Thursday 20 June

We started off the day with a research task that would help us with the next task in the computer games platforms & technologies unit. John gave each of us a specific component to research and place on a mind map, mine was HCI. I didn't find this task difficult but it wasn't easy either as I had to research not only, but everything associated with it. After we had done this, we had a look at another students version of the task we were about to do and I have to say it was very good. However, I was very surprised to hear that this was only graded as merit. I thought it was going to be distinction for sure but John said without referring to images, it can only get a merit.

I then got straight on with my work as I had a lot to re-do. So I did a mixture of all my outstanding units and managed to get some finished. The only thing I really want to get done is assignment three for 2D animation because it has been put off about two or three weeks now. 

Wednesday 19 June

You know the usual morning had begun when John showed you a video involving technology. The video explained Google's new idea to get internet to anyone via balloons. This was a very interesting concept, considering Google is just an internet browser and not an ISP. But none the less it’s still an amazing idea that I think Google is known for (bringing out the next answer to something). Today we had a TED video, this one was picked by Emanuel. The video was fairly interesting as the person on stage talked about robots (more specifically drones) that have the ability to make dangerous decisions without the need of humans controlling it. I think this is a scary thought as robots can be hacked, tampered with and most important malfunction. If any of those were to happen while the drone was flying over a city or other highly populated area with friendlies, It won’t be a very pleasant outcome.

The questions for the video were quite difficult and some weren't even remotely relevant to what he was talking about in the video, like "What was the colour of the guys eyes?” However, despite the difficult questions I still managed to get 7 out of 11.

Moving onto the work for the day, I continued creating graphics for my game. Deciding that my characters movement was going to be the most challenging. In the end I managed to find a video on how to make a character look like it is running. I very closely followed the video and the outcome of my running character was rather pleasing. 

Monday 17 June

Before the day began, a video was shown this morning talking about the new leap technology that will allow people to use touch screen without actually touching the screen. I thought this was interesting technology but I didn't really understand the purpose, still I thought there was a place for it in the technology world. Then John gave a talk to both levels about what we were doing today; the level 3's got a chance to explore a new piece of software called Game Maker Studio. This was the thing I had been waiting for as I really wanted to get stuck into creating my own game. Previously John had asked us to think about what type of game we would make by considering characters, level design, the menu and the power ups we would have in our game. I thought of a single platform game where the character would have to jump and duck to get around different obstacles in the game. As the levels progress the game get harder by the character coming up against different enemies and try to reach the end without getting killed. On the last level the character would have to parachute down to get to the finish line and complete the game.

We didn't actually begin the creation until later in the day as John wanted us to familiarise ourselves with the program and maybe pick up some tips and ideas that would help during the creation of our own game. I'm glad we were given time to look at the program and go through multiple tutorials as I can have some problems when it comes to programming. Once we were all somewhat confident with Game Maker, we told John our ideas (this is to make sure thy meet the criteria) and then got started on designing our assets (characters, levels etc). Not much was really accomplished today except learning a new program but I still enjoyed the experience and I hope my game turns out how I want it.

Thursday 13 June

Before we began today, John asked us what we thought was the most interesting technology in gaming industry at the moment. I said PS4, this was because it is the big talk at the moment and that it will be one of the best gaming consoles of all time alongside Xbox One. Although, the PS4 does have a slight advantage on the new Xbox. Dan had a good one which was virtual reality. He said this one because he felt nothing has really become successful through virtual reality technology and he would like to see something that really takes off using that type of method of gaming. Once everyone had voiced their opinion, we moved straight onto our work. Throughout the day, I was working with Dan on our animation as we needed to add suitable music to it and I had to finish the next task in the computer games unit.

As for the animation, I was handling it throughout most of the day as we both looked at music and agreed on what we wanted to add. I didn't learn anything new today as we just continued with our usual work, so today's blog post will be very short in comparison to other posts.

Wednesday 12 June

John started the day off by telling the class that he had the points back from one of the moderators. It said that the main issues with our work are the spelling mistakes and grammar. Which we had been told about in the past due to increasingly annoying repeats of work being handed in that wasn't spell checked, proof read or read out loud to check for grammar issues. I find with my work that I spell check it but don't really look out for grammar errors.

Today I was trying to catch up on work I had missed due to being absent for a few days. The work I was working on was the first two tasks of developing computer games. I managed to get the majority of task one done but will need to do some more tomorrow. The first task involved the impact of gaming on society in the form of a Power Point or report.

Wednesday 5 June

Today was another day where we could finish any of our outstanding work. I was trying to complete assignment 2 in software design unit and perhaps assignment 1 as well. I managed to finish off assignment 2 and will send that off to John so he can either mark it or send it to Catherine to so she can read through it. I have almost finished assignment on I just need to refine it a bit more and add some detail to it. Overall today I am happy with the work I got done as I am only here for half the day. Tomorrow I will move on to refining mine and Dan’s animation by adding some music to it.

Tuesday 4 June

We started off with our usual tech Tuesday video. This was about making everything a potential circuit and changing how things operate. This was an interesting video but the guy presenting it was quite strange. I've seen something like this before but not as inventive (the one I saw was drawing circuits). As usual, I got an 8/10 (which is good considering the questions given were quite difficult). I really enjoy these questionnaires that we do every Tuesday because it wakes me up in the morning and the video can be funny and very interesting. After this John introduced the unit to the class which involved games. I was excited for this unit as I enjoy gaming, so I should be confident with this unit. Once John had gone through the tasks and he gave us some sheets to do in groups of two(me and Ben were in the same group). By completing these sheets, we will have already done most of assignment one. This was how easy the unit seemed.

When we all came back from lunch, John said we could work on outstanding units, this was good news as I still have a few units left to complete. For the majority of the day I was working on the code for assignment 1 and assignment 2 of software design. Today was also the level 3 extended working time, where level 3s had to stay till 4.30. I don't mind as the time seems to fly by when you’re doing the work anyway. During this time, John introduced the final unit for the level 3s, this was very similar to the unit that was introduced earlier.

These are the sorts of units I prefer as they seem to overlap a lot, which makes it easier for me. Overall I found today enjoyable.