Phase 2: Work in Progress

I'm behind with the blog at the moment, with delays caused by paid employment and illness.  There are a number of posts I have half-written, and I'll post them (backdated) in coming days.

Partial, rough level

The video below shows a partial level that I made last week.  I'm still finishing it off, but you can see the basic idea of how it works.

The important thing to note is that what you see here is not an animation, and events are not timed in any way.  It shows the game engine responding properly to events and triggers, and collisions between objects.

At the moment I'm focusing on the player controlling the game by clicking on certain objects and adjusting a setting for them, which will alter whether the contraption works or not.

• Fan.  When the level starts, this switches on and takes a few seconds to get up to full speed, whereupon it blows the Eggle off the platform.
• Under the record sleeve is a balloon.  This can be inflated or deflated to adjust the angle of the sleeve, changing the slope.
• An Eggle falls onto the turntable and is forcibly ejected at an angle, depending on the turntable's speed setting.  (Eventually, this will be an imitation Fisher Price record player but I haven't built a 3D model of that yet.) 
• The ejected Eggle knocks a hammer over, which falls onto the control panel of the Space Truk.  The player will need to program the truck to follow a specific route to hit the next trigger.

The basic idea is working well, and the problems with physics are starting to get ironed out.  I'm still having a nightmare with friction, but you can read more about that when I've published my missing posts.

3D Printing & Nostalgia

Back in October 2012 I posted about 3D printing, looking at potential applications within video gaming.

After doing a test 3D printing project myself, I got to see the impressive Rapid Prototyping facilities in UCLan's Art & Design department workshops, including examples of CNC foam-cutting, traditional stereolithography and cutting-edge granular colour printing.  Very impressive.

Since then I've kept a casual interest in the subject.  Today, while doing research for my game project, I came across a novel use of this technology...

Led Zeppelin on the Fisher Price record player

Back in the 1970s, Fisher Price produced a toy record player which used plastic discs to play nursery rhymes.  The discs had small notches which triggered note chimes as they passed across a collection of levers housed in the needle arm.  Essentially, it was a music box with interchangeable tunes.

British engineer Murphy had been experimenting with re-creating these discs using a CNC milling machine (computer-driven cutting tool).

A video of Fred's disc for Stairway to Heaven.
(If you're wondering why it sounds funny, it's because the record player does G# scale only)

He has updated the process to create software for making discs quickly and easily using a method based on 3D extrusion printing.

This is certainly a very creative application of 3D printing, and demonstrates a way to breathe new life into nostalgic items.  Fred Murphy, I salute you!