Primary Build Master

Summary

• Schedule all internal and public builds to ensure complete and successful regular updates
• Gauge build viability as quickly and correctly as possible
• Main goal is to keep any new updates as bug free as possible to return the game back to a stable state
• Control public facing data and assets to ensure clean builds with no spillover
• Coordinate with the Operations, Community, Quality Assurance, and Development teams to maintain a clear channel of communication
• Produce regular Live builds
  • Track specific changes through the entire build process
  • Pinpoint areas that may need further attention
  • Communicate with players through social media for not only tracking bugs, but also for gauging general sentiment regarding large updates
  • Extended availability during crunch time both before and after deployment to Live servers
  • Maintain and troubleshoot internal builds, while preparing for Test and Live builds

Tournament Judge / Secondary Build Master

Summary

• Maintain and monitor all internal builds
• Determine bug and feature statuses both before and after builds
• Track high profile issues from initial submission through each environment to ensure complete fixes
• Live events, both on and offsite (TwitchCon 2015 H1Z1 Invitational, H1Z1 Showdown 2015, TwitchCon 2016 H1Z1 Invitational)
  • Create integral documentation, procedures, and processes
  • Coordinate with Development and Quality Assurance teams to maximize testing in a limited amount of time
  • Schedule and coordinate daily internal play tests with multiple employees (50+) from every team
  • Prepare for specific test cases that emulate potential worst-case scenarios at the event
• Assist Quality Assurance in preparation for major updates
  • Test new features in unique ways
  • Throughly document new potential issues
  • Document new systems, both for the end user and other customer service personnel
  • Alert producers/managers/leads at discovery of possible game breaking bugs

Build Master

Basics

• Main focus on integrating builds between different environments
  • Ensure error free builds that incorporate all code, art, design, sound, and partner changes
  • Coordinate various tasks with multiple teams to produce a polished product
  • Diagnose any issues with a build as quickly and correctly as possible
• Redesign and refine existing build system (proprietary process based on ANT)
  • Expedite builds on different platforms, with special attention to parallelizing tasks as a priority
  • Remove extraneous build code while implementing new and streamlined functionality
• Prepare for additional platform launches
  • Create new branches in both Perforce and the build system for internal and external environments, complete with additional workspaces, branches, and databases
  • Implement multiple new types of builds (PS4 packages & PS4 patch packages) while simultaneously upgrading existing system
  • Provide multiple builds (both internal and external) per platform on a daily basis

In Plain Terms

Building a game is like making a delicious sandwich. You’ve got your meat, cheese, tomato, lettuce, various sauces, and bread. It has to be organized and fit well together, everything goes between the two pieces of bread, otherwise you have a mess of sauce and tomatoes. You also try to grab everything from the fridge in one go, but sometimes you forget the tomato or lettuce, and you have to go back and grab it. And then there are the times where you get everything together and find out that gummy bears DON’T taste good in a BLT and you have to scrap it. Don’t forget about the times where you grab some bread, thinking that it’s sourdough but it’s actually wheat, so you need to go back and find the correct loaf to start again. Or there’s the time when you really want a grilled cheese, but it’s 1am and it’ll take at least twenty minutes to do it properly (after burning the crap out of it twice and having to re-wash the pan), and suddenly it’s 5am and all you have to show for that effort is five unevenly cooked sandwiches. I make sure that each sandwich comes out perfectly.

This project is now considered finished (as of May 2014), but may be brought back to life at a later date.

(Jump to the downloads)

Pitch: The game is And Carry a Big Stick. It’s a 3D third-person shooter game set in the year 1912, branching into alternative history with the tension of fighting an implacable foe to save the free world from robotic domination. The player will take on the role of Theodore Roosevelt, aided by his unnamed saboteur sidekick to thwart the plans of the illegitimate robot regime. The player will struggle against the environment and foe alike using both period-specific and futuristic weapons purloined from the opposition in a fast-paced, level-by-level spree of robotic mayhem to preserve the human race. (Game concept/pitch by Stephen Haines, all art assets by Kevin Smith, with sounds and UI designed by Vance George.)

Roles:

• Lead Programmer
• UI Scripter
• Moose Enthusiast
• Official Note Taker

Specifics:

• Final capstone project
• Unity3d
  • C#
• 100% original
  • Art assets
  • Code
  • Sounds
• 10 weeks to complete
  • Must have a single playable level
    • Including win/loss conditions
    • Smooth movement
  • Must have good documentation
    • UML diagrams
    • Flowcharts
    • Game Spec
    • Technical documentation
    • Milestones
  • Must be presented at the end of the course
    • Power Point
    • Group presentation
  • Must have some code written by each team member

Specific Duties:

• Coordinate tasks
• Version control
  • Integration + documentation
• Script the basics of the game
  • Character controller
  • Main camera
  • Weapon switching
  • Various health/ammo drops
  • Collision detection
  • Hit detection -> raycasting
• Documentation
  • Basic UML diagrams [found here]
  • Compile change logs
  • Create coding standards [found here]
  • Track changes made to the shared drive

Downloads:

• Demo (EXE) [found here]
• Documentation (PDF) [found here]
  • Programming Content (p. 76)
  • Code Structure (p. 79)
  • Concerns and Alternatives (p. 79)
  • Resources (p. 80)
  • Technical Matrix (p. 81)
  • Appendix A: Project UML Documentation (p. 84)
  • Appendix B: Team Meeting Notes (p. 92)
  • Appendix C: Capstone Activity Log (p. 144)
  • Appendix D: Ongoing Code Changelog (p. 209)
• Presentation (PPT) [found here]
  • Overview (slide 16)
  • Integration example (slide 17)
  • Original UML (slide 18)
  • Final UML (slide 19)
  • Defining moment (slide 20)

Screenshots:

First working prototype.

First glimpse of the grunt.

After implementation of grenades and basic AI.

Robot communist group hug (after unintentionally disabling the AI).