I’m coming out of the woodwork to announce a new game from Sokay, Cheddar Beach: Episode 0. In a strange turn of events, this new game is in the style of a visual novel. Meaning that it’s a story-based game, with a lot less interaction than an action game like Thugjacker. Cheddar Beach: Episode 0 is coming this Spring and planned for release on PC (Steam) and mobile (Android and iPhone/iPad).

I started working on Cheddar Beach about a year ago. The plan was to come up with something that I could potentially finish just by myself. For years, I’d been wanting to experiment more with telling stories in games. With each Sokay project, I’ve tended to approach the gameplay and story together. We may start with an idea sparked by the story and the world that we imagine, and sometimes we start with the gameplay first and build a story around that.

With Cheddar Beach, I wanted to figure out if we could make a game based around a story. The story is the gameplay. Could that be interesting in and of itself? Growing up, action games were just about all there was to play on the NES. The games that got more complicated than that (Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest), just weren’t for me! Mostly because they didn’t make any SENSE to me (I could barely read), but also, menus are boring! I want to control an actual character, move them around the screen and have them attack when I press a button!

Over time, I grew out of my comfort zone. Secret of Mana was an action game that introduced me to leveling and experience points. Chrono Trigger introduced me to why the story in the game can be the “icing on the cake,” and made it worth learning how to navigate a menu-based RPG battle system. Resident Evil and Metal Gear Solid showed me stories that I could enjoy, without even playing the game firsthand.

Cheddar Beach is not only a new genre for us, but a new game engine. For this project I dove into the Godot Game Engine to get a feel for development with it. On my first impression, it reminded me of what it ‘felt’ like to develop games in Flash. Back then, it felt quick to jump in and experiment with ideas. The editor is lightweight and worked well across Windows and OSX platforms, so it got my attention. It’s free and the exporters for different platforms (html, Windows, iOS, Android) seemed to work well also. So I gave it a shot.

We are planning on releasing Cheddar Beach: Episode 0 in Spring 2024. It will be available on PC by way of Steam. Also, for mobile on Android and iOS.

Currently, the game is playable from start to finish, but we’re testing and polishing things. The plan is to continue development of Cheddar Beach: Episode 0 after launch to polish, add new features, and implement feedback. The goal is to keep this rolling until we can develop and release an Episode 1, which would be the “actual” start of the story.

Stay tuned!

• Cheddarbeach.com coming soon!
• Wishlist Cheddar Beach: Episode 0 on Steam!

The post Announcing Cheddar Beach: Episode 0 appeared first on blog.sokay.net.

This is one of my favorite sayings simply because the cartoon 2 Stupid Dogs made an entire episode based on it. And I found it quite funny. It still sticks with me today! It’s the only explanation I have for the sudden realization of a passing of time.

My last post on the blog was 6 years ago, practically to the day. This was shortly after the release of Raybeem, our VR music visualizer. I remember feeling worn out after that project and not having a clear direction of where to take it beyond its initial release.

The last post was Feb 2018, and a few months later in May, we presented Raybeem at the VRLA convention at the Los Angeles convention center. I was working on a VR project for Amazon at that time so it’s all a bit blurry to me now. We had a great showing at the convention but I felt a bit of frustration in continuing VR development because of how challenging that project was.

The blog has turned into one of those things that “I’ll get to later.” Initially, I wanted to update the WordPress theme to work on mobile better. I had some new ideas for how I wanted to organize the blog. Then it became maintenance issues, how do I even login to this thing? Then a site migration forced me to finally get around to updating stuff but I didn’t know what to say.

We’ve got a new game coming out soon so I waited just about as long as I could before I had to face this ‘dragon.’ So I’m posting something to get past my initial restraint. I can’t figure out how to center the images in this post! But I’ll worry about it another day!

Our new project, Cheddar Beach, is NOT VR. It’s not even Unity, but it’s a game at least! A large part of Sokay is the spirit of breaking new ground, at least for us individually. Each game or application has been unlike the one before it. This one is a story-based visual novel game, but it’s developed almost entirely by myself! Me, Bryson! So that’s a common thread.

This is a project where I forced myself out of my comfort zone to take care of all of the in-game artwork. I typically avoid the character stuff and Ricky draws it. This time Ricky has got my back by helping out with character designs though!

I’m looking forward to sharing more!

Nice to see you!

Peace!

-Bryson

The post Hello World! (2024) appeared first on blog.sokay.net.

 

I’ve been in a good groove lately, jumping around with a handful of games that I’m really into. A bunch of games have come out recently and I’ve tried hard to focus on finishing or revisiting some games that I’ve had for a while.

Over the past couple weeks I’ve revisited Yakuza 5. I think I completed the main story of Yakuza 4 back in December of 2015. That was a free PlayStation Plus title that happened to be exactly the game I wanted to play at the time. I was always in love with the premise of the Yakuza series but never got around to playing them. Yakuza 4 gripped me hard with its overly excessive violence, fun gameplay and skill progression system. The story caught me a bit off guard for how good it was. In the end, I think it took me about 40 hours to complete, while I expected it to be somewhere in the 20 hour territory.

Now that you’ve got my backstory, Yakuza 5 was released on PS Plus almost immediately as I mowed through Yakuza 4. I was kind of fatigued with it at that point, and it didn’t help that Yakuza 5 starts off incredibly slow. A few weeks ago I was reminded that Yakuza 6 comes out next month so I decided to take another look at Yakuza 5.

The game starts with the protagonist Kazuma Kiryu hiding out in a new city as a taxi driver. It starts you off having to do taxi missions and highway race battles (in typical over-the-top Sega fashion). Not so much fighting so it starts pretty slow. Once the game settled in, it’s pretty much more of the same. In this game, you’re running around a few blocks of Fukuoka. It’s a much more mundane environment compared to the red-light-district of Kamurocho, where the majority of Yakuza 4 takes place. I believe there are other cities in this game, but I don’t think they’re as big. I’m looking forward to what happens next as if I’m looking forward to the next episode of a soap opera. So many twists and turns and backstabbings. What you’d expect from a crime story.

I’ve been taking mental notes about the structure of the game. It’s basically an old school beat ’em up game but it’s got a lot of layer to it which make it more interesting. You’re free to wander the open map and get into random battles with enemies wandering the streets. The found the streets generally more restricted compared to the more open areas of Yakuza 4, so it can be more difficult to avoid battles when you’re not interested in fighting. You’re rewarded for fighting by gaining experience, which gives you skill points when leveling up. These skill points are basically used to make you more god-like by giving you greater abilities to grapple, dodge, and special attacks.

