8-21-12
What is a Capstone?
Over the years I have heard a few things about what a capstone should be. Our final project, or portfolio piece that encompass our best skills utilized to create the piece that defines our work. An animation or a game or a comic or a whatever. Shows off our skills that make us marketable. But I remember spending a lot of time figuring out what it is that I want to do, and if it will make me money or lead me to what will make me happy and successful.
I have always had a vision that I have had trouble expressing. Even
with my art and programming skills, I always found myself hitting the
wall. Coming up with a story. It was nice to see that I was in a room
full of people that had that problem too. It took me a bit of time to see what I wanted to do. Even back as a Heron undergrad struggling with being able to use our artistic voice and coming up with something that was marketable. I think I've always wayed that in some equation in my work.
For me personally, I think I have always had this problem. When I was little, I had a pencil and a transformers coloring book or a game controller and an issue if Nintendo Power in my hand. My passions were games (electronic) and art. It took me a lot of time drawing, programming, drawing and playing games and reading fantasy adventure stories, and playing old school DOS muds (before every home and school had computers) and searching myself and finding what I wnated to eventually do with these skills and hobbies. I studied art by itself. I also studied programming, and both disciplines would always come back to haunt me or combine themselves to create something amazing. And interactive art piece... a game always seemed to be the solution. It only took me 20 years to figure out what I wanted to do. I want my capstone to be the epitome of that.
Today, I enjoyed hearing what Beth and the others had to say, about our voice and how our Capstone could be the final chance to do the project that we wanted to do.It reminded me of my own struggles figuring out what i wanted to do. It got my gears grinding ...
This weekend I began going through some of my old sketchbooks (Not so much for this class, but mostly because i needed to clean the hell out of my apartment and unused art space) I realized that I actually have been so busy with work and programming that I have nearly forgotten about much of my art and ideas that I had sketched out many semester ago. ... I was inspired me to start working on some of the characters that I started waaaay back in Mat's comic class and before. But now I am trying to create a capstone that reflects my search for my art/and voice in programming ... No; interactive storyteller identity! And once again, a video game seems to be the best platform for me to do that and showcase my talents.
I think that they're a number of things that will keep me interested in working on this capstone for the next two semesters. Simply, fighting gmaes have been one of my favorite genres, but on the outside looking in they are shallow (story line) and broing button mashers (my fiance's opinion)
My goals are to change that by attempting to add new techniques to the core game play, (ways to break out of infinite long combos, and a simplified counter system so that any one can jump in and suddenly join a kung fu battle of reversals and counters and the final strike! And I want to give my characters a decent story. I now what I want, but I have been having trouble fleshing out the core concept. I have characters, but I have been struggling to make them into a cohesive story. i do want legitimate fighters, not just you killed my father, prepare to die! I want 'pure' fighters, but at the same time, they need a story that makes them ... not boring :) I have a few more things to add but am already past my word limit. More on this my next blog,
See ya next time
