This game is amazing on many levels, but the most beautiful part of it was the environment itself. While playing the game, I was so amazed with the world created by the developers, that I sometimes forget about main objectives. That’s my main reason why I’ve decided to focus my research on this game, as I really love the work they’ve put into it to create this vast and divers world.

I was surprised to see that many plants were made from an actual geometry rather just simple plain shapes. The base of each leaf has its own tube-like base to go with. Most of the games use low polygon alpha planes for the plants like these. In Horizon Zero Dawn even the smaller plants on the ground had their own geometry.

Another interesting point was, that most of the trees had some plants growing on their sides. This gave a nice effect of a fully-grown jungle and add to the realism. I’ve also noticed that most of the materials have been using an effect called a ‘subsurface colour’, which affected in a more realistic shading effect.

On the other hand, the trees and plants weren’t that carefully placed, so many leaves were overlapping with others. This slightly destroyed the effect of the realistic environment, but it’s only a small downside to the entire amazing effect.

The game run in a day and night circle as well as has multiple weather conditions, so the materials responds to those with appropriate effect. During the rain the leaves were appropriately shiny to give an effect of wetness. This gave me a better understanding on how I wan my own leaves to looks like if I decide to have a rainy weather.

The game have also multiple interior environments (which I don’t have screenshots of), which could have also influence my own design. However, most of the interiors was so destroyed by the nature, that it probably wouldn’t perfectly suit my own idea (my lab will only be abandoned for few days). This is why I haven’t focused on that area of the game for my research.

REFERENCE LIST:

Horizon Zero Dawn, (2017), Sony Playstation 4 [Game]. Sony Interactive Entertainment.

It was a very productive day. I’ve picked the images that I took in a park nearby and decided to analyse them for the shapes, colours and other aspects. I believe this would help me to create foliage in my own level.

The research provided some general understanding of how trees and bushes are made (the flow of the branches), and what shapes of leaves I can possibly get in my own level. Although those plants grow in the current times, the prehistoric nature doesn’t have to be as much different. Remember, the world that I want to create isn’t strictly prehistoric, so the nature could have evolved and become more recognisable as current one.

I’m planning to use the colour samples to enhance those in my own level and shapes of leaves helped me to better understand the differences between spices of bushes and trees. Now I should be able to combine that knowledge and use it in my own design to produce realistic foliage.

I was watching this movie with a friend, when it came to my head that it can be a part of my research as well. As majority of my level would take place in a rainforest, the movie seams to be a good choice for the research. At the end it helped me to generate a more playful ideas for my own level.

The main storyline is about a quest, where the main character must travel from one point to another through the dangerous woodland, and at the same time communicate with his father through a futuristic device. They show emotions, make hard decisions and help each other throughout the movie. This will give me some ideas while working on my script for the walkie-talkie conversations in my own game.

The path taken by the character require many skills. This hard and trouble making rout gave me some ideas on how to improve my own level by adding some obstacles to my level (huge fallen tree that the player can walk on it). This will increase the general playability and make my level more interesting, as I haven’t considered any platforms or higher levels before.

The movie had many interesting camera angles, where all plants in the area were perfectly captured on the screen. I don’t know much about the camera work, so this may improve my final presentation of the game.

REFERENCE LIST:

After Earth, (2013), [DVD]. Directed by M. Night Shyamalan, United States, Columbia Pictures, [Viewed: 16 April 2019].

Tonight I watched half of the series about the Dinosaurs on Netflix. It was called ‘Walking with Dinosaurs’ and is a BBC series recorded while ago. Although it won’t be my main source of visual reference, I found some interesting and important facts about the dinosaurs, which gave me several ideas for my level.

1. The living dinosaurs leave lots of signs of their existence. This can become an interesting sign for the player that there are living creatures around. Broken or eaten plants, lay eggs, make dens and do many other things. Some of these may become part of my level.
2. I have gained additional information about many species of dinosaurs. It included information such us the area where they lived, what they eat, how they reacted to each other and so on. This would improve my knowledge about those creatures and help me build a believable level as well, as some of these (type of food for example) would have a huge impact on the actual environment.

At this point, I have also make a list of potential games and movies that I would like to research for this project:

• Horizon Zero Dawn [game]
• Jurassic Park series [movies]
• Avatar [movie & game]
• Jurassic Park: the game [game]
• Jumanji [movie]
• Far Cry Primal [game]
• The Lost World [TV series]
• Ace Age series (stylized) [movies]
• Good Dinosaur (stylized) [movie]
• Evolve [game]

This will probably be updated during the project as some of these may came to my head later on.