You can eat at various restaurants to gain buffs to stength, defense, stamina and your life bar. You can craft weapons and armor. And there’s an endless amount of side content that you may be awarded for (missions and mini-games). I like the semi-non-linear approach and I’m starting to consider something like that for a future game. I really love the idea of an open town hub, that also has random battles.

The Heat system is main event when it comes to fighting in Yakuza. These are special attacks that you can use when charging a special meter by damaging enemies. It also drains when you take damage. All you have to do is press Triangle next to an enemy while your Heat guage is above a certain threshold. The best part is that it’s context sensitive so the action will change depending on where you are in the environment (smash an enemies face into a pole), which item you’re holding (smash a fallen enemy with a bike), or what position you’re in (being grabbed from behind). This can be fun to setup a situation where you can execute the most devastating attack. It helps break up the monotony.

I don’t think any of this is new for this game but the actual Heat attack animations have been switched up. I believe you switch to other characters later on in the game. In Yakuza 4, different characters had slightly different fighting styles which helped switch it up a bit. I’m looking forward to seeing where it goes, but I think I just really want to see what a Yakuza game looks like on PS4. I’m hoping I can make my way to Yakuza 0 and Yakuza Kiwami soon.

I started playing Yakuza 5 after taking a break from Monster Hunter World. I think I dropped like 20 hours into that in just a couple weeks. I had to step away from it before it consumed me. Once I got a general idea for the loop of the game, I felt like I got a good enough taste for the moment. I still haven’t managed to get together with friends online so I’ve been missing a bit part of it. It’s a spectacle of a game though. Massive worlds with incredibly intricate world design. One of the showcases of the game is the design of the first level, which is a dense forest with many interwoven levels. It just makes me wonder how they put it together so seamlessly.

Super Mario RPG has been a favorite of mine since childhood but I never beat the last boss. I made it to the end and was disappointed that I needed to grind to face the last boss, as I got destroyed. I think this game is every bit of the masterpiece that I remember it as, but it’s still surprising to see some of the design decisions. I think what’s kind of shocking is that it’s pretty challenging. I play bits and pieces of Chrono Trigger very often and I feel like Super Mario RPG might have a higher difficulty overall. It’s kind of surprising, at least, because it kind of comes off as a “game for kids.” It does help you out in clever ways like giving you “freebie” items randomly when you use an item. Or other random perks like getting another free move or restoring your HP. One big difference from other Squaresoft RPGs of that era is that when you die, you restart from the last save point with your progress in tact. I think this is very helpful for RPG newcomers but very progressive considering that’s what games typically do today. And yes, I have died a lot on this playthrough. haha! At least early on.

One area of the game that stood out to me was the Kero Sewers area. It’s a kind of tricky area relatively early in the game. Similar to Lost Woods of the Zelda series or the Forest of Illusion of Super Mario World. This area basically leads you around in circles unless you’re observant. I’m sure this was no big deal to me back in the day, but I feel like it’s considered “bad game design” nowadays. I’m sure this is an area that a lot of people got stuck back in the day. When Googling “Super Mario RPG sewers”, “How do I get past Kero Sewers?” is the top post. This makes me wonder if I should design something like this into a game – an area where it’s a bit of a puzzle to figure out a solution to. I just finished Super Metroid and a large part of the enjoyment of that game is overcoming such obstacles. I think we shouldn’t be afraid of players getting stuck.

The limited item inventory of Super Mario RPG simplifies things a bit so that you know exactly what items you’re holding at any given time, but can make it challenging when you end up plowing through mushrooms. Coming back to it, it’s amazing to see Squaresoft at arguably their highest point doing amazing justice to the Mario IP.

I found my copy of Picross 3D digging through old games. I love this friggin game. It’s living on my 3DS right now and I’m playing it to clear my mind at any given time.

The post What I’ve Been Playing: Feb 20, 2018 appeared first on blog.sokay.net.

Raybeem is the first VR project from Sokay. It’s not 2D. It’s not a game. Yet, it’s as close to my heart as any of the previously released Sokay products. I spent 2017 working full-time on Raybeem. I can describe it as a whirlwind, which was hard to make sense of while I was in the middle of it. I’m writing this mess to dump what’s been going on in my head into a huge blog post.

Raybeem is a virtual reality project that started out as a desire to listen to my favorite Drum & Bass station, Bassdrive.com, in Virtual Reality. As an adolescent, I spent dozens of hours of my life gazing at Winamp visualizers. Switching through visualizations to find my favorite, tweaking settings, and downloading new ones.  This was the prime way of listening to music for Bryson in the year 2001.

This was my dream for 2017, listening to Drum & Bass music in VR. In a world of my creation.

Raybeem’s been a large project for me so I’ve had a hard time figuring out what to say about it. At it’s core, I consider Raybeem to be a VR music visualizer. That was the starting point for the concept, anyway. I just wanted to create an application for listening to music in VR. The different visualizations in Raybeem are thought of as “Themes.” The way I imagined, a Raybeem theme is any environment that reacts to music in some way. So a theme could be anything – realistic or abstract, interactive or non-interactive.

When I started working on Raybeem, I had a strong idea of what I was trying to build. As it turned out, even with all the notes, sketches and prototypes, I fooled myself into thinking it would be less work than it was. Here’s a brain-dump of a lot of the things I figured out on my Road to Raybeem’s release.

Audio Spectrum

This was a demo to figure out how to access the audio spectrum data in Unity.

The heart of Raybeem is a component that analyzes the audio spectrum. This is accomplished in Unity by using the AudioSource.GetSpectrumData() method. This gives me the audio data for the current frame of audio being played through Raybeem. This doesn’t care what the source of the audio is, as it can come from local MP3’s, web streams, microphone input, etc.. I took this data and divided and averaged it to come up with  LOW, MID, and HIGH range values between 0.0 and 1.0. This essentially gives me a percentage for each of those ranges. I still consider it a naive approach but it worked GE (Good Enough).

I used that audio value to determine a variety of different things. For the most part, these components control things like object scale and color. Another example is the particles that boost their speed above a certain audio threshold in the “Blue” theme. These reactions are defined simply through Unity components that I can drop on objects in themes.

