Jump Jump Orchestra: Prototype (Studio 2 - Folio 1)

View my Folio 1 Presentation online.

A screen recording of my interactive prototype as part of my submission for Folio 1 in Studio 2.

My original idea for Studio 2 was inspired by the playground game, skipping, also known as jump rope. I was particularly drawn to the social interaction and physical movement of skipping, and the feeling of 'togetherness' when groups of people skip/jump together. I want to try and capture these elements in my game using the Kinect as a sensor and Unity as my game engine. I have further developed this idea after thinking about the world in my game, and who the characters (the players) are.

The concept for my project moving forward is that players play musical instruments as part of an orchestra. Rather than compete with one another, they have to work together jumping to the right beats, in order to successfully "perform" the piece of music. Hence the title: Jump Jump Orchestra!

There has been some significant changes since Week 5's experiment, including:

• Generating the beats algorithmically using the Koreographer plugin within Unity
• Learning how to use and customise Koreographer within the code
• Learning how to use camera layers to visualise different objects at different depths
• Connecting the jump trigger with the hit state, so that feedback can be given when the player jumps on the beats
• Getting a simple score working on the top right (still needs a lot of work though!)

There were numerous moments of head-banging frustration as I'm completely new to Unity. I've only started to use the program for my own work this semester, and to make something like this that involved many advanced mechanics: Kinect gesture detection for the jump; beat generation from audio; setting up a scoring system so the two systems can work together - was an immense learning curve. Many times I was on the verge of giving up; luckily I was able to consult with lecturers and other MAGI students for Unity help. And special thanks to Hizi, who stayed up with me past 3am in the morning, helping me troubleshoot this prototype via Messenger. T_T I'm eternally grateful.

Next steps: polishing the prototype so the code is cleaner; get local multiplayer working with the beat system; figuring out how I want the scoring system to work (total score for all players?); set up a proper score/game manager; start work on art / design / assets.