Thou was not born for death, immortal bird!
TWP #16 Ode To The Creative Journey Continues.
I am back. After a brief sabbatical (not official) I have returned to pour out the ideas and rumblings that occur in my head for the week. Despite not writing anything it was a very productive month and a half. Also despite not reading *anything* it was a very productive month and a half. Maybe its the changing of the seasons, the cataclysm of a winter we had here in Buffalo is finally trending towards warmer weather, that's allowing me to think more clearly.
As long time readers have known I have been working on a project I dubbed "Project Pluto". A PT like space story game based on an android living along on a distance space station. After about 1.5 years of building out mechanics and struggling to write a story I had to shelve it for the time being. I needed something new to work on. Something to ignite the creative fire once more. I realize I can't pivot to new things forever, that is if I ever wish to finish anything, but something different helps to juxtapose the struggles on the other project. This is being developed in Unreal Engine 5.1, which is still my go to engine to work in.
Along side the development of the new game I have also been trying to keep my software engineering skills sharp. I started working through this course on Coursera called "Foundations of Sports Analytics: Data, Representation and Models in Sports". Combining two things I really enjoy is the best way for me to study and apply something. I think I found an avenue which I can move forward with growing more confident analytical mindset as opposed to a pure engineering mindset.
Something Interesting
While brainstorming with my AI companion it mentioned this poem by John Keats. It's called "Ode to a Nightingale", and below is a small snippet of that.
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44479/ode-to-a-nightingale
"Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird!
No hungry generations tread thee down;
The voice I hear this passing night was heard
In ancient days by emperor and clown"
This passage speaks to the idea of rebirth and immortality, suggesting that even though winter may bring death and darkness, spring will always bring new life and regeneration. Although I am no poetry expert I found it an interesting read, and there are some neat analysis videos on YouTube that go beyond anything you could imagine.
Game Update: Project Gato
Update # 1
The new one. For this I have been itching to do something stylized, less realistic than most of my other prototypes. I have numerous asset packs and content that I have been pouring over and conforming to the environment I have built. I spent a lot of time on landscape generation outside of the engine. Specifically using Gaea. Below is a shot of my WIP building a type of stylized, swirled and twisted mountain surrounded by small islands.
Gaea is a node based landscape generation tool, where you can fully customize and create any kind of landscape. Giant mountains, massive fault lines, rolling hills, deep canyons, you name it.
Here I have imported the landscape into Unreal Engine. There is a bit of math needed to get the X/Y and Z scales down.
But with that imported a simple example can be setup quick using a good auto-landscape material and procedural foliage generation.
The next steps are to work on the layouts of the islands, now that I have the landscape I wanted generated. I also spent a lot of time learning landscape materials but ultimately settled for using Brushify.io and custom stylized landscape textures. I have also been back in Blender trying to relearn everything since I haven’t touched it in a couple years. I plan on creating my main character on my own, and utilizing as many purchased assets as I can for the environment. This allows me to focus on design and coding.
I recommend this course on Udemy for getting familiar with Blender: Gamedev.tv Blender.
Below are some current shots of my in development world:
Useful Links
Until Next Week
Normally I post about what I am reading, but I don’t think I touched a book in a month (slowly making my way through “On The Road” by Jack Kerouac). Just been so focused on game dev and engineering stuff. Oh and also I play way to much Destiny 2, I think thats probably the reason. The worst part of the year was the last 2 months. Winter still lingering, sun never shining, cats being sick, motivation at a low. But alas we have survived to see another day, another week.
As always, you can find my on Twitter (or whats left of it) @corey_s_.