Dev Journal 1.1

MetaWars is entering EVO 1, and we hope to welcome our MetaWarriors aboard the battlefield with a brief update on our development process.

MetaWars hatched in 2021 and our community has grown to over 180K. Throughout this journey, our goal is to build a trailblazing and stunning experience with you.

During the growth and development phase of our ecosystem, despite the challenges around us, there have been a lot of initiatives and progress made.

 

Key Points:

  • Game Development is focused on expanding our backend communication architecture and Mech movement and controller states

  • Overall Improvement on Mech Movement and Player Control

  • Limited Edition NFT renderings are compete and waiting for marketing deployment

Behind the scenes, our team worked hard and made developmental progress on the game engine. We would like to share some highlights of the current production and our upcoming plans.

 

Game Engine Development

A lot of effort has been put into developing the foundation of MetaWars’ gameplay and making sure it meets the highest standards and user experience possible. In addition to Player Movement and Controller Improvements, we’ve also built a new Weapon Handle System that will allow players to move more freely and precisely control their weapons. Mech Movement States and Fine Tuning Movement Pace and Control will be the focus of future improvements.

Player Movement and Controller Improvements // Building
Weapon Control System // Done
Fine Tuning Movement Pace and Control scheme // Upcoming
More Mech Movement States (Recoil, landing, takeoff motion design) // Upcoming

 

Dash, Jump, Recoil, Landing, Takeoff motion design & animation

 

Rendering

Visuals always take us long time to build and that’s the key element for the game. We are currently developing a comprehensive and sustainable rendering strategy . Now that the rendering of in-game environments and shader development has been enhanced, Mech Customization and visual effects creation can begin. We believe that our community’s future gameplay experience will improve immensely with our anticipated Post Processing Effect adjustments and optimizations, as well as our asset management advancements.

Upgrade Scene Visual and Lighting for in-game environment // Building

Mech Texture and UV // Building

3D model integration and compatibility test // Bug Fixing

Shader Development for Mech Customization and VFX // Building

VFX rendering compatibility test

Limited Edition Planet NFT rendering // Fine Tuning

LE Planet customization and Rendering

Adjust and Optimize Post Processing Effect // Upcoming

Asset management improvement // Upcoming

Shading and Rendering design

 

Mech Movement Animation

MetaWars has undergone a significant animation makeover in the last month. Mech rigging are specifically time consuming, instead of using the standard human rig. Each Mech design have their own customised bone to present all sort of gameplay movements. Mech movement animations will be further refined, and IK and animation transitions will be updated in the near future.

Animation Improvements for Mech ground Movement // Building

Adjust IK and animation transitions // Upcoming

Ground movement animation design

 

Game Features

Our feature development team is laser-focused on completing the project on time and on budget. Our ecosystem has just been enhanced by adding customisable color and texture patterns. Keep a watch out for our latest updates, which will feature attachments that may be added to various parts of the body, to demonstrate our commitment to appreciating your tireless efforts.

Customization Features: configurable color, texture pattern and system // Prototyping

Designing attachable accessories on different types of Mech’s body parts// Prototyping

 

Game Art

For this world to feel completely coherent and expansive, it requires an all-encompassing art and style. We are pleased to announce that we have conducted an extensive study on our community and the “market” and have begun to plan for the arts and world style. In the near future, mech designs will be made available.

Initial batch of Mechs model design and 3D modelling // Done

Character design concept

Mech Design and World Concept Art Style calibration // Building

3D mech model rendering

Future Mechs concepting and prototype // Upcoming

We are in the process of forming partnerships with other guilds. More information about this will be shared soon! Subscribe to our various social media feeds so you don’t miss any news about the project’s progress.

 

(updated on 2022-10-19)

MetaWars is rapidly progressing into our designated release schedule. Over the past few weeks, MetaWars has been demonstrating the mech movement animation and rendering design to our community. The team has been focusing on further optimizing the mech motion and VFX, user experience design improvement and game demo prototype building.

We are ecstatic to update our development progress, which covers:

Key Points

  • We’ve run through a few prototyping and testing of the tutorial-level design by trying multiple routes and map designs to introduce the game demo control and gaming style.
  • The initial enemy is integrated, the first initial obstacle is a small target that challenges your skills on aiming!
  • Internal testing and device UAT are continuously ongoing to optimize the performance

Enhancing Motion and Movement Design

In the MetaWars game, mech is the core character. While playing a TPS game, smooth motion control is one of the crucial elements to making a great gaming experience. The development team has put more effort into the motion graphic. Control smoothness and movement animation to create seamless mobility to the character.

Player Movement and Control Improvements // Done

Mech Movement and Motion Control Optimization

 

Fine-Tuning Movement Pace and Control scheme // Done
More Mech Movement States (Recoil, Landing, Dashing and Shooting) // Done

Mech Movement Prototype Showcase
( Walk, Run, Dash, Recoil, Land, Shoot)

 

Rendering and Visual Effects

Since the rendering of the environment and gameplay effect has been enhanced, we are now progressively developing the 3D model and in-game environment. Visual really takes us a long time to build, but we never doubt all the hard work and time we contributed to building the immersive in-game visual effects. The outcome is unexpectedly incredible, we believe this can accomplish our primary goal which is to provide gamers with a more engaging gaming experience and enhance the player’s immersion in the world, through 3D model design, shader, colour, and continuous communication.

Visual Effect Maximum Performance Stress Test
 
Upgrade Scene Visual and Lighting for in-game environment // Done
Before: Environment Building and Visual UpgradeBefore: Environment Building and Visual Upgrade
After: Environment Building and Visual Upgrade

Mech Texture and Scaling // Done

Mech Building and Scaling

Enemy Building and Compatible Testing// Prototyping

Obstacles Design and VFX Integration

Shader Development for Mech Customization and VFX // Building

 

Fully Functional and User-friendly UX/UI Design

We hope you enjoy our mecha model production showcase in our last update, but needless to say, we have been working hard on the functionality of mecha control and the overall user experience(UX). Currently, the team is focusing on the UX of the game, from entering to exiting the game we prioritize the user journey of gamers. Meanwhile, the user interface(UI) prototype is designed to meet the needs and art style of MetaWars.

Game UI Design and Interactive Integration

Game UI design and integration (e.g. HUD) // Prototyping
UX design and cognitive friction reduction // In Progress

Tutorial Stage Game design and Scene Building

Of course, as time went on, it became necessary to put together the game — a tutorial stage. We want it to be more than an introduction that our game designer has built a mini stage with a complete learning journey.

Tutorial Stage Design and Map Building

Tutorial Game Flow and Stage Design // In Progress
User guide and HUD Implementation // In Progress
Enemy and Shooting Target Placement and Integration // Prototyping
Tutorial Stage Internal Pre-Alpha Testing and Debugging // In Progress

 

Internal and Performance UAT

We have run through a long period of testing and adjusting the game data. MetaWars is a 3D FPS game, the frame rate and graphic performance are one of our major concern when it’s come to the user experience. Coming next step, we will be focusing on the performance optimization. Player will be allowed to play the game with the best graphic performance.

We are sincerely thrilled to share all these details with the community. The journey of building a Game from scratch takes enormous tears and sweat. We will continuously share news about our development with you all.

Join our discord for more work-in-progress update: