Video of Finished Tower and Explanation

I just finished putting the final touches on the 3D tower model in Blender. I decided to document some of my backend work on the model with FRAPS and show of the tower with an turnaround render. This is what I got after merging the two videos in Camtasia:

From here on out, I need to figure out how to import this model into Unity 3D. From what I've looked at so far, I need to bake the textures onto the model, and then put the .blend file into the correct Unity project directory. Apparently, Unity reads .blend files natively, but I'm sure that I will uncover some interesting problems as I import the model. 

Windows and Clock Finished

Just finished remodeling the tower, which entailed adding recessed windows for the upper tower structure, a recessed clock face, a recessed door-like entrance on the side of the tower, and a hoist. Here's the most recent render (w/o a bump map or much thought given to the lighting):

I suppose if I had more time, I would really make the upper tower structure look nice. Once I become more proficient in Blender, I'll move on to explore some of its more powerful features. For the time being, however, I gotta get these models cranked out and imported into Unity, so some of it's gonna be fast and a bit dirty. Maybe someday I'll take a 3D art class myself, or get some digital art students on-board who can really get some work done.

Tower Hoist Addded

While getting the tower model ready for importing into Unity, it occurred to me that I should perhaps also add some type of hoist mechanism above the elevated window/door. After all, the denizens of the medieval town needed someway to get their mead up into the tower, right? Here's a quick render (w/o bumpmaps or much thought given to lighting) on what I developed this morning:

Although the particular image I have been using of the Obertor tower in Bad Camberg does not show a hoist, I have seen this mechanism on other medieval structures in Germany and thought that it would perhaps look good on the model. A bit of artistic freedom, perhaps. I also thought that it would break up the flat surface of the model a bit, giving players something to look up to while they are exploring the game. All in all, it was an addition with a fairly low vertex count, the iron ring having a total of 32 vertices. Still don't know how the Unity game engine will handle such things, but I'm hoping that the addition of such minor details - although hopefully not a CPU or GPU hog - will give the game world an added sense of depth.

Summer Workflow and Theory at 30,000 Feet

It has been a while since I sat down and updated my research blog. With the birth of our new son, the dramatic and total failure of my computer's video card, and my attendance at the recent Humanities Gaming Institute I have been extremely busy and distracted. Now that things are settling into a routine at home, my computer has (once again) been returned, and the institute is over, I can get down into a productive summer work flow. This is how I'll most likely divvy up my time:

Monday through Thursday:

Mornings: Work in the office, develop 3D game resources, watch Blender videos, play with Unity game engine.
Afternoons: Help out at home with children.
Evenings: Help out with children, read up on secondary literature (gaming, second language acquisition)

Friday:

Mornings: Work in the office on book project and blog.
The rest of the day same as M-Th.

Weekends:

Do whatever I can, whenever I can.

Before the summer is out, I'd like to polish my workflow by developing some models in Blender, baking UV textures onto the models, and then importing these into Unity. Once I've done this, I should have a fairly good idea of how Unity will handle the files and whether they are low-poly enough. I'm sure other bugs will emerge during the process, which will hopefully help me figure out where potential bumps are and how to smooth them out. I'm specifically focusing on two models to import into Unity, the tower and building I have already developed (see posts below). There are a few things I would like to adjust on the tower before I import it into Unity, namely the windows and clock. In past models, I simply “slapped” these features onto the main mesh, which seemed passable enough but did not give the tower a sense of reality. Windows generally are recessed a bit, a feature I'd like to add to the model:

Now for my feedback on the Humanities Gaming Institute. I've been torn for a while on what I should say about it. Although I did not stay for the entire time (family responsibilities called me home early), I'm not sure that my staying the full three weeks really would have provided me with new insights on how games could be used in a humanities context. In fact, much of the discussion at the institute seemed to be highly theoretical – at 30,00 feet, if you will – and did not address the “how” and “why” that are fundamental before games can be successfully applied in humanities contexts. There was a lot of talk of Foucault, Flusser, and Huizinga, and not enough talk (in my opinion) on learning objectives, the nature of knowledge in games, game affordances, assessment, and debriefing strategies. My question was simple: “Why should I choose to use a game to teach Topic X instead of another approach and what is the best way to use the game?” and I'm afraid that I did not get a solid answer. This was a huge oversight, in my opinion. Perhaps this is just my training as an instructional designer coming out, but I think that video games must be carefully thought-out before they are used as instructional tools.

The Dell from Hell

Now that the semester is finally over, I thought that I would be able to get some quality development time in. My Dell XPS M1730, however, had other ideas. I've been having nothing but problems with it for the last, oh, four or five months. For a while, the Battlefield 2142 would come up with visual glitches, showing weird model textures:

And sometimes even getting the in-game text all jacked-up:

Most irritating! Especially since I was trying to gather gameplay images for my book project. And since I also wanted to sink my teeth into Blender and get more modeling done. So, after countless software re-installs, driver wipes and updates, memory stress tests, and graphics card stress tests, I finally turned the XPS over to campus tech support, who installed a new motherboard and, just yesterday, a new graphics card. 

The XPS worked well for about one day, whereupon it promptly crashed hard to a black screen and now stubbornly refuses even to boot. I'm now on a Dell Latitude D630 loaner and am watching Essential Blender Training videos to keep in the flow. Hopefully the XPS will be back soon in good working order (which I doubt), so that I can get back to game development and, most important, so that I can pose as a hard-core gamer at the upcoming Humanities Gaming Institute. 

Would I ever get (or request) a Dell product again? Given my experiences with the XPS, probably not. Maybe a comparable Apple product would be nicer.

FRAPS Test and Musings on Second Language Acquisition

Finally got the full license for FRAPS yesterday and I decided to take it for a spin around the Battlefield 2142 neighborhood to see what it would do. All in all, I'm very impressed with the software and consider it $37 well spent. It will be especially useful when I begin to document gameplay for my book project and describe the development work I am doing in Blender. While making the video, I also started to reflect on 3D digital game-based learning for second language acquisition:

To summarize what I say in the video: I think that the sense of presence these 3D games provide can be a powerful platform on which to design second language instruction. Specifically, the simulated social contexts found in these game environments - when coupled with well-designed second language instruction - could potentially create learning situations that combine embodied action with spatially-situated knowledge. Or, in other words, the student will know what to do and when to do it.

I think that this type of research is really sorely needed at the moment as the humanities continue to flounder. As essays in The New York Times recently pointed out, the outlook for the humanities is particularly bleak and the recession has hit graduate students especially hard. Not that digital game-based learning is the panacea for all these problems, but perhaps it is a new direction (like the neurological approach to English literature) that will help us to re-conceptualize what we do and lead us to see it in a new light.

Test Render for Foreign Language Annals

This past week I have been polishing my 3D digital game-based learning article for The Foreign Language Annals, getting ready to get the final submission out the door. Now that the text has been corrected and improved, I thought that I would look at the images that I would include in the essay. I have done a lot more 3D development since the time I originally submitted the essay and I want to put my best foot forward. Throwing all the models together that I have created so far, I came up with this:

Nothing really fancy with lighting or texturing, just something to give the readers of the essay an idea of what is currently possible in a 3D gaming environment. I just wish that some of this technology had been around when I was learning Russian. It would have made mastering the whole perfective and imperfective verbal aspects so much more fun.