An example of a Raybeem audio react component within Unity.

Since then, I’ve learned a few more things about working with audio. At some point I’d like to revamp the audio analysis aspect of Raybeem to allow for more nuance in theme reaction. I’ll get to that sooner or later!

Themes

The only thing that Raybeem’s themes have in common is that they react to music in some way, or provide a great experience for listening to music. In most cases, I’ve created components that listen to an Audio Spectrum range and react based on its percentage of activity. For example, in the “Blue” theme, I have particles that float around and react to the MID range of the audio spectrum. When the MID range is at 0%, the particle is yellow and when it’s at 100%, it’ll be completely red. If the MID range is at 50%, it’ll be exactly halfway between yellow and red, so some orange-y color. I’ve created different components in the themes which apply the same logic to properties like ‘scale’ or more complex color shifting for the windows in 100’s of instances of buildings for the “Highway” theme.

That was a mundane explanation, but essentially I made a bunch of these components and playing around with them I stumbled upon these themes.

“Blue” Theme

The initial theme for Raybeem is this particle system called “Blue.” The algorithm for the particle system is actually based on a tutorial I read by Robert Hodgin. I believe Apple bought the iTunes visualizer from him as it was originally a plug-in he developed for iTunes. It’s quite a shame that they took out all the bells and whistles from it, but that’s another story…

Anyway, the particles were initially going to be something like faeries or butterflies in this “Zen” theme I was developing when I first started working on Raybeem. When I started testing them as I was blocking out an environment for VR, I felt that it was mesmerizing to just sit and watch what the little particles floating around were doing. This was before I even had music in the demo.

From there, I was unclear with the exact visual direction for this “Zen” theme so I dropped the particles in a new theme test with a black backdrop. The black backdrop was too harsh on my eyes, with the solid black with white particles on them. So I tinted the backdrop Sokay blue. Then I noticed that having a solid color as a backdrop didn’t feel right, so I added a gradient so that you can get a sense of which direction is up at least. I then added in a isohedron wireframe dome to give some sense of a horizon. Then I dropped in faded building planes in the distance to give a better sense of depth. Additional tweaks to the particle shaders to give a fog-like effect to show more depth.

This was the testbed for figuring out if there was a visual connection to the music. Initially it was on Gear VR so I could easily show it around to people to gauge interest in it. I felt that most people had a very positive reaction, even if some couldn’t see past the initial prototype. I found out that a lot of people couldn’t get past the abstract nature of this theme, so I wanted to show a variety of themes so people wouldn’t get things twisted.

“Highway” Theme

Once I hit the ground rolling, I had this concept for a “Highway” theme for Raybeem. I had gone to Tokyo, Japan for 3 years in a row and the vision of a huge never-ending city has been forever scarred on my mind. I’m from LA, which is a big city, but it’s all spread out. Not so dense. I wanted to try to make an endless procedural theme where you could “drive” on a traffic-less highway forever. The LA dream, a city with no traffic (as my homie Chris pointed out to me).

Don’t ask me why, but I decided on modeling this thing myself. I’ve got an art background so I’m not shy to throwdown when it becomes necessary. But it’s also necessary to flex once in a while to maintain said skillz. I was aiming for a lo-fi Star Fox kinda look since I’m still nostalgic of that era of 3D graphics (shout out to Virtua Fighter and Virtua Racing!) I was experimenting with that look with my WebGL Rush-D demo a few years ago, so I started right where I left off.

A city block laid out within Unity.

The city didn’t end up being procedural, but it’s a bit randomized. I setup about 10 different arrangements of city-blocks. Each block, I meticulously placed buildings by hand and adjusted them based on how they looked as you passed by while in VR. The order in which the blocks come by is random. I used the Unity asset Curved World to randomly bend the environment to give a sensation like you’re turning around corners while on this endless road.

Initially the plan was to take you through different areas of the city – tunnels with trains and underground structures, coastlines, and endless bridges. I scaled back my vision because I had to actually make all of that stuff! It became time consuming because I ended up needing to add more details to the theme like benches and trees.

I sketched out concepts for city block types.

I cut corners wherever I can. Since I was going for a flat shaded look, I decided to use the COLR Unity asset. I figured the only way I was going to finish Raybeem was by setting limits and accepting what I could get within whatever restraints. COLR saved my ass because it shades polygons based on which direction it faces (essentially North, South, East, and West). I had to combine this shader with the Curved World shader and it was a fairly easy integration.

Where things got tricky was trying to update so many instances of materials. So for this theme, I isolated the window materials for buildings and adjust those dynamically. Since I’ve got dozens of instances of each particular material, I decided to just modify the sharedMaterial for each material. You’re generally not supposed to do that because it has the unintended consequences of modifying the original asset. Since these material would always be only updated by code I just decided to go that route. But at first that didn’t work and I tried some other things. Right now it’s all cloudy and in the end I ended up building a convoluted method of finding a reference to the material but none of that matters anymore. Let’s put the past behind us shall we? It’s working after all!

Oh yeah, well the reason why the material wasn’t updating after I changed the colors dynamically was because of the way the COLR asset was setup. It used Unity Editor scripts to update the material when using the color picker in the Unity Editor. I think in the end I had to make something to force those updates to happen from within Raybeem. It was a nightmare to figure out but in the end it was an easy fix.

“Lightshow” Theme

I’m still a raver somewhere deep down in my cold heart. Since I started Raybeem I wanted to have a “purely raver” theme but didn’t know which direction to go. With the perfect timing, just as I was trying to figure out which direction to go for a new theme, I found this awesome post on Reddit. Yes, if you can’t tell, I shamelessly ripped off the feel of this theme. It barely took any time to figure out how to make a particle system to create this warm glowiness in the distance that just felt great in VR. I combined it with a Kaleidoscope asset that I’ve been looking for an excuse to use.

I wanted people to be able to give VR lightshows with this theme. I’m still working on the hand functionality, but right now you can leave light trails and shoot butterfly graphics. Hopefully later I’ll add other graphics like unicorns and other raver kinda iconography.

“FireDancer” Theme

So I’ve never been to Burning Man, but I’ve heard stories from homies. This theme is directly based on my experiences at a rave in the middle of a desert near Lancaster about 10 years ago. I cracked my windshield driving off-road in a Toyota Camry chasing glowstick waypoints in the darkness. It was worth it to experience firedancing first-hand, in the bitter cold of the California desert. Yolo.

