Group feedback BA4

Game Design document and Presentation

Too much text and not enough visual language in the presentation
We're supposed to be able to describe our ideas visually with mood boards themes and artwork.

Bullet points would help instead of long walls of text, consolidating written word and clarifying that with spoken.

Combine the imagery with the idea, maybe make a short slide-show for how things work, weave the mechanics of the game into the presentation. Suggestion: assign several slides for a step-by-step walk through of how a particular mechanic works.

Trial and error with the sweetspot for information vs imagery - really all i knew was that i have too much text and not enough imagery. Next time I'll try to prioritise images and have as few bullet points as possible.

Highlight what makes interogation unique, as well as that we completely forgot to mention how the AI behaves, maybe more on the costumes.
We need to thoroughly examine what we've talked about and make sure we don't miss anything so the whole idea is communicated.

Peer feedback would help, showing our presentation to other groups so they can give us suggestions on how to improve it for the final viewing.

Try to aim for more new and interesting game ideas as opposed to tried and tested ones, be more adventurous in the genre we work on in the future. Try to push the idea of what games can be and that will insight interest in our work.

Be less risky when it comes to the contextualisation of the game.

Synopsis and creative writing could have improved the level explanation as opposed to the very straight forward and functional description of each level I wrote.
Add depth and story to this sort of thing in the future.

MoH Revamp - Influences

One notable game we really liked the look of for the UI was Splinter Cell: Conviction. It's modern, clean and clear cut style is very easy to read and doesn't distract too much from the game.

I was really inspired by Crysis having such varied gameplay with an obviously linear route with plenty of space for attempting new tactics.
This video series by Nanosuitninja clearly demonstrates the variety of tactics you can use in Crysis aswell as a very thorough guide series that explains most of his tactics.

The audio meter from Metal Gear Solid was an essential part of making stealth gameplay with sound as the key mechanic for being spotted possible.

In metal gear the ring surrounding the player vibrates and lifts in the direction of enemy foot-steps or noises. We want a similar effect but only as a signifier for nearby noise, not revealing the location as well without checking the PDA.

The suit itself was inspired by multiple things, the marshal police uniforms featured in Neotokyo as well as a real life prototype for a new soldier suit and clear influence of Crysis can be noted in the piping and general appearance of the helmet. The spinal section looks as though it draws from Dead Space. The overall look is also very similar to

While researching the conflict in south america i talked to a friend who will remain anonymous
here's what he shared with me http://pastebin.com/bCtUJjqd

Re-vamping a franchise

For this project we were given a choice of several franchises to develop a game idea that would breath new life into the series.

We chose the Medal of Honour series and have come to the conclusion that a futuristic take on a south american drug war would be an interesting setting for the game to explore.
We will research the weapons, the way the gangs operate and how drugs affect the nation as well as general millitary tactics and un-conventional tactics to spice up the gameplay.

Notes concerning the plot:

• Drugs have been developed in such a way that nano-bots/dragon breath-like chemical will inhibit free will leaving addicts slaves to the drug gangs.
• They may have a sort of hive-mind ability making their presence even more dangerous as they can quickly and efficiently share information with each other telepathically. With no leadership addicts in the US will merely become susceptable to manipulation. If the drug is to have a nano-bot inside we can also introduce an EMP-like effect that could temporarily disable newer technology. We had discussed the US maybe depending more on electronic weaponry making the fight in the south more difficult.
• There is moral ambiguity about the fight as the militia are under the influence of a drug, although they are however guilty of being a drug addict. It's up to the player to decide if they should use deadly force or risk an assailant waking up from a non-deadly shock/round.
• The south will be using modified old (conventional) weapons so as to be comparable in force to the US's newer technologies.

Changes from the recent tutorial:

• Make the game less futuristic, use existing drugs for similar effects, PCP, dragons breath, cocaine
• the combat and feelings we want to produce can be done without the mystical nano-drug. this'll have a broader audience as there will be people who won't want a completely sci-fi shooter.
• experiment with new drug concoction that makes addicts more impressionable. america seeks to clamp down as it's citizens become drone-like.
• south american addicts are kidnapped and dosed on other drugs to make them better soldiers.
• CoD skull finding/ Halo collectible system, contextualised via US gun-tracking scandal. could proide extra score bonus to the level or upgrades or secret ammo cache. slight addition to the existing MoH single player competitive play.

