How has the project gone Versus initial expectations?
I'm generally pleased with how the project has progressed, though it would have been nice to really add some more gameplay elements and mechanics. The implementation of the player body took much longer than expected in my initial production outline and that transformed the project from a game to more of a narrative experience. I would have liked to have spent more time on the crime scene apartment level- as it is I don't feel as though the player can do any real investigation but I simply ran out of time to implement more objects. The Narrative/ investigation objects would certainly have to be all modelled and custom versus the asset packs as generic objects wouldn't have stood out to the player enough as significant or tell the story I needed them to.There where compromises versus what I had initially pitched and that was unfortunate. I would have liked to flesh out the detective side of the game and give everything a less confined or cramped pacing as an experience.
I would also have wanted to create more models and individual assets for the project but again, the blueprint side of the project just took so much longer than I anticipated, meaning that I customised several and created several models but not enough I feel to give the game a definitively unique visual style.
The change in style to more of a steampunk/ less grounded experience was done about 7 weeks into production and while there are elements of steampunk, in the final project I don't feel that they make much of an impact.
I would suggest that the use of assets here was more of a hinderance as by their nature Asset packs from the Unreal Marketplace have to be fairly generic so they have a good audience for customers but because I relied on them more than I would have liked, they leave the project looking bland.
How does the project match up to the individual Pitch?
The overall narrative structure is a fairly close match, but I had to cut some of the more obscure elements such as the man with the pigs head as I didn't have time to create or modify the existing models. It is a shame to lose some of those elements as I feel they would have made the project feel much more unique and darker in tone.
What changed?
The scope of the project and the style of the project changed dramatically at points in the production process. The narrative aspects did get a slight simplification but the overall structure remained fairly consistent, just the scale of the levels changed. I think in some ways it makes the project a more pick up and play experience but in other ways I feel it lacks the depth I really would have wanted. The style went from a fairly straight 1940's murder investigation into a more surreal experience which is fine and I feel lends itself well to VR. In VR you can re-create mundane experiences but to put a player in an immersive surreal experience can lead to better player engagement.Lessons Learned? Wisdom gained?
Overall The biggest thing I've learned is to be flexible with deliverables, if some things take longer than they should it's fine to tweak and change other areas of production. I've also learned that even the most prepared production will hit some road blocks and stumbles and ideally you would want to take those into account in the initial production schedule. I'm pleased with the project as a whole but taking these lessons on board for next time/ the next project is something that I'll look to do.
The blueprints aren't quite as robust as I would have liked, ideally a more systemic approach would be taken and indeed make additional content creation more robust, I didn't use inheritance to my advantage. I'll definately have to consider this in future projects.
It was also very important to get feedback from the supervisor and other users. The supervisor was always willing to consider a change in scope as long as the rationale was there and offered feedback throughout the process that really enabled me to keep progressing without spending too long on areas that wouldn't have an impact on the project. User feedback also helped shape the project, though this is far more limited than planned but although feedback from the supervisor and the users wasn't always what I wanted to hear it was incredibly valuable in shaping the final project.
Another note, the whole project had me considering the impact of accessability and VR- how can this be improved? Are there ways for the differently abled to enjoy these experiences- I'm sure work could be done to improve but ultimatly and unfortunatly this was outside the scope of this project.
