Idea Generation for Computer Games - Pre Production and Cultural Context

Through this unit, I have been tasked with implementing a fully functional character into Unreal Engine, utilising a multitude of processes and functions within the blueprinting system to bring the character to life.

Much like work I have done previously with regards animation, I had to take into account the animations I would be needing, for this purpose, I referred back to an earlier mindmap I had created, this would serve to give me ideas for animations I could implement into the flow of my work alongside any animations which are to be mandatory to this unit.

The mindmap can be seen below;

For the purpose of this unit, I have carried my character over from my previous work and have also been provided access to multiple packs of animations from Mixamo. From these packs I took a Sword and Shield animation pack, and a Greatsword animation pack. These were downloaded and imported into Unreal Engine along with my character, ready for the implementation process to fully begin.

Along with the animations, I was also tasked with making a few quick meshes to act as a primary & secondary weapon and a shield. for this purpose, to fit with my character, I created a baseball bat, a sledgehammer and a riot shield. These will all fit well with the animations to be used in terms of proportions and locations to which the weapons will be socketed within the character.

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Cultural Context is an important part of every stage of games development, and as such must be considered right from the get go when mind mapping and brainstorming, putting together mood boards also.

Within cultural context research and responsibilities, developers must all take care that they are not planning to create content which may be offensive to a group of people, be it of any size, this means any topics which may be considered sensitive to any race, religion, gender or other are generally best avoided if it is showing them in a negative light unnecessarily.

For example, a videogame clearly depicting acts of terrorism could use a character of any race or religion, preferably based in a country in which terror attacks have not recently happened, as this is not only sensitive to the race and/or religious citizens, but also if depicted in a specific location, could upset a whole city or even country or people.

For this reason, I have considered obligations to make the setting fictional, a random post apocalytic setting, inspired by multiple sources including the TV show 'Defiance' and the film franchise 'Mad Max'. Keeping the setting fictional means anything can happen within the region to an extent without affecting people negatively.
I have decided my boss will be an alien or mutant of sorts, as this is still a humanoid type of violence which I will be implementing, but as the enemy will not be human, the rating for a proposed end game would not necessarily need to be as high, as long as the violence was not extreme.

I have however, decided to design my level with a higher class and lower class area incorporated into the design, bearing this in mind, I would intend further down the production pipeline, to implement characters of all different races, aliens and/or mutants alongside humans, with no direct correlation to whether any specific races would be lower or higher class.