For this theme, I actually got the fire from one of Unity’s tutorial projects. It’s on the official Unity YouTube somewhere if you’re interested.

“StarStream” Theme

This is the first theme that I released in an update after Raybeem’s release. With this theme, I set out to give more control to the user and give them a world that they can have more interaction with. Much of this interaction comes in the form of an optional mini-game.

When starting the theme, you appear in a space-like environment with star bits of nebula-ish clouds flying by you giving you a sensation of movement. You can use the control sticks to move in the direction your facing, backwards or side-to-side. You have a mini-map in the HUD locked to your view, it appears in the bottom left corner of your view. Using that, you can find a “Sokay coin,” which appears as a beacon. Upon collecting the coin, a mini-game is triggered and you must defeat all of the spawning robots before the time is up.

I kitbashed some Unity assets for the robots and the guns you use. I might eventually create new artwork for this theme, and revamp the gameplay, but I’m planning to focus on new themes at this point. Here’s a video of it in action if you want to take a look.

VR Input

Getting this thing working for both of these controllers wasn’t that fun.

Initially Raybeem was a prototype for GearVR and the Oculus DK2, which at the time relied solely on gaze for UI selection since the VR motion controls weren’t readily available at the time. As I began serious development of Raybeem, I had to rework the UI input system to be more flexible to allow it to work with any amount of selection inputs. In addition to the new UI functionality, I had to figure out a system for dealing with VR input with both the Oculus Touch and the HTC Vive controllers.

For the gaze-based UI, I ran an update loop that raycasted from the camera and checked for collisions with any object containing an interactive UI component. If that UI component wasn’t already selected, it became the selected object. From there, any selection button press would trigger that interactive UI component. To make it work with controllers, I instead made a list of different sets of raycasts that interact with interactive UI components. So now I had:

• Camera Raycast
• Left Controller Raycast
• Right Controller Raycast
• … and as many more might be needed

But the problem with that was that I didn’t want the gaze to be the selector, although I might want the gaze to be a selector if VR motion controls weren’t available. So I setup a data type that sends along whether the raycast is a “gaze” or “selector” input. This way I can switch the gaze to be a selector if necessary and I can also have the gaze still interact with UI elements. Currently, the VR menu for Raybeem will automatically fade out and move away from you as you look away from it, making use of the “gaze” type of raycast. This system still only allowed for one “selected” interactive UI element, which created a problem of being able to highlight different buttons with different hands, because of that, I followed the lead as other VR software and limited selection to the “active” hand, and hide the other hand’s input. Just act like the problem doesn’t exist in the first place!

Once I got the VR motion controllers working for the UI, I had to figure out what the hands were actually going to do for the themes. During that time, I hadn’t thought of it too much because I was focused on many other buggy aspects of the project. I felt like I could just whoop up anything quickly for the user’s hands if I had to. A challenge in that process was figuring out how to handle the VR controller input for multiple types of controllers as well as button schemes for future themes that might be nothing like the themes I launched with.

What I ended up with is breaking down the input something like this:

• Menu button – brings up the VR menu
• Stick (analog) – sends Vector2(x,y) value
• Trigger (analog) – sends a value between 0.0 – 1.0 based on how hard its pressed
• Grip (digital) – pressing activates a theme effect

Aside from the menu, the controls between different Raybeem themes are inconsistent. Some people didn’t like this because “What do the buttons do?” In some cases, like the “FireDancer” theme, the buttons do nothing. This is partly because I’m figuring it out and short on time, and I don’t want to force functionality in if it doesn’t make sense to me at the time. My explanation for this is that all themes are self-contained and follow their own rules. Some themes might have no interaction whatsoever, some might be full-blown games with complex logic for different situations. These differences most likely need to be presented to the user in some way (so far no tutorials within Raybeem ;p ). As Raybeem continues to materialize, I hope to find a way to ease people into things. Defining the input for these interactions has given me a starting point that I hope to polish up over time.

In retrospect a lot of these problems probably could’ve been alleviated if I would’ve used VRTK , but when I first came across it I wasn’t sure how legit it was. Besides, sometimes it’s worth doing things the “rough” way to understand what’s really going on.

VR Camera Rigs

One of the most challenging aspects of this project was making it compatible with both the Oculus Rift and the HTC Vive, as well as function perfectly fine without VR. I wasn’t even sure if it was possible when I first took on this task. Although I had both VR HMDs, I led development with the Oculus Rift. Since I started it with Oculus’ Gear VR SDK, I didn’t have to change anything to give it compatibility with the Oculus Rift. Oculus is a lot easier to develop for simply because there’s API documentation, which I believe doesn’t exist with the HTC Vive. For Vive development, you’re expected to pick apart demos and troll their development forums which is super unproductive. Once you get past that, development is pretty similar for both of them.

To handle multiple VR SDKs, I created a bootleg “VR Detection” system. When you boot Raybeem, and if the “VR Active” setting is set to ‘ON’, Raybeem will attempt to activate a VR mode. What it does is check to see if VR is available, then it loads an appropriate camera rig based on whether you’re using an HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, or no VR. These camera rigs are based on the rigs delivered in each respective VR SDK. For the most part, I modify these rigs by just drop on components to allow these cameras to integrate into Raybeem. There’s components for UI raycasting, postprocessing, and camera fade effects.

It is possible to simply use a Vive Rig as it’s “Open VR” and Oculus is supported, but from my understanding, that way doesn’t take advantage of Oculus’ drivers which I believe are the only ones that support ASW at this moment. So for the best Oculus experience, you really want to use Oculus’ SDK.

If no VR camera is loaded, the VR detection system will load an “Attract Camera.” The Attract Camera displays the scene from different perspectives while a user is not in VR. The intention is to always show some action on the screen regardless of whether someone is interacting with Raybeem. This attract camera also displays when you unmount the Oculus HMD, I believe this functionality is disabled with the Vive because it was causing crashes (but don’t quote me on that).

Right now that Attract Camera has 3 modes, set by the current theme.

• Orbit: Essentially a turnable that rotates the camera around a point and randomly switches zoom and changes speed & direction.
• Teleport: Camera jumps around to different defined locations in the scene.
• Combo: Camera randomly switches between “Orbit” and “Teleport” modes.

