Revised and improved mockup: Added green circles and dots to simulate player selecting unit and moving it (the circles may also designate a target to move to). The train button darkens to simulate a click. And there is now a main menu in the demo that simulates a player saving and resuming the game. The end where the enemy concedes was mainly just to shorten the demo, though it is not a bad idea to implement in the real game.

The mockup still runs a little fast, as if an expert player is playing it. However, it is a lot slower than it originally was (I almost halved the frame-rate to slow it down from the original, because you had to watch it a few times to catch everything going on).

Well, module 9 seems to have went over fairly well, though the instructor said I could tune up my game mockup a bit more. Still 91 out of 100 in the workshop is not bad at all!

Also, I have decided to add a new page to my portfolio to display my game design endeavors:
http://www.wix.com/dracon852001/csinclairportfolio#!game-projects
Please check it out, I plan to put the best of my game assets there as I create them, though you will see some of them here on this blog as well. I hope to continue sharing my design endeavors, thanks for reading/viewing, I will continue to update at least once a week.

In other news, my birthday is coming up, so I fully plan to slack off a bit and give myself something nice; perhaps pre-order guild wars 2 lol.

Yes I am still alive, just a bit distracted still. I will turn Module 9, the final module for the workshop this Sunday. Then I will work on art for the extras I had planned for the game. The new art is looking good, I will link to it when I have everything organized and set up. It has been a great ride and I am looking forward to seeing the art come together and come to life in a game!

So far I have a decent game mockup completed. I have bit preoccupied lately, but I am approaching the finish line in terms of the initial design. Completing this module will finish the workshop. As I look back on everything I have to say it was a great adventure designing this. I firmly believe my skills have grown and that I have learned just a little bit more about what it takes to design a game.

This is not to say the game is finished, I still have a lot of things I want to add into it to make it a unique and fun experience. But I continue work on my own rather than with a structured workshop. I plan to keep in touch with Kelsey, my partner, and keep things rolling, so stay tuned for further updates.

Module 8 complete, it called for a refined interface and background:

This will probably be the final interface template I use. The background seen is probably what the first or second level will be based off of. So a lot of the elements are complete and we are well on our way to a working first level! I know the programmer is still working on some things, but it is nice to be almost done with the modules.

Module 9 looks to be mainly gathering everything up, refining some images, and presenting. A mockup of the game is called for as well, presented via a flash animation. I look forward to putting everything together!

Module 7 complete, I actually had to refine my image... Unfortunately I redesigned at my old size and not a bigger size so there are some pixel artifacts (not too bad though). Note to self, design larger, it is easier to shrink things than it is to make them bigger lol.

The level 1 map currently looks like this (though it may actually be level 2, I got to talk to my partner and see what they think, they may already have a rough map to finalize for a first level):

Module 8 is refining this background and my interface elements further. I actually will redo the larger portions of this at a higher resolution per the instructors recommendation.

two modules left to go, but I feel we can take this game above and beyond this course if we keep in touch and keep working on it!

Module 7 was about interface elements and creating a first level as far as I could tell. My general thoughts on game interfaces are: Keep them simple, unified and unobtrusive. A good interface lets the player access the game options or components and then fades into the background.

I know this is a bit blurry because of the compression used but it should give a general idea of my interface. The music is from

http://www.last.fm/music/Christoph+Sachal/_/Lofwyrian+Forest 

I was not sure about what the terms are for that music, but I figure as long as I cite the source in the credits it should be okay in this case.