Tribe - tv show
http://www.bbc.co.uk/tribe/tribes/babongo/index.shtml

Kony
http://invisiblechildren.com/about/history/
http://www.bbc.co.uk/tribe/tribes/sanema/index.shtml

http://www.bbc.co.uk/tribe/topics/knowledge.shtml


Joseph Kony’s tactics were—and remain—brutal. He often forced children to kill their parents or siblings with machetes or blunt tools. He abducted girls to be sex slaves for his officers. He brainwashed and indoctrinated the children with his lies and manipulated them with his claim of spiritual powers.
At the height of the conflict in Uganda, children “night commuted.” That is, every evening they would walk miles from their homes to the city centers. There, hundreds of children would sleep in school houses, churches, or bus depots to avoid abduction by the LRA.
Kony and the LRA abducted more than 30,000 children in northern Uganda.

Plot

• You play as a Mexican in the US Army
• Drug violence spreads to the US
• US responds by clamping down the borders and neighboring drug production places in SA
• Introduced to the Golden Triangle
• Missions work from the border going deeper and deeper into the drug production world
• When you get there people are more powerful than before, invigorated by the land and their produce.
• This is the heart of drug production, marijuana and opium, it's your goal to secure the area.
• The people of this area have been doped up on a special version of PCP the drug leaders developed that will last indefinitely. (much like how the MC of Limitless developed his own version of NZT 48)
• Final boss idea - He's fixed himself on the perfect PCP version needing no refreshers. Your goal is to dose him with an imperfect version to bring him back to vulnerability. At this point you can either kill or arrest him.
• Choice 1 - You kill him - The knowledge of how he developed the drug and the lab's whereabouts die with him, and it continues to be produced and consumed.
• Explore further around the Golden Triangle for clues to the whereabouts of the lab.
• Choice 2 - You arrest him - You can interogate him, but you have to keep him dosed all the way back to the US or else he'll return to his improved state.
• Fail state for choice 2, you mess up the QTE and he escapes en-route
• Win state for choice 2, you keep him dosed and you find out where the lab is, unlocking the extra mission
• Lab mission - Guards are all under different PCP effects, some more effective than others.
• If you kept him alive you get the chance to do the stealth version of the lab mission, letting yourself into the facility.
• If you killed him you can't get in with ease, you need to force your way in, this may alert the guards.

The golden triangle is a perfect setting for a wave-based mode. The area is sought after for it's great fertility.



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Below are a few links we'll use to make the game seem more realistic, we'll base the weapons on existing weapons in the region as well as the plot that will have some ties to current affairs there.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batalh%C3%A3o_de_Opera%C3%A7%C3%B5es_Policiais_Especiais

M16 rifle
M4 carbine
H&K PSG1 sniper rifle
Benelli M3 shotgun
FN P90
IMBEL MD97
H&K MP5 A2 and K
H&K G3
H&K 21
Taurus PT92
IMBEL 9mm
Frag grenades
FN FAL
FN PARAFAL
M1 carbine
weapons used by BOPE

http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/2004/sep/29/table-top-accelerators-make-progress
might be cool to introduce this as a weapon feature

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phencyclidine
 Moderate doses (5–10 mg intranasal, or 0.01–0.02 mg/kg intramuscular or intravenous) will produce analgesia and anesthesia.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Gunrunner

Project Gunrunner is an operation of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) intended to stem the flow of firearms into Mexico, in an attempt to deprive the Mexican drug cartels of weapons.[1]
In early 2011, the operation became controversial when it was revealed that Operation Fast and Furious and previous probes under Project Gunrunner had allowed guns to "walk" into the hands of Mexican drug cartels since as early as 2006

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATF_gunwalking_scandal
Operation Fast and Furious, by far the largest "gunwalking" probe, monitored the sale of over 2,000 firearms, of which nearly 700 were recovered as of October 20, 2011.[15]A number of straw purchasers have been arrested and indicted; however, as of October 2011, none of the targeted high-level cartel figures have been arrested.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/world_now/2011/10/mexico-wide-receiver-reaction-guns-weapons-left-right.html
REPORTING FROM MEXICO CITY -- Mexican politicians and pundits reacted with anger to revelations this week that U.S. agents allowed guns to be smuggled into Mexico under a secret weapons-tracking program that preceded the current focus of controversy, called Operation Fast and Furious.
Commentators from across the political spectrum expressed criticism after The Times revealed this week that a Fast and Furious-style gun program under President George W. Bush allowed guns to "walk" across the border into Mexico during 2006 and 2007.


http://www.borderlandbeat.com/
http://www.blogdelnarco.com/
These two sites have a huge amount of posts concerning the drug violence and corruption in mexico and south america.

