General Discussions

I found designing a game from scratch like this to be an excellent experience in programming. This is because I had never been given such free scope to produce a program. Unfortunately, it also taught me the hard way the lesson of scope, and how to be more reasonable in my goals. When we were first given the task, I came up with so many ideas and was very excited to learn how to try and implement them. Unfortunately as the deadline drew nearer I realised that many of my ambitions were too lofty, and I regrettably had to decide which ones to cut. Despite this however, This was one of the best opportunities to learn Object Oriented Programming, and put what I have learned previously to the test. Being given reign to design your own classes, and design the entire structure of the game yourself makes you appreciate good software much more, as you very quickly realise how bad practice can quickly cause your code to become unmanageable. For the next years, I would say have more labs early on to ensure people start as soon as possible, and maybe try and work some sort of Java/C# programming into second year to try and make the transition much more cohesive. - Sholto

I personally found the Game Design Experience to be a pleasant challenge, and while it took up a lot of my available time, I enjoyed figuring out a problem and watching a product come to fruition. I got a better understanding of the design process and how intense Game Development can be in a short timeframe. Future Developments for the game, for me, would include the expansion of the World this is set in, as everything was left open-ended and I'd be interested to see someone else's take on the Game World. Other improvements may include better AI for the enemies, more enemies, better graphics and sounds, etc. - Riley