Arcane
Spell
Language
Alpha - 11/26/2024
Sprint
In Alpha, we continued working on spell-casting mechanics, fixing the misfiring issues, limiting the subset of letters cast for each element, and improving the visuals of each spell type. This week we focused on fleshing out singleplayer and its playability, where we added dragons as enemies which would be only defeated by a spell that is stronger than its type (ex: Water beats a fire dragon, fire beats an earth dragon, etc.). This focus on single-player allowed us to fix many of the minor bugs we had in milestone 2 as well as add more ease of play to the user.
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For multiplayer, we are running into issues with Meta's avatar generation, so continue debugging and experimenting with builds, as opposed to Quest Link testing. Currently, we plan to build out multiplayer in the upcoming gold sprint, however, if multiplayer continues to have some issues we will abandon that option and solely have a singleplayer mode.​
Sprint Overview
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Spells
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​Particle systems for each spell: Fire, Water, and Earth
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Spell type casting (weaknesses and strengths circle)
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UI
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UI is more cohesive with theming​.
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There is a "How to Play" section to teach the player how to cast spells.
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Single-player progress
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Adding opponents (dragons) for the user to shoot spells at​.
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Reducing the subset of letters, so there is less information the user needs to handle (see the spell circle above).​
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Gameplay loop.
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Uncertainty with multiplayer
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Meta's avatar generation​.
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Meta Quest Link testing issues and debugging.
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General Quality Updates
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Environment and sound effects​
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Progress
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Progress on single-player:
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We expanded on the single-player mode by adding dragons players must defeat. There are three types of dragons: a fire dragon, a water dragon, and an earth dragon. You must sign letters associated with water spells to defeat the fire dragon, letters associated with earth to defeat the water dragon, and letters associated with fire to defeat the earth dragon. As of now, each dragon defeat leads to a one-point reward.
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​Spell casting:
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We have fixed some of the issues we were having during milestone 2, such as misfiring spells, aiming, and the subset of letters used for casting being too large. Now we have set up a casting time (how long a sign needs to be held for the spell to be fully ready to cast), which also is paired with a visual queue of the spell growing larger in the aiming hand. We have also fixed the issue of firing spells in the wrong direction when "left" is selected for the signing hand. Alongside the added visual upgrades of preparing to cast, a particle effect system has been added to each of the spell types. ​
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A rather large change to what letters the player can use to cast spells has been implemented. We have reduced the letters to 1 per type, so the player has less information to handle. This helps reinforce the idea that the player needs to search for how to sign the letter instead of sticking to their known signs within the long list.
Progress on multiplayer:
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Meta Building Blocks remain unable to support simultaneous avatar generation– unclear whether this is an issue with multiplayer or with the avatars themselves
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Will continue debugging and experimenting with builds, as opposed to Quest Link testing
General quality updates:
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Added environment to both multiplayer and single-player mode, a small meadow with a shifting skybox.
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The environment will likely remain small and static because movement will be disabled throughout the game.
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Casting a particular spell will play its corresponding sound effect.
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Pressing a button will play a clicking noise.
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Future Plans (Gold)
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Add videos to the "How to Play" section of the intro screen.
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In game modes, we want to add functionality to show people the correct gesture for a letter if they cannot get it correct.
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We also want to add a fun, engaging VR environment for these players to be immersed in.
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A learning mode will also be added that is separate from the single-player game.
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Multiplayer is a work in progress, and we are not sure if we will be able to get it working by the next milestone. If we cannot get it to work, we will make a more robust single-player game mode with dragons that can fight back and different strength spells, where you might have to cast multiple letters to defeat one dragon. We would also like to add more movement in the dragon to make defeating them more difficult.
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Make changes to the website as per critique we received.