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2012/09/20/169179/mexicos-zetas-crime-gang-using.html
MEXICO CITY — Needing to replenish its ranks, Mexico’s brutal Los Zetas crime gang has refined the tactic of springing hundreds of its members in mass jailbreaks. But unlike the Hollywood version, the jailbreaks don’t involve overcoming guards, crawling through dingy tunnels and scattering once outside the fence. Instead, scores of dangerous inmates simply walk or drive out the gates in cahoots with wardens and prison guards.
The jailbreaks, including one this week in which 129 inmates fled a state prison near Piedras Negras, across from Eagle Pass, Texas, lay bare Mexico’s broken penitentiary system, where wardens either bend to organized crime or face death.


http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2012/08/21/163000/rumors-of-war-within-mexicos-los.html#storylink=misearch
MEXICO CITY — Mexico’s largest crime group, Los Zetas, appears to be splintering into two rival factions locked in occasional open warfare with each other, experts say.
The factions are tussling for control of the central states of Zacatecas and San Luis Potosi and are battling each other in parts of the Yucatan Peninsula.
What sparked the rift is unclear, but signs of the apparent split have come in public banners left at crime scenes, replete with accusations of betrayal and treason between factions led by the two top leaders, Heriberto Lazcano and Miguel Angel Trevino.


http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2012/09/27/169904/mexico-nabs-alleged-crime-lord.html
He commanded 400 gunmen and his turf included Zacatecas and Aguascalientes states as well as parts of Guanajuato and Coahuila states, the statement said. At one time, he controlled gang operations in Monterrey, a key industrial hub in northeastern Mexico, it added.
A bitter feud broke out a few months ago between Velazquez, who also is known as “Z-50,” and one of the two top leaders of Los Zetas, Miguel Trevino Morales. It led to a series of tit-for-tat murders in their respective ranks, including a dump of 14 bodies in San Luis Potosi on Aug. 9.


http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2012/09/17/168769/mexican-us-relations-improve-in.html
WASHINGTON — Despite ongoing violence south of the border, cooperation between Mexico and the United States has reached unprecedented levels.
Violence in Mexico has claimed more than 35,000 lives since President Felipe Calderon came into office in late 2006. Most of the fighting has been between drug gangs, but the violence has left Mexicans questioning Calderon’s war on drug trafficking.
Poire credited U.S. intelligence with helping Mexico capture the alleged kingpin of the Gulf Cartel, Jorge Eduardo Costilla Sanchez, known as “El Coss.” The State Department had a $5 million reward out for his arrest.

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2012/10/02/170364/central-america-drug-case-vexes.html
MEXICO CITY — It’s become known as the case of the “fake journalists.” And it’s a headache that just won’t go away for Televisa, the Mexican firm that’s the largest mass media company in the Spanish-speaking world.
Six weeks ago, border agents in Nicaragua detained a large crew moving in six news-gathering vans with the Televisa logo, finding more than $9 million in cash and traces of cocaine in the vans. Prosecutors later charged the 18 Mexicans with money laundering, drug trafficking and organized crime.


http://convan.newxip.info/r.php?nin_u=Oi8vd3d3LmFpcnBvd2VyLmF1LmFmLm1pbC9hcGppbnRlcm5hdGlvbmFsL2Fwai1zLzIwMDkvM3RyaTA5L2JyYW5kc2VuZy5odG0%3D&nin_b=1&nin_f=norefer
+
http://www.hellonearthblog.com/2011/02/who-hell-are-los-zetas.html
+

general info on Los Zetas

http://borderland-beat-forum.924382.n3.nabble.com/Zetas-Training-and-Tactics-td4029902.html
A selection of detailed responses to tactical questions about gand conduct and combat

