I
did this to get an overall impession of how udk works. The controller,
pawn, shaders, physics etc. The shield effect is about the same as used
in my other video, except I use decals to project the impact effects.
Creating
the the LEGO® parts was done in Blender. But unlike the Slizer models,
this time I imported parts from MLCad and remodeld them vertex by vertex
to be low poly. This still took alot of time, but was way faster than
measuring and modeling everything with real parts.
Why am I not making a game?
Before
I get bombarded with messages again (like after releasing my Bionicle®
Machinima) no, I will _not_ make a game! Apart from this being about a
year old, I worked six months on the Bionicle related stuff to learn how
to use udk. The mechanics in this video barely work, are bugged to hell
and the code is every maintainer’s worst nightmare. I originally planed
to release it along with my machinima as kind of a “behind the scenes”
sort of addition but quickly withdraw from that idea to prevent even
more “make a game” messages.
Still,
I came to the conclusion that I should at least show it for I have put
many hours into this work. So, don’t try to convince me to make a game!
Here are some reasons: 1) look above: the code sucks, I did it while learning how to use the Unreal Development Kit 2)
The LEGO® Group has given me permission to release my machinima, I
haven’t asked them for permission to develop a game and I highly doubt
they would give away their license for free. 3) I would _NOT_ work
on a game for years to come to release it for free and I cannot sell it
for reason 2. I simply cannot spare so much time. 4) The work you see
here has taken many months and it would need a couple hundret times
more to make an actual playable game with story, models, animations,
meachanics, menus … and so on, it’s a long list. 5) I have been
there before: I have worked on a lot of projects and free big ones
always end up being canceled. I also know very well what it feels like
to think your project is very easy when you come up with it at first. It
never ends well, trust me. 6) I am sure I will find more reasons if you are interested.
This
is a rapid prototype of a project that has been canceled. The idea is
to build stations around planet’s in a solar system. Each planet has an
orbit where the ships can travel within. Interplanetary transit takes up
a ship’s energy which is also used to fire and can only be restored in
orbits or carriers. That way one has to wait for two planets to come
close to each other before attacking.
A 3D Screensaver which lets you fly around the Earth. On the nightside you can see the lights of the cities. Not all textures are made by me, see license during the installation.
I created this a while ago but the project got canceled. Since then I
did an overhaul of the system. Apart from two workarounds for
dynamically setting values in latent kismet sequences it is pretty solid
and should be easy to use and build upon. A Readme.txt on how to use it
is included in the zip file. (I also mapped the A,B,X,Y Controller keys
to Q,W,E,R for testing)
The first simple button press QTE looks like this:
The QTE is nested inside a subsequence. Once activated it first checks whether other QTEs are active by comparing the named QT Active bool variable. In case no other QTE is currently running this variable is set to false. Then the remote vent Lock QTEs
is called to set the boolean variable to true and enter cinematic mode,
which prevents the player from controlling his pawn. Next the gates
after the input events are opened to allow the events to be registered
by the QTE Sequence. Additionally GFx Invoke ActionScript is used to tell the QTE Flash Player to display a simple button.
At last the QTE is activated by sending an impulse to the start input
of the sequence. The QTE will now run as long as is specified by Duration (default: 2 seconds) and listen for impulses on the Right Key and Wrong Key inputs. A correct button press increases an internal value that triggers the Success output and quits the QTE. Likewise a wrong key press results in Failure.
Success and Failure also activate the Finished output. Stopping the QTE activates the Aborted
output. While a real QTE would change what is going on in the game this
one just plays a flash response for the player and resets the boolean
lock after it is finished.
This is a fan made machinima. Over the last months I have been learning how to use UDK and made this realtime cinematic. The theme is of course my favorite LEGO® series (when they were still mystical heros and not just some machines). Although I worked alot on this project I have not done everything by far. Check the credits (on youtube) to see what I took from where. Aside from animating in UDK, most work went into modeling the LEGO® parts in Blender. But unlike the Slizer models, this time I imported parts from MLCad and remodeld them vertex by vertex to be low poly. This still took alot of time, but was way faster than measuring and modeling everything with real parts.
After switching to UDK I recreated my old effect
with updated graphics. Just like the old effect, you can download this
one and use it. Included with the download is a txt file to explain how
to use it. However, unlike the Irrlicht shield I did not spend much time
to make this shield work perfectly, it is pretty much just working.
Magnon was a racing game where the cars could drive upside down and the race tracks would be confusing and twisted. The development blog is still available here.