Creating Cocozee
The first monster and the most important one to design was the nature monster that you would start and play the game as if you had picked it beforehand. The starting monsters have to be appealing in a cute way as they are meant to represent a younger maturity of their monster race but also appear to have potential as they will eventually grow.
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Middle stages of maturing (also referred to as evolution in most games) have been cut entirely from this game for a few reasons. The first one is that they are simply unmemorable, a lot of the time they are awkward and forgotten due to them not going for cute or cool, more of a balance of both. But more importantly, maturing works a lot differently in this game due to a lack of any level system, rather you have to complete a certain task/s explained to you by a special NPC. I have also implemented narrative elements into this maturing system, having a thought out reason on how this strange method of progression makes sense.
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Moving on from that design choice and back to the starting nature monster, I had a clear idea of what I wanted to create. My first idea was a coconut monkey, having both themes relating closely to tropical areas made sure that this monster would fit nicely into the environment. I tried to come up with some other ideas, some other tropical animals came to mind but for the most part I was already settled on the first idea I had come up with. When looking for references, I obviously chose to look at a lot of Pokemon monkeys and a few from other monster collection games as well, along with pictures of coconuts.
The finished design of character that I have named Cocozee features a lot of inspiration from the references above. I especially used the Pokemon Chimchar (reference #2) to understand what basic features a monkey themed monster should have as well as how to balance a starting monster design's cuteness as well as it's potential.
One problem I do see with the final design that I have made is that the frilly part of the coconut may look more like some form of facial hair to some people. Luckily this is only a problem with the concept art's perspective and a lack of 3D viewing and so this shouldn't be a problem in-game.
Creating Cocozee
The first monster and the most important one to design was the nature monster that you would start and play the game as if you had picked it beforehand. The starting monsters have to be appealing in a cute way as they are meant to represent a younger maturity of their monster race but also appear to have potential as they will eventually grow.
​
Middle stages of maturing (also referred to as evolution in most games) have been cut entirely from this game for a few reasons. The first one is that they are simply unmemorable, a lot of the time they are awkward and forgotten due to them not going for cute or cool, more of a balance of both. But more importantly, maturing works a lot differently in this game due to a lack of any level system, rather you have to complete a certain task/s explained to you by a special NPC. I have also implemented narrative elements into this maturing system, having a thought out reason on how this strange method of progression makes sense.
​
Moving on from that design choice and back to the starting nature monster, I had a clear idea of what I wanted to create. My first idea was a coconut monkey, having both themes relating closely to tropical areas made sure that this monster would fit nicely into the environment. I tried to come up with some other ideas, some other tropical animals came to mind but for the most part I was already settled on the first idea I had come up with. When looking for references, I obviously chose to look at a lot of Pokemon monkeys and a few from other monster collection games as well, along with pictures of coconuts.
The finished design of character that I have named Cocozee features a lot of inspiration from the references above. I especially used the Pokemon Chimchar (reference #2) to understand what basic features a monkey themed monster should have as well as how to balance a starting monster design's cuteness as well as it's potential.
One problem I do see with the final design that I have made is that the frilly part of the coconut may look more like some form of facial hair to some people. Luckily this is only a problem with the concept art's perspective and a lack of 3D viewing and so this shouldn't be a problem in-game.
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SWOT Analysis
Strengths
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Skills:
I feel confident with character designing as I know from previous units what process to go through when designing a character as well as how to create and organise a character sheet for that character. I also feel somewhat confident with modelling but I can see some parts such as the modelling of the monsters being a challenge.​
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Resources:
I have access to resources such as Trello for clear organisation and planning of the tasks that I need to do, Pureref for quick organisation of inspiration, Photoshop for the creation and planning of character and environment designs, Maya for the modelling of the props, characters and modular assets, Audacity for the editing of sounds that I may create myself or find online, Substance Painter for the creation of textures on the models and obviously Unreal Engine for the game itself as well as probably many more resources.
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Knowledge:
I have a decent knowledge in developing concepts for fictional creatures and attempting to execute those ideas. I also have knowledge from previous units how to use resources effectively and efficiently.
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Weaknesses
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Skills:
I'm not so confident with UV mapping and texturing as I haven't had a chance to develop the skills to do them effectively. For this project, I want to try and focus on developing these skills as I haven't given myself the time to in previous units. I also haven't drawn a lot in a while and so it may be a bit of a challenge to demonstrate and create the art for the characters and environment designs.
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Traits:
One trait that causes me problems sometimes is that I like to hyper focus on one part of a project for too long, even if it's meaningless. This could be something bigger like spending too much time on idea generation or designing and neglecting other important parts, or it could be something smaller like hyper focusing on a small inconsistency that may take a lot of time to backtrack and fix despite being unimportant compared to bigger tasks. A good solution for this trait is utilizing Trello to organize what's important and what isn't so that I know what to prioritize.
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Knowledge:
A gap in my knowledge would be how to design environments which will be important to focus on filling as the tropical environment that this game's portion is set in is quite important to make the world interesting to explore.
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Opportunities
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Skills:
The skills I will need to learn to eliminate my weaknesses are UV mapping and texturing which I will do by doing research on how to do it effectively and by prioritizing those skills more within this project. Another skill I'll need to refine is drawing again so that I can draw clear and readable concept designs for this project. I will do this by doing extra practice and looking for inspiration online.
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Market:
I definitely would say that there is a gap in the market for a monster collection game that lets you play as the monsters in world where humans don't even exist at all. This means that all the characters and NPCs are monsters of intelligence similar to humans instead.
A reason many monster collection games that feature combat feel very similar is due to this idea of the monsters being owned by you rather than played by you, this results in mostly turn based/strategy combat. By changing this and making it so that you play as the monsters, it allows for combat to be drastically different and real-time. Despite this, combat would not be the main focus for this game as the main focus is saved for exploration instead to help me create an experience that feels like a walking simulator of some kind. I think that having an open and unique world to explore also fills a gap in the market for monster collection as many of these types of games have been usually very linear until more recently.
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Resources:
I can get access to resources such as ArtStation for lots of inspiration when it comes to designing characters and environments as well as the resources already listed for this project.
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Threats
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Environment:
Software such as Wix or Maya can stop working or shut down which will disrupt my ability to work. A solution to this would be doing the next most important tasks on other software which is functional and usable
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Assistance:
People may not be able to help if I am struggling on something such as UV mapping or learning how to use Substance Painter and so a solution for this would be searching up how to do the skills/get the knowledge that I am missing.
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Time:
All the work needs to be completed by the 17th of April. This leaves me with a short time constraint to finish everything I want to complete. The best way to make sure that I finish what needs to be done is utilizing Trello to organize what tasks are important and what are not so that even if I don't finish everything, I will at least have the most important parts of the project finished.