REFERENCE LIST:

BBC Walking with Dinosaurs, (2012), [Online]. Directed by Tim Haines & Jasper James, United Kingdom, BBC, [Viewed 10 April 2019]. Available from Netflix.

As I’ve mentioned before, one of my main inspirations is also an Avatar movie. Although it takes place on a completely different planet, I wanted to have a look at their plant creation as I remember it being really creative and interesting. My second main research would be the advanced technology they’ve implemented into the movie. This may have a huge impact on what would be placed into my own level.

The research was good enough for me to orientate within the possibilities of the futuristic technology, but I still feel like I’m missing the main point. I want my own lab facility to be slightly more advanced, have much more interesting hardware and other items around. I want to amaze the player with the technology but at the same time make it looks realistic and possible to use.

I’ve also found out, that most of the lab scenes had a small blue tint. This gave the place more unnatural – computer-like lighting. It was also slightly darker than other areas probably to make the on screen images more visible on the screens and holograms. This would definitely be applied to my own design.

The world of Avatar is a pure beauty, so I could take screenshots every few seconds. However, the actual plants are slightly too much fantasy-like for my own production. I still want to be able to fill my world with amazing plants. I would really like to impress the player with its beauty, but at the same time, give the impression of reality and unexpected danger.

I also have to admit, that I love the creature design in this movie My own dinosaurs (the few that I’ll have in the level) may be very colourful as well, but at the same time, nicely blend with the surroundings with the patterns on their bodies. I don’t want them to be too visible from the distance, but on the other hand, I want them to be quite easy to find. This may be a little tricky, but if the colourful patterns won’t blend enough, I may add several colourful plants around the area to camouflage them better.

REFERENCE LIST:

Avatar, (2009). [Blu-Ray]. Directed by James Cameron, United States & United Kingdom, 20th Century Fox, [Viewed: 12 April 2019].

Here it is! It is time for the location for my project to be revealed (let’s say it’s a huge reveal). First I wasn’t sure what my location should looks like, although I had several general ideas in my head. In the meantime I came across a beautiful place called Dinosaur National Monument!

The Dinosaur National Monument is located on the border between Colorado and Utah, US. There are two main rivers (Green and Yampa) on its territory and the mountain range called Uinta Mountains. The park grown since it was first declared a National Monument (1915) and now its territory includes over 200 acres and contains over 800 palaeontological sites. It is a place, where many dinosaur fossils and bones were found. This would be a perfect place to resurrect dinosaurs and bring them back to live!

I have also already picked a perfect exact location. This is at the very heart of the part and has e beautiful view on the rivers and a huge rock formation in the centre of it. This would become a base for my own design, but as far as I really want to have a vast jungle, this will require a manor redesigning.

This is a really intriguing terrain and would looks really good as a base for my level. Although it would be hard to accomplish, as all of those textures would be hard to make. Let’s see how it would work, but so far I’m in a high hopes.

REFERENCE LIST:

Google Earth, (2019), Dinosaur National Monument 40°31’13.8″N 108°59’30.6″W, elevation 200M,  3D map, [Viewed: 12 April 2019]

Would it be surprising if I’ll say that my main inspiration were the Jurassic Park movies? Probably not. So they were my main inspiration altogether with the Avatar. All of the Jurassic Park movies had a huge impact on my decision to change my main idea to this new one.

I could have picked any of the Jurassic Park movies, but I’ve decided to re-watch the 3rd one. I remember, that there was an abandon lab, where the main characters hid from a dinosaurs for a while. This would be a great starting point for my lab facility research.

Although I could have put many other images from the movie in here, I’ve picked those, which influenced me the most. This is the interior of the facility, which gave me several new ideas:

• I really like the idea of having cages for he dinosaurs inside the building. This shows that the workers were using them as part of their experiments and needed them really close. This could work out great in my own level design.
• Although both the movie itself and the technology shown in the lab were quite old, it still gave me several ideas of what may be needed inside the facility. I’ve managed to make a short list of areas that could possibly be inside this type of place. As the scientists would work AND LIVE in the building, it require several different type of rooms for them to function properly. This list will be very useful when it comes to designing the map for the interior of the lab.
• The forest had many interesting plants, but the more importantly, I’ve learned that in many places, the path was also completely covered with the smaller plants and leafage. This will definitely be applied to some areas in my own level.

Although this movie is pretty old (2001), it was a research worth spending my time on. I’ve learned quite a lot and it definitely will have an impact on my own production. I’ve came up with few ideas of how to improve my level, which would effect it in a really good way (I hope so). This was a good time and important research.

REFERENCE LIST:

Jurassic Park III, (2001), [DVD]. Directed by Joe Johnston, United States, Universal Pictures, [Viewed: 11 April 2019].