The Attract Camera system was one of my original goals but ended up being a pain to implement because I was already neck-deep in tasks when I started getting it in. It was important to bringing Raybeem to life, though, and I was able to capture a lot of great footage for social media because of it. I hope to keep layering in new Attract Camera modes as new themes bring new requirements to the table. Check our Instagram for footage of this in action.

Live Events

Raybeem Live at a big trance show at Garage Gallery LA, in Downtown Los Angeles.

Sokay did its first live events during the Downtown Los Angeles Art Walk back in 2011. These were called “Sokay Play.” At the time, I was knee-deep in the development of our Flash game, DONUT GET! Initially I was ashamed of showing our older games like Thugjacker and LUV Tank at these shows, but I quickly realized that it didn’t matter to people how old our games were because they had never seen them before. Our old games were “good as new” to the artwalkers.

With Raybeem I was trying to improve on the user feedback loop, compared to how I handled DONUT GET! I made the mistake of not testing DONUT GET! seriously until the end of the project. This was partially because it took so long to bring all of the parts together for a cohesive experience. In retrospect, I should’ve got it in people’s hands sooner so that I could actually take feedback into consideration before becoming burned out on the project.

Raybeem Live at VRAR, Long Beach Main Library in Downtown Long Beach. Reppin’ 562!

The first show I did for Raybeem was at the event VRAR at the Long Beach Public Library main branch in January 2017. I was lucky that my homie Gabotron helped organize this event at his job. I wasn’t ready, but it was a golden opportunity. This was the first month that I started full-time development of Raybeem. It was still basically a prototype at that point. Raybeem was only the “Blue” theme, with some enhancements and optimizations to take advantage of the power of PC. I added in the ability to cycle through different palettes, but it didn’t have any motion controls or interactivity at that point.

It was an exciting experience to show these strangers a glimpse of my new project. That event was the first VR experience for a lot of people and everyone that tried Raybeem walked away with a smile. Even the old dude that wanted me to play some heavy metal! That was extremely encouraging so early on. I started to take in the comments from everyone trying it out. I don’t remember many major revelations, but this is where I started my “listening process” with users. I listen and try to understand the core or what they like and what they don’t like, and try to imagine ways for me to address their concerns. Little did I know at the time, I was going to be in for a lot more live events for Raybeem!

Our first major show was an art show Super Future from Futra.

It turns out that music is sorta universal. I got lucky to be accepted and invited to several shows leading up to the release of Raybeem. I came across Futra‘s call for submissions for their summer show, Super Future. It was this hybrid art, music, performance event hosted at Lot 613 in Downtown LA. We setup a proper booth and I sweated while hoping everything would go smoothly.

Super Future turned out well thanks to all the Sokay Family that came out to help and show support.

In the end it was all good. We had a long ass line of people for most of the night and we got a lot of great feedback. I was relieved that I didn’t have to man the booth since I had Sokay Family helping out. It was a strange experience to see so people coming up to me like I was some kind of expert on virtual reality stuff.

That event went well but it took a lot out of me. I ended up doing several more shows before actually releasing. We did a few events at Upload LA, a few with a dope LA rave crew. Around this time I finally felt like I was onto something because when Raybeem’s on the dance floor, next to a big ass speaker, reacting to what a DJ’s playing. That’s the recipe right there. That moment is what it was all about. I envisioned Raybeem as something for me to use to smoke weed, kick back and  and engulf myself in my tunes after a hard day of traffic and diving in code all day. This personal home experience. Events is where it’s at though!

I’m still trying to figure this out. Doing events takes a lot out of me and it can be a pain to lug a bunch of fragile equipment around. I’ve gotta turn down opportunities for shows sometimes. Gotta keep on pushin!

Social Media

Follow Sokay on Instagram at @sokaylife.

When I started Raybeem, I decided to take social media a bit more seriously and got a Sokay Instagram setup. We have a Sokay Facebook page with some likes, but it’s been pretty inactive. The plan was to get some help with that so that I could focus on development and whatever else I needed to do for Raybeem, while someone took care of the social media dealings. In the end, that didn’t work out and I had to handle all this social stuff while I was doing development.

For Instagram, I kept it pretty basic and tried to post a picture a day. I started with old Sokay content, to give me time as I prepped Raybeem to a point that I felt good showing it off. I don’t know what else to say. I made sure to take a lot of photos and videos of people using Raybeem just in case it might be useful on social media. First impressions are some rare moments you can’t recreate.

The Flyer and The Teaser

I printed out and hand assembled the Raybeem flyers. By this point, I think I’ve handed out over 200 flyers at shows, conferences, and various events.

I wanted to have something a bit different to post on social media so I brought on the homie Ramiro to do a comic for Raybeem. He’s been killing it with his horror comics and I always wanted an excuse to work with him. One of the challenges I faced with promoting Raybeem was that for a long time I just had a single theme and it looked really “samey” in screenshots and footage. I was thinking that having a comic based on the idea of Raybeem would at least give me some content to promote Raybeem with on social media. In addition to that, we designed it as a flyer to be handed out at our booth when doing live events.

Ramiro’s rough layout sketch of the Raybeem comic.

My favorite part about collaborating with someone is that they often take a vague or bad idea of have and turn it into something great. From what I remember, I told Ramiro some vague concept about the VR application “Raybeem” being created by this mad scientist type of guy named “Dr. Raybeem.” This doctor set out to resolve all forms of psychological damage with a treatment in the form of this virtual reality software, dubbed “Raybeem.” As story goes, Raybeem worked but it worked a bit too well and became an epidemic. People sought it out over drugs & alcohol because it was a place where they never wanted to leave. Nobody has seen Dr. Raybeem in years and some say that he lurks somewhere within the code.

Read the comic for yourself at http://www.liveinyourmusic.com

That’s not all! I really had to see Ramiro’s artwork in motion, so I decided to animate a motion comic as well.

I’ve got no reason to be animating in After Effects but I really enjoy this kinda stuff from time to time.

The Trailer

Putting together a trailer for the release of Raybeem was something that I wanted to get some help with. Fortunately, the homegirl Jennifer Estrada was down to help me out. What made this a challenge was that I was still figuring out exactly what the “package” of Raybeem was. In other words, I figured out most of the functionality but I wasn’t sure how to message that. Additionally, I wasn’t sure exactly what I was going to ship with the release. The features and themes were changing up to the last second. Fortunately, I she was patient with me and probably used to it because she makes trailers and such for a living!

