Hi everyone!

We're 5 students from Howest, Digital Arts and Entertainment. In our team we have 2 developers(Bryn Couvreur & Mauro van Houtte) and three technical artists (Cedric Declerck, Dries Martens & Vera Grosskop). 

This week we came up with a finalized story and setting for our game. We also answered the research questions below:

1. How can we, as technical artist create a beautiful atmospheric game? What ways are there to make technical art, RFX and shaders pull the weight of handpainted/sculpted designs?
   1. We opted to create abstract shapes, without making it look very low poly. We will also use gradient textures and noise maps for shading assets, characters and environment. All of these are combined in an Art Bible of which we'll hopefully soon share some gifs. :)
2.  How should the platform be structured?
   1. We've experimented with having one big platform and several smaller platforms that are clumped together. Several smaller platforms were found to work better with the way we decided to have damage done to the platform. Having several smaller platforms felt better to play with because the player can then focus only on the parts of the platform that currently require attention.
3. How should the platform be attacked? What happens when the player fails to defend it?
   1. We toyed around with the idea of having one big platform where you have to manage the weight that sits on it, and distribute that weight evenly, so the platform doesn't tilt over. This was difficult to manage, but we did keep part of this idea. When something sits on/hits a platform it will slowly sink straight down into the water below unless the weight is taken off it.
4. Should the player have a ranged grab? Will the throwing have a lock-on?
   1. This is something we were planning to research but unfortunately weren't able to, due to time constraints and source control issues. We will make sure this mechanic gets properly fleshed out in future versions.

For next week we plan to have a placeholder environment, with a character some lillies and a simplified water shader.  This way we can make progress on our prototypes read better!

Stick around next week for some cool art and prototype updates!