"Final" Schedule

Week 1 9/19
Overall Goal: Get a rough prototype worked out.
Tech: Level editor/parsing is already roughed out. Get basic movement in for the character and begin “enemy” block movement.
Art: Concept character design and any necessary UI.
Design: Maybe create simple physical prototypes to test mechanics. Or simply write them out in detail on the PBWorks.

Week 2 9/26
Overall Goal: Evaluate results of prototype to discern what needs to change in the immediate future with the overall design.
Tech: Work further on gameplay mechanic implementation if it isn’t already done. Otherwise begin researching lighting techniques for the shadows and lighting.
Art: Begin work on the animations. (Walk cycles etc.) Concept any environmental flair we may need or want.
Design: Play around with the initial implementation of the gameplay mechanics and begin to write down any critiques you may have or what you think should be different.

Week 3 10/3
Overall Goal: Have a near definite vision of what the final game will be. Get Alpha video ready for Thursday.
Tech: Refine gameplay and have the “enemy” blocks moving close to the way we would like them to. Recycle using the pooling technique or something similar to ensure best performance. Leave real optimization until the end though.
Art: Continue work on animations and any other needed art. Leave title screen until close to the end of development. This will probably lead to better ideas for it and it isn’t important yet.
Design:Start planning out some questions to ask external players so that we can begin to run play tests ASAP.

Week 4 10/10
Overall Goal: Run play tests and evaluate feedback to find what is/isn’t working. (Tissue Tests)
Tech: Hopefully gameplay will mostly be nailed down and most of the focus can now be placed on making the game pretty. (Jumping if we have it.)
Art: Have the running animations finished without the transition or jump animations.
Design: Read through player feedback and run the play tests to get an outside perspective on the game.

Week 5 10/17
Overall Goal: More playtesting and tweaking! (awesome 30 seconds hopefully achieved!)
Tech: Work out any bugs we may have. Have everyone on the team play test and others as well.
Art: Help play test and also continue to make the game pretty in any way you can. Details as we get closer.
Design: Play test and report any bugs you can find. Tweak gameplay speeds and mess with any new ideas you may have that would be simple to implement.

Week 6 10/24
Overall Goal: Decide on final content/goal.
Tech: Know exactly what needs to be implemented by the end of the project. Pretty up game with a title and credits screen. Should be easy.
Art: Help tech create title and credits screens. Something creative rather than bland. Attract mode like an arcade cabinet? Finalize art and decide what needs to still be done.
Design: Create an interesting design for title/credits screens and finalize what design tweaks must still be implemented.

Week 7 10/31
Overall Goal: Content complete! Start nothing new! (Maybe) Cut the fat!
Tech: Would like to call code complete and only do cleanup/testing. But small tweaks are also ok.
Art: Have all art either done or at the least in progress and close to done.
Design: Start making your final adjustments to how the game plays. Player speed, block speed, jump heights, etc.

Week 8 11/7
Overall Goal: Actual content complete!
Tech: Bug fixing and testing.
Art: Have all art completed.
Design: Have all gameplay final.

Week 9 11/14
Overall Goal: Hopefully be able to relax.
Tech: David stop being awesome.
Art: Joe, Logan, and Matt stop being awesome.
Design: Everyone stop being awesome.

We win.