Here’s the result:

 Steam & The Release

While my head was spinning with bug fixes and testing on multiple VR headsets on multiple computers, I realized I had to actually release this thing on Steam. I had run through the general idea of releasing games on Steam once I got the store “coming soon” page up.

None of this felt real until I finally saw the Raybeem listing on Steam. Something something something, I eventually figured out how to release builds and whatnot but that was a headache of a process when I just wanted to get it over with.

I’m still tripping that I finally made it to Steam. My first experience with Steam was downloading whatever activation there was for my Best Buy bought Half Life 2 on release day on my crappy connection to my neighbor’s wifi because I didn’t even have internet at the time. Now I’ve got some Sokay stuff on Steam! (and a legitimate internet connection)

Keep on Raybeem’n!

I just released an update to Raybeem with the new StarStream theme. I noticed a pretty bad bug in it just as I was prepping for release, while the homie came thru and tested it a bit. Oh well, there’s more where that came from! Haha!

If you lasted this far in my essay, much love! I think even my mom gave up a few chapters ago. If you’ve got some questions or feedback, feel free to hit me up at sonofbryce [at] sokay.net.

One of our next shows is coming up! VRAR2 at Long Beach Main Library, March 3rd 2018. Stay tuned for more details!

Peace!

Links

• Join the Sokay Newsletter!
• Raybeem on Steam
• Raybeem on Viveport
• Raybeem coming soon to Oculus Store (hopefully!)
• Sokay YouTube, for Raybeem development videos
• Sokay Instagram
• Sokay Facebook
• Bryson on Twitter
• Oculus’ Unity documentation

The post Road to Raybeem – VR Music Visualizer appeared first on blog.sokay.net.

“Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex” opening, song by Yoko Kanno

  I’ve finally finished watching the anime series Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex. The first season, at least. I watched a few subtitled episodes of the show around the time when it was released in Japan in 2002, but at the time it wasn’t something that could hold my interest. At that time, I was deeply enamored with the colorful ninjas of the Hidden Valley of the Leaf in the show Naruto, which was just starting to take the world by storm. To its merit, Ghost in the Shell: SAC had exciting robots and futuristic weaponry, but it functioned as almost a backdrop to a detective story of political corruption and turmoil. A lot less sexy than the mastering of jutsu’s and fighting tournaments of the early episodes of Naruto.

Scene from the Ghost in the Shell film (1995)

In the 90’s, Mamoru Oshii’s animated film Ghost in the Shell was one of the most popular vectors for anime discovery before shows like Dragonball Z and Pokemon brought anime to the mainstream in the United States. I remember anime as an underground culture back then – you kinda had to know somebody that knew about it. I remember glimpses of anime in the back of gaming magazines or a few tapes in the back of a video store. I probably ended up first watching the Ghost in the Shell film after a friend let me borrow a VHS tape of it. Even finding it hard to follow the plot, it’s always been a favorite film to watch simply because of the visual detail.

Jumping back into Ghost in the Shell: SAC show, I quickly discovered why I lost interest in it in the first place. It’s a great looking show, but a lot less flashier than the film. Sure it has some robots and shooting and explosions, but it also has a slow methodical pace. Most episodes have a whole lot of talking about things you know little about, with only a few scenes of action if you’re lucky. GitS: SAC must be watched intently as every line of dialog seems like its there for a reason. From the first episode, you’re dropped into the situation and there’s not a lot of scenes with overt exposition explaining the situations. This is a good thing because if you’re engaged, everything you need to know will be eventually spoon-fed to you over the course of its 26 episodes. It’ll make good sense in the end. Most of it, anyway.

Batou providing backup to Major in Stand Alone Complex

The series follows “Public Security Section 9,” a government organization specializing in investigating cybercrime and terrorism. A division that doesn’t publicly exist as they report directly to the Prime Minister. The first episode starts with a hostage situation that Section 9 is called in to handle. The police and military are already involved and from there you follow Section 9 Chief Aramaki navigating through the mixed signals of the political chain of command in order for him to determine if and what kind of action must be taken. Through the dialog you get an understanding of Chief Aramaki’s respect from both the police and the military and a taste of his relationships with military officials, who find it hard to tell him the truth.

“The Truth” seems to be elusive in the world of GitS: SAC. The main plot revolves around this hacker dubbed the name “The Laughing Man.” He, or she, becomes legendary for kidnapping the president of nanomachine company on live television 6 years prior to the start of the show. At the start of the show, the Laughing Man makes a return but nobody is sure if it’s the original or a series of copycats, as the motive for the new crimes don’t appear to match the initial incident. Not only can The Laughing Man not be trusted, the same can be said of the government officials. A large part of the show involves Section 9 uncovering secret truths of officials within the government and depending on the repercussions, deciding how or whether to act on them. As a result, it seems like the only “believers” of truth are the agents of Section 9, as they don’t have political or monetary ambitions and are motivated only out of justice. It’s pretty convenient that all the protagonists are 100% good guys, but it’s sort of at the expense that nobody outside of the organization can be trusted.

The Tachikoma of Stand Alone Complex

One of the most surprising subplots of the show involves the Tachikoma robots. Initially, I believed that these AI robot “think tank” companions, with bubbly voices, seemed little more than the “cute anthropomorphic character” anime trope. The stereotypical cute characters that tend to provide a bit of comic relief to contrast the dark situations of the show, as well as serving for more merchandise to sell. By the halfway point in the series, I better understood that the what purpose the Tachikoma served in the story.

At the start of the series, you learn that Tachikoma are experimental robots that Section 9 begins to work into their missions. Members of the Section 9 unit can bark commands to Tachikoma and they’ll understand and carry out their orders accordingly. These “think tanks” offer stealth reconnaissance and heavy artillery when situations escalate. In dangerous situations, the Tachikoma are essentially disposable and since they share a hive-mind AI and their bodies can simply be replaced if destroyed. It doesn’t stop there, as we eventually discover that with extended exposure to people and new experiences, the Tachikoma learn and start to display signs of individuality. Section 9 must then evaluate the potential danger of working with robots that can evaluate situations and as well as act on their inhibitions.

