MQP Meeting 12/2 Notes

• Joey showed his basic monster models and animations and I showed my animations for the flying monster
• Professor Rosenstock reiterated working towards a full battle level with a complete environment and suggesting to narrow the number of different battlefield locations to around 3
• We also discussed our intention to have a color system between types of monsters and the instrument classes needed to defeat them (also extending to the color scheme for instrumentalists to denote which instrument class they are versed in)
• As an extension of this we also talked about the potential use of different particle effects to denote when monsters are taking damage or being healed
• Dylan also led us through the new added tech features to the prototype including Kyle's implementation of monsters which are weaker to more and fewer notes respectively and a monster which decreases the effectiveness of all instruments on the field
• Kyle demonstrated the newly implemented fatigue system and tempo changing system
• Under the fatigue system each instrumentalist has a "fatigue bar" which is subtracted from each time a note is played; whether an instrumentalist's fatigue bar reaches zero or the slot is turned off, the instrumentalist's fatigue bar will regenerate after five seconds of inactivity
• A sliding bar was added to the battle mode screen to allow variations in tempo during battle
• We talked about the possibility of having different animations to denote different levels of fatigue for each instrumentalist
• Professor Rosenstock suggested the artists try and think of different ways to represent the tempo slider
• We also briefly discussed the possibility of having different difficulty settings rather than just relying on variations of instruments
• Brian then showed the work he has put forth on sound design playing some of the sound effects and MIDI files he's found to correspond to our list of instruments and also played some sound clips he had composed as potential menu tracks and other game condition tracks such as winning or losing a battle
• Professor Rosenstock suggested Brian continue on by putting together some sample patterns to be used in game or potentially serve as unlock-able patterns as part of the upgrade system
• We then discussed potentially having to switch from a step sequencer to a piano roll to accommodate more interesting and complex patterns, most of which revolved around adapting the step sequencer to be able to combine beats into longer, continuous notes, or having some kind of visual indicator (such as connector lines) between beats which, when toggled, would indicate different note durations

WHATS NEXT

• For the artists Professor Rosenstock suggested a potential division of labor in which Joey focuses on putting together more environment assets and I recreate the instrumentalists and some animations for them as well as making more instruments
• Professor Rosenstock also suggest that the group discuss and potentially draw up initial designs of important UI elements which the artists would also then work on
• Part of this also included rethinking the functionality of the instrumentalists themselves and their associated actions (selecting patterns, instruments, instrumentalists) while in battle mode
• Professor Rosenstock re-expressed his desire to showcase the front of the instrumentalist models somehow
• Professor Rosenstock also brought up the point of coming up with a name for our game, suggesting we brainstorm some potential titles
• Professor Rosenstock also expressed that he thought further implementation of the upgrade system (instrument trees) be the tech teams top priority
• This also includes thinking of other potential "player upgrades" that could be implemented as part of the upgrade system (such as patterns, beneficial potions, etc)
• Professor Rosenstock's final point was that we should try and bring all our features and assets into a single version