Prior to meeting up this week, we created a document online to outline and organize our ideas for level 1. This document includes our plans for the structural flow of the overall game, elements and media we will need for the level, ramp and pacing, map layout, as well as interactive objects and collectible artifacts. After this, we were able to meet in person the following day to discuss the Alpha Code milestone in detail. We talked in depth about the layout of our introductory level in terms of map and narrative beats, and considered potential reward systems that we could integrate into the gameplay. Additionally, we tackled the subject of enemy AI, player limitations and characteristics, cutscene placement, end-level indicators, and possible new animations. Throughout the meeting, our members made several rough sketches depicting our ideas while the online document was also updated to reflect our design revisions. As the main focus of the meeting was figuring out the flow and pacing of the areas the player will encounter in the first level, most of our sketches were of the initial environments we plan on having the player explore.
From here on out, the team will meet again in person tomorrow to discuss the aspects of the milestone that we were not able to cover or finalize so that we could solidify level 1 and get started on building the second prototype. The visual artists will begin preparing assets immediately according to the layout plan and coding will proceed as soon as assets are done.
