developing a 3d game using spark engine

DEVELOPING A 3D GAME USING

SPARK ENGINE

Lauren Bissett, Daniel Maguire, Nicholas Woodfield

BACKGROUND

Background Two overall goals:

Expand upon 3D game engine built last semester.

Create a fun, interactive game built on top of the engine.

Background Using:

Microsoft’s XNA framework (C#).Visual Studio 2008.Additional software for art and music

development.

PROJECT SCHEDULE

2. Schedule, Lauren

Feature January February March April

Design •Floor plans•Character design•Content list

•More floor plans

Modeling •Playable character model based on character design•Level building•Prop building

•Level building•Prop building

•Level building•Prop building

Rigging •Generic skeleton•Rig generic skeleton

•Tweak rig for playable character

Animation •Assist in content pipeline development and testing by providing custom animations

•Walk cycle •Animate •Animate

Game •Lighting•Staging

•Lighting•Staging

2. Schedule, Dan

Feature January February March April

Game •Puzzle design •Research•Investigate game architecture•Gameplay

•Inventory System•UI•Gameplay

•Gameplay

AI •Path finding•Line of sight•Research

•Decision system•Path finding•Line of sight

•Decision system

Audio •Sound effects•Background music

•Sound effects•Background music

•Sound effects•Background music

2. Schedule, NicholasFeature January February March April

Engine •Lighting•Normal Mapping•Content Pipeline•Animation Research •General Architecture•Code Rewrites•Documentation

•Animation Package•Particle Effects System•Specular mapping•Parallax mapping (?)•Environmental mapping

•Honors Thesis •Honors Thesis

Lighting •Per-pixel implementation •Further development•Optimization•Portability

Particle Effects

•Basic particle system•Fire•Dust•Etc.

•Game-specific effects using system

Continue

Game •Foundation•More robust collision/physics

•Specific gameplay mechanics•Stairs

Continue

2. Schedule, Analysis Schedule only started to fall apart

toward the end of the semester. Got most individual items done! It was only the final integration that fell

behind.

COMPLETED FEATURES

Engine ArchitectureScene graph

Rendering SystemMaterials & Lighting

AnimationInput

Content Pipeline

Engine ArchitectureMaterials & Lighting

Normal mappingEnvironmental mapping

Light mappingSpecular mapping

Rim lightingLight objects

Diffuse Map Normal Map Specular Map

Engine ArchitectureCollision DetectionBounding Volume Hierarchy

AABBOBB

SpherePhysics Files

Integrated with 3D Editors

Engine ArchitectureAnimation

GPU SkinningPlay

Speed upSlow down

Reverse

Artificial Intelligence•Check visibility

• Rectangle intersections• Corner intersections

•Lion Move• If visible, move toward player

• Newly visible?• Roar• Fresh in Memory

• Go towards player• Check for collisions

•If not visible• Forgotten?

• Sleep• Slightly remember?

• Forget a little more• Pursue (choose viewpoint)• Check for collisions

•If frozen, move around object

ArtModels

AnimationsTextures

LevelsProps

Character

ADDITIONAL FEATURES

No heap allocation per frameAvoiding excessive garbage collection

Allocate everything up frontValue types

Avoiding box/unboxing w/ enums/intsRender queue

Reduce state switchingCache states

Optimizations

CUT FEATURES

Cut Features Particle Engine

Very complex.Not enough time to implement correctly.Would have meant cutting other features.

Inventory System UI

The ability is there, but ran out of time!

DIFFICULTIES

Difficulties, General TIME!

The biggest problem is we ran out of TIME! Integration

All the pieces are there, but we lacked time to fit them together.

We ran out of time for integration.

Difficulties, General Man/womanpower

Could have gotten a lot done if we had a small team dedicated to each development area.

Difficulties, Gameplay AI algorithms were based on a 2D

algorithm. Translation to 3D proved challenging.

Difficulties, Art Lack of suitable textures

Each texture needs a diffuse, normal and specular map.

Could only find a handful of suitable textures.Painting by hand is too time-consuming.Resulted in lots of tiling, which makes the art

looks overdone and bland. Inexperience

Apparently this art stuff is kind of difficult.

Video Demonstration And now, the moment you’ve all been

waiting for… Video

OVERALL ASSESSMENT

So how did we do? Basically, all the pieces are there, we

couldn’t put them all together in time.

So how did we do? We did, however, accomplish a LOT!

So how did we do? The engine is at the stage where

anyone could pick up our code and build a game right now.

So how did we do? The engine is at the stage where

anyone could pick up our code and build a game right now.

So how did we do? The game itself is not very playable, but

there’s something there you can interact with.

So how did we do? As a group, we consider the underlying

code and art a success, but the lack of final integration our only weak point.

Overall, we are satisfied.

The End