ending scene and add more dramatic effects to the winner.

We will continue to find and fix some rare bugs.

--Patch 4.0--

1. New tutorial level was created. Players can experience part of the game, try out the controls in the tutorial level and make bear noises!

2. We created a new character selection scene. Players can choose their favorite bear character and easily figure our which bear they control in the character selection scene.

3. We created a day-night cycle for our environment. Obstacles will be slightly harder to see during night time and our environment has more variations.

4. We implemented the new jumping mechanism that adjusts according to the player's current speed. Now it becomes easier to jump accurately when they have high speed.

5. We implemented the new jumping animation. Now the bear characters rotate a bit when jumping and it help players find the current timing to jump.

6. We created new UI for the character's current lives. Now characters have noticable red hearts that indicate their current lives.

7. Now traps has a shorter "preparation" time when players have high speed. It helps make traps more effective against others during the late stage of the game.

8. Trees now look transparent if they could potentially block the main camera. It help players navigate through the complex environment more easily.

Moltivations:

Players reported that the jump feels floaty during playtest sessions. They felt difficult to handle the jump. Therefore, we added the new jumping mechanism and new jumping animation to help players better control their jumps, especially during the late stages when players have high speed.

Some players complained that the environment is too repetitive. Hence we introduced the new day-night cycle with unique light effects in our scene. It help create more variations for our environment and make more difficulties as players process.

We polished up our starting menu and the character selection scene to give players better instructions on the mechanisms of our game. Some players want to choose their favorite bear during the selection scene and we realiazed their dreams!

We also introduced new UI and patched some of the items according to players' feedbacks during the playtest sessions.

Previews for GOLD version:

1. New textures/models for bridge cubes, logs, hunters and bears.

2. Balance the items!

3. Better looking character selection scene with more professionalism.

4. Animations for our title scene that makes you feel like running in the forest.

5. Improve the quality of our icons and UI.

6. More variations of our platforms. More animations for different bears to emphasize their characteristics.

Patch 3.0

1. Added new platforms and introduced new enemies/obstacles to create more variations

1. (a) Bears now have to dodge hunters with nets by utilizing their jump abilities

1. (b) Trees now appear on the paths and bears get knocked back when colliding into them

2. Added particle effects to water, bullet, bear jumping and items to make the game more vibrant

3. Added sound effects for water, bullet, bear jumping and items

4. Implemented the circular fading transition scene

5. Used Hooke's Law for our triple heavy weight item. Bears now get squashed when weights hit them

6. Polished up the ready-up scene and the main menu

7. The game speed will increase gradually over time and increases faster when players die

7. (a) The background music now have a pitch according to the game speed

7. (b) Bear death will cause the game go to slow motion for a short duration to add more dramatic effects

8. Logs now have an intial acceleration so they are more effective

9. Bear traps now activate a little bit faster so they are also more effective

10. Implemented a camera zoom out effect for the platforms where hunters appear and shoot at bears

Moltivations:

Players from previous play testing sessions found the game too repetitive and slow so we decided to create more variations and increase the speed and the effectiveness of items in our game. Furthermore, the lack of sound effects make players not realize the hunters behind so we added more sound effects and particle effects. Changing the pace of the music add more fun factors and dramatic effects for our players.

Preview for Patch 4.0

1. Adding more obstacles and platforms to the game

2. Adjust the item system based on player's rank and distance

3. Implement a character selection scene

4. Make trees transparent if they block the camera

5. Polish up the game by adding more particle effects and juicyness