Daniel Lock
JustWave
JustWave was my 2017 Global Game Jam (GGJ) game. My team and I were given 48 hours to create a game that was based around the theme of "Waves."
We decided that we wanted to based our game on the idea of literal waving. Although it was not a very abstract idea it gave us a lot of room to create an effective game especially in 48 hours! We wanted to make a game that would give the player a good experience while showing off each team members abilities. To make this possible we concentrated on making sure we had at least one fleshed out level that would incorporate the use of sound, 3-D modelling, programming and environmental design.
What was the plan?
My role
I was the lead programmer and environmental designer for the project. I loved the roles that I had as it made it possible for me plan out a lot of the environment while programming so that I could work out exactly where the problem areas were going to be and sort them out before we started to create a full build. I feel that my biggest achievement on the project was my Ai. We needed the Ai to be able to walk around randomly without leave the level boundaries or getting stuck on a wall. To sort out this problem I made an Ai that could find a suitable target on the NavMesh every ten seconds and start to move towards it. I think that the biggest problem I had was with the optimization of the characters. I had made the Ai to look at the play when they came into range. The problem was that the method used caused the game to run poorly because of how many RayCast checks had to be made. I tried to optimize this method but was unable to and decided to adopt the "Fail faster" approach and used a second methods of colliers and triggers.
The reception
When we showcased the game at the end of the game jam we received a number of comments on the games unique take on a first person shooter. A number of people played the game and expressed the love for the idea, the use of Ai and the sound.
Want to see the game in action? Contact me for a Mac or Windows build!