What I love about this subplot is how it’s presented – in details sprinkled in across the series. Early on, the Tachikoma are a bit clumsy and ineffective but as they grow with experience, their role on the team becomes more seamless within each mission they take on. Initially I thought the Tachikoma dialog was kind of useless and annoying but it becomes clearer that it’s showing their child-like curiosity of the world, as they understand more every time they’re “set loose” in the real world. Their usage becomes so effective within Section 9’s missions because they help mitigate risks and can function autonomously. They can preemptively stake out a situation and capture a suspect even if a Section 9 agent hasn’t yet arrived at the scene.

As big as an advantage the Tachikoma are, at a point in the story they’re no longer in use. I expected that the Tachikoma made Section 9’s jobs easier but the team is just as strong without them. The stakes become higher when the main characters become more at risk in their encounters and must attack enemies head on. What I like about how they wrote the characters for this part of the show is that it showed to me that although their job became easier with the help of the robots, they didn’t allow them to be a crutch and they didn’t complain about not having them when situations were rough. It’s like they saw the Tachikoma strictly as a tool. Which is inspiring from the human perspective because you shouldn’t feel limited when you don’t have the best tool for a job. But from the robot’s perspective, a bit depressing to only be thought of just a tool when you’re just coming to grips with your own identity.

It’s a beautiful show. Check it out! I didn’t even get into the soundtrack by Yoko Kanno, which I listened to religiously for years despite only ever watching a few episodes of the show.

Gallery

Links

• “Tachikomatic Days” series on YouTube
• Watch “Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex” on Hulu
• Watch “Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex” on Steam

The post New Love for ‘Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex’ appeared first on blog.sokay.net.

I’ve probably spent more time creating Sokay clothing and other merchandise than I should have been doing. I’m supposed to be making more games, right??? But you know, I have fun doing it! Can’t help myself. Last week, we exhibited our VR music visualizer Raybeem at an art show in Downtown Los Angeles – Super Future by Futra. Since we were showing some Sokay stuff out in public, I took the opportunity to try to sell some Sokay shirts, at least put them out in front of people. This got me thinking of the journey of this Sokay clothing experiment.

Back in 2012, when we were getting close to the release of Donut Get!, I became obsessed with creating merchandise for the game. Even longer ago, a friend of mine had pitched me this idea of creating mini-games that were tied to the designs of shirts he was making. I thought it was a great idea but I took forever to finish games, it wasn’t an idea I thought could actually follow through with. I think this was before we even finished our second game LUV Tank, so I probably wasn’t in the mindset of making bite-sized games at this point. I revisited this idea with Donut Get! – could I sell a shirt for a game that I was essentially giving away for free?

Donut Get! was my first serious attempt at trying to make some money with our games. Traditionally, internet culture said that Flash games were free. That was the world we grew up in, earning money was sort of a fantasy. Some people were selling the rights to their games to online gaming portals, but that wasn’t an interest of mine. Online stores like Steam were just starting to open up to more developers, but the short experience of Donut Get! didn’t seem like something I could sell unless I expanded it even further. So if I had to release Donut Get! for free, could I make some dough by selling merchandise related to our products?

Doing research on T-shirt creator forums, I quickly discovered that it was a complicated process. Initially, I was trying to do the shirts myself but I either had to invest in a vinyl cutter or silk-screening equipment. Either way, I would be out of a lot of time and money figuring these things out, in addition to not having the space for all this equipment. I buckled and figured out that I needed to order from a professional. I ended up ordering about 35 shirts from a company online, doing DTG (direct-to-garment) to allow us to use the Donut Get! “Box Art” image, drawn by the homie Matthew Harris.

This fat stack is just a portion of all the Donut Get! shirts I ordered way back when.

At the time, I was hosting Sokay Play as part of a monthly show I was doing with my homies at the Downtown Los Angeles Art Walk. My thinking at the time was that I had a space to sell these shirts to people during the art walk. Unfortunately this arrangement ended the month that we finally finished Donut Get! I sold a handful of shirts to the homies during that event but I was mostly occupied with exhibiting the game to spectators. Indulging in the excitement of years of work coming to a conclusion.

Unfortunately that was the final Sokay Play during the DTLA art walk! Not having a shop, I tried a bit to sling the rest of the shirts to homies and family. Some people bought some, some people just wanted a hook up. I was happy to just have people sport something with the Sokay name on it. I took it as a loss, of course, but worth it for the greater good of promoting Donut Get! I didn’t dwell too much on it since I had quickly moved on to the development of The Crazy Program, our first game designed from the ground-up for mobile.

I’m no Daymond John, I realize I’m not a fashion designer so I haven’t been completely confident in the shirts I’ve come up with. Creating shirts and merchandise is fun to me though, as I mentioned earlier. Wouldn’t it be great if I could just make up some designs, and make shirts without a huge investment? Soon after that experience I discovered Spreadshirt, which has an on-demand service. I wasn’t happy with the quality of their printed shirts, which were sorta like iron-on looking, but their vinyl shirts were pretty good. It was quick and easy as well, and they offer you simple online shop. This gave me the opportunity to start experimenting more with clothing designs, all I needed was vector art. I love making vector art! No problem.

While I was experimenting with the Sokay Go! concept (creating HTML5 mini games for phone browsers), I had another shot at Sokay merchandise with Spreadshirt. I pulled the “Donut King” achievement icon from Donut Get! and turned that into a shirt and hat design. This turned out to be a hit, with people asking me “Where’d you get that hat?” Later on, I did a series of hats and shirts based on parody logos of Sega and Capcom, two companies that heavily inspired the feel we try to achieve in Sokay games like Thugjacker and LUV Tank. Our way of showing respect to the Gaming Gods. Practically anyone that’s grown up in LA has some love for the Raiders, no matter what city they move to. To show our LA roots, I designed a graphic which is a cross between the Raiders logo and “The Captain” boss from Thugjacker – both have eye-patches and I switched the swords to The Captain’s iconic hammer.

The Sokay x Raider design.

Now that Raybeem seems to be something that we’ll be demoing around Southern California often, I once again have an outlet that gives us an opportunity to put our merchandise in front of potential customers. In fact, during the first art show showing of Raybeem we ended up selling a Sokay x Sega hat to a total stranger. Just a dude that wanted to show support and have a hat nobody else had. That’s the coolest thing ever.