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_San_Fernando_massacre  ctrl F
a man wearing....
please sir...
a driver of one...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heriberto_Lazcano_Lazcano  - Z3 - Z40's boss/co partner
Z40 is loyal to Z3 (Heriberto)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miguel_Trevi%C3%B1o_Morales - Z40

http://www.borderlandbeat.com/2012/09/when-taliban-called-z40-traitor-trevino.html
When banners purportedly signed by Velazquez recently appeared in various cities — accusing rival Miguel Trevino and his followers of being traitors — Trevino reportedly sent steam shovels and earth-moving equipment to smash one of Velasquez’s homes in the Zacatecas city of Fresnillo. The Committee to Protect Journalists took photos:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zhenli_Ye_Gon
Zhenli Ye Gon is a Chinese-Mexican businessman accused of trafficking pseudoephedrine or ephedrine precursor chemicals into Mexico from Asia. He is the legal representative of Unimed Pharm Chem México. From 2002-2004, Unimed had been legally authorized by the Mexican government to import thousands of metric tons of pseudoephedrine and ephedrine products into Mexico, as a part of its vast importation business. 

He is claimed to be a member of the Sinaloa Cartel, a charge that Mr. Ye Gon, who has no previous criminal record, has denied. He became a citizen of Mexico in 2002.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinaloa_Cartel

The Sinaloa Cartel is associated with the label "Golden Triangle", which refers to the states of Sinaloa, Durango, and Chihuahua. The region is a major producer of Mexican opium and marijuana. According to the U.S. Attorney General, the Sinaloa Cartel is responsible for importing into the United States and distributing nearly 200 tons ofcocaine and large amounts of heroin between 1990 and 2008.

http://www.militaryphotos.net/forums/showthread.php?156820-Weapons-seized-from-Drug-Cartels-by-Mexico-s-Military-amp-LE-%28updates%29/page51
photos of seized gear
http://www.militaryphotos.net/forums/showthread.php?156820-Weapons-seized-from-Drug-Cartels-by-Mexico-s-Military-amp-LE-%28updates%29/page42  gang shot in transit - warning graphic images

http://www.borderlandbeat.com/2012/07/chapo-isidro-history.html
gang affiliated with los Zetas, they produce much of the opium and marijuana

http://www.borderlandbeat.com/2011/09/35-zetas-executed-in-boca-del-rio.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NjRB7fuils
Article about Zeta gang being killed and left in the road, previously bound, gagged and tortured.
Video is of the people who claim to have done it.

http://www.borderlandbeat.com/2012/05/mexican-security-forces-seize-32-tons.html
Un-marked container obviously flagging up as suspicious, mexican authorities attempting to determine who has legal responsibility of the huge shipment.

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/blogs/crime-and-punishment/australian-illegal-drugs-among-worlds-most-expensive-20110616-1g5ie.html#ixzz28gqPZDxv


http://edition.cnn.com/2012/10/09/world/americas/mexico-zetas-cartel-boss/index.html
http://borderland-beat-forum.924382.n3.nabble.com/EL-LAZCA-KILLED-td4033402.html;cid=1349809804501-561
http://borderland-beat-forum.924382.n3.nabble.com/file/n4033444/a73.png last image of him alive
http://borderland-beat-forum.924382.n3.nabble.com/file/n4033541/28d143cb6d55a0ffd37eb9a0dabc4283_int470.jpg last image of him ever, he's dead in this
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-19880968 - has a great key for drug traffic and gang influence

http://www.borderlandbeat.com/2012/10/m-1-sinaloa-cartel-cell-leader-killed.html opposing gang leader (sinaloa gang) died, el M1

Aaron's post

M16 modified
-exhaust capture chamber for more reliable shell expulsion, battery pack for the chamber and ergonomic chin/cheek rest

M4 modified
- similar exhaust mechanism with visibly obvious connection to battery pack, and hand guard attached to the fore-grip, same chin/cheek rest

Getting to grips with this handy brush set from Anthony Jones http://schoolism.com/interview.php?id=78
Andes inspired piece

http://www.militaryphotos.net/forums/showthread.php?152629-Mexico-deploys-an-additional-5-000-troops-to-Juarez-to-fight-drug-cartels