Milestone Complete: The Next Chapter Begins.
In 2011 a small group of people gathered in a classroom at Texas Woman's University to discuss the logistics of creating a AAA shooter video game as an independent project. The creator of the game told those in attendance that the project would take ten years if he had to do it alone. As we begin 2016, less than five years after this insane dream began, this game is over 60% complete: with a vast majority of the work being assembled and created by one man who is learning everything from the ground up.
Formerly this blog was dedicated as a place where tutorials and information on subjects regarding game design were stored for later reference by the project creator, James "Cheshire" Clayton... Your humble author. Everything that has been learned has been recorded here from the learning resource it was taken from so other project members and students could use it. As the journal moves forward from here, what I hope to do is make it a deeper resource for lessons learned, roadblocks and challenges, and a more personal collection of notes.
I don't know if anyone will find it useful, but if you're reading it than all I can say is thanks, and I hope you'll learn something useful.
_________
The Status Quo Project has been dedicated to creating a video game that encompasses many genres of gameplay. At its core Status Quo will be a first person shooter with character progression built around a roleplaying system of classes and skills. These classes and skills, along with armor and weapons, will add "MODs" to each character, creating an endless array of game customizations per character. MODs allow the character to use abilities, vehicles, and unique interactions with buildings and terminals like hacking and sabotaging. MODs will also allow the framework of the game to expand, allowing for the introduction of other game genres, such as top down RTS (real-time strategy) views when commanding non-player characters to follow and attack as a part of the action. MODs open up the game types even further, creating avenues for many other types of game elements; making Status Quo a unique project working to combine elements of every other genre of video game (including text adventures and turn based card games).
As crazy and too big as it may sound this project is well underway.
In the last 4 years the Status Quo Project has assembled thousands of "physical" assets (characters, environments, weapons, vehicles, etc). I've worked tirelessly to assemble levels, design characters, and write the overall story and play structure. There have been around two dozen contributors who have written stories or scenarios, modeled gear, or written accompanying systems that will be a part of the game, and their work has been invaluable, but more help is always needed. Everything takes twenty times longer (if it even shows up at all) when it's volunteer work. Sometimes I'm amazed I've gotten this far... I'm equally amazed I haven't given up yet.
In the next few years all this work will start to manifest in the more technical sense. Character models, weapons, and vehicles will get rigged and animated, and hard coding will be done for gameplay. This journal will include notes, more tutorials, and progress on the SQProject. As we close the chapter of modeling and resource gathering, we open a new phase of the project and venture into the technical side of video game design.
Frankly, I'm scared as hell, but I've come this far, so I can't quit now. Even if I'm only doing it for myself, I've learned so much. Imagine what I'll know next year.
Thanks for reading, I'll try to keep it interesting. Please check out my work on any of the other social media outlets below, and follow me here for more updates.
www.miffedkittypress.com
Facebook: SQProject
Twitter: @Cheshire3D
Blogger: miffedkitty.blogspot.com
Portfolio: miffedkitty.artstation.com
Formerly this blog was dedicated as a place where tutorials and information on subjects regarding game design were stored for later reference by the project creator, James "Cheshire" Clayton... Your humble author. Everything that has been learned has been recorded here from the learning resource it was taken from so other project members and students could use it. As the journal moves forward from here, what I hope to do is make it a deeper resource for lessons learned, roadblocks and challenges, and a more personal collection of notes.
I don't know if anyone will find it useful, but if you're reading it than all I can say is thanks, and I hope you'll learn something useful.
_________
The Status Quo Project has been dedicated to creating a video game that encompasses many genres of gameplay. At its core Status Quo will be a first person shooter with character progression built around a roleplaying system of classes and skills. These classes and skills, along with armor and weapons, will add "MODs" to each character, creating an endless array of game customizations per character. MODs allow the character to use abilities, vehicles, and unique interactions with buildings and terminals like hacking and sabotaging. MODs will also allow the framework of the game to expand, allowing for the introduction of other game genres, such as top down RTS (real-time strategy) views when commanding non-player characters to follow and attack as a part of the action. MODs open up the game types even further, creating avenues for many other types of game elements; making Status Quo a unique project working to combine elements of every other genre of video game (including text adventures and turn based card games).
As crazy and too big as it may sound this project is well underway.
In the last 4 years the Status Quo Project has assembled thousands of "physical" assets (characters, environments, weapons, vehicles, etc). I've worked tirelessly to assemble levels, design characters, and write the overall story and play structure. There have been around two dozen contributors who have written stories or scenarios, modeled gear, or written accompanying systems that will be a part of the game, and their work has been invaluable, but more help is always needed. Everything takes twenty times longer (if it even shows up at all) when it's volunteer work. Sometimes I'm amazed I've gotten this far... I'm equally amazed I haven't given up yet.
In the next few years all this work will start to manifest in the more technical sense. Character models, weapons, and vehicles will get rigged and animated, and hard coding will be done for gameplay. This journal will include notes, more tutorials, and progress on the SQProject. As we close the chapter of modeling and resource gathering, we open a new phase of the project and venture into the technical side of video game design. 
Frankly, I'm scared as hell, but I've come this far, so I can't quit now. Even if I'm only doing it for myself, I've learned so much. Imagine what I'll know next year.
Thanks for reading, I'll try to keep it interesting. Please check out my work on any of the other social media outlets below, and follow me here for more updates.
www.miffedkittypress.com
Facebook: SQProject
Twitter: @Cheshire3D
Blogger: miffedkitty.blogspot.com
Portfolio: miffedkitty.artstation.com
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