Big ups to the homies that bought our Sokay hat and tore up the dance floor in Raybeem! Taken at @GarageGalleryLA

So writing this post has made me realize that I should start experimenting more with one off designs more often, to try to gauge interest of people. For the Raybeem booth, I created a special Donut King shirt for the team working the booth. This one has a male (yellow and purple) and female (pink and white) variation. Cop one yourself at http://shop.sokay.net!

Sokay Shirts available when you try Raybeem at an event!

Thanks for your support! Raybeem’s coming soon, stay tuned!

Follow us on Instagram @sokaylife.

The post The Sokay Clothing Journey so Far appeared first on blog.sokay.net.

For the most part I’ve been gravitating towards Nintendo’s games. These tend to be well designed and easy to jump in and jump out, without lengthy tutorials. You don’t have to put in heavy work to get some joy out of it. The multiplayer gameplay is also brings me back to Nintendo’s games, since it seems like the entire game industry outside of Nintendo has forgotten why game systems have multiple controllers. More often these days, I find myself gravitating towards older games.

My main game of the moment is Final Fantasy VII.

These fun moments make me smile.

I played through this game when it released. I was 13 years old. After playing Chrono Trigger and Super Mario RPG, I was hooked on RPGs. I couldn’t get enough RPGs and this was by far my most anticipated game. And what do you know? It actually exceeded my expectations. I long considered this my favorite game of all time. This fact was definite until I played through Xenogears and Ico. Then, it became a toss-up. Over the years I’ve dabbled in emulated versions of FF7 but never replaying it more than the first 8 or so hours, which the first arc of the story within Midgar. It took me about 60 hours to beat it the first time, so it’s a relatively small chunk of the game.

I’ve been replaying Final Fantasy VII as the newly released PS4 version. One thing that’s made it easier to get back into is that I can stream the game from my PS4 to my Vita. Now I don’t have to be on the couch, I can be anywhere in the house. I’m trying to make a habit of playing a bit in bed before I go to sleep. Being able to resume exactly where you left off at anytime makes it a lot easier to pace through.

There’s memories. There’s hype. In fact, there’s so much hype around FF7 that it made me unsure if the game was as amazing as it’s remembered as. I’m about 15 hours in, and so far I think it’s clearly as great as its reputation suggests.

Graphical Powerhouse aka Final Fantasy VII

I still can’t believe how far ahead of the game Square was in their graphical presentation with this game. Even considering Donkey Kong Country was released a few years earlier, and Super Mario RPG the year before, there’s just an insane amount of high-quality, hand-crafted artistry in this game. It would be years before any other game studio could come close to their mastery of 3D art.

It could be seen that the popularity for FF7 would be based on it’s graphical fidelity which hadn’t been seen before in 1997. Fortunately beyond the graphics, there’s the same great gameplay, music and story that the series had always been known for. Yes, this is my love letter to Final Fantasy VII. You’ve got me! But I just can’t get over how much they nailed this game, and failed FF8 and many other games after.

I’m digging that the plot and characters are simple and archetypal enough to understand quickly. You’re lead into new scenarios every hour or so which are unique sidestories in new areas but still support the main goal (i.e. saving the planet). The characters aren’t too sure why they should continue their journey, but their leader Cloud holds them together. It’s borderline hokey but I think some of the charm and believability is due to it not being so completely cold and serious as later games in the series got.

The gameplay is so on point with a simple but highly polished and balanced battle system. Add to that the excellent Materia system and it’s easy to see why Square tried so hard to 1up it in later games. Battles can become tiring in areas with super high encounter rates, but overall I love the difficulty and how it still keeps you on your toes.

Anyway, so far so good. Right before FF7, I played through about half of the PS1 version of Chrono Trigger, on my PSVITA. Another classic masterpiece. An epic story that moves along at a much faster pace than I remembered. It reminds me to keep players surprised and looking forward to what may happen next. It’s interesting to compare and contrast the battle systems of Chrono Trigger and FF7.

Be Big Boss in Metal Gear Solid 5.

Either Bloodborne or Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain is my most played game this year. I dumped hours and hours into this game, sweat dripping from my brow as I attempted to infiltrate bases undetected. These games are similar in that they are all about mastery of the gameplay mechanics. Using the environment to your advantage. And adapting to bad situations on the fly. I’ve finished every mainline Metal Gear Solid game and this game by far has the most polished control. For the first time I had no qualms with the quirkiness and felt like it was completely my fault when I get spotted by a guard. As much time as I spent with it, I only made it about halfway through the main missions. As the missions got more difficult and time consuming, I decided I needed a break. My main complaint is that I wish there were more story sequences, instead of the heavy reliance on cassette tapes for story.

On Wii U I’ve been playing a bit of Super Mario Maker. Not as much as I imagine I would because I mainly just play it when friends come over to show them what it’s about. It’s a fun idea and it’s a good social activity to sit around the TV and pass the controller around, trying to beat the 100 Mario Challenge. The interface is great, with a heavy throwback vibe to Mario Paint. Simply brilliant execution — I wish I had something like this when I was a kid. My favorite stages are the puzzle-like ones that make you rethink all your abilities as Mario. This game even adds some new abilities (like the spiky shell helmet!).

I played a good amount of Splatoon for Wii U as well. I went from “I could care less” to “Wow, what an amazing game!” overnight with this one.  On first glance, it looked like another multiplayer game I’d play for about an hour and get bored of. After playing the online network test for this game, I couldn’t get enough. Totally hooked. This game works great for me, a completely casual online gamer. I can jump in and out really quickly, and don’t have to pout about getting headshotted every 10 seconds like most online shooters. Brilliant game that I keep coming back to. The artwork is great as well.

Beyond those, I played a bit of Monster Hunter 4 on 3DS with coworkers. I played a bit of Final Fantasy 14 online with coworkers as well, only for a month though. I love these games but they’re such a commitment. I finished Escape Goat 2, which is a really amazing puzzle platformer. Not enough games that make you think out there! I played through Child of Eden, searching for inspiration for Raybeem. I played through The Order: 1886, a game that had a lot of potential but is still the best looking (consistently) game I’ve ever played. I just couldn’t get into FarCry 4. I fell in love with Yakuza 4! And a buncha other stuff.

That’s it! Had to let that out. These days I feel like I have to rationalize the time I spend playing games by studying them and finding out what I enjoy about them. It helps me out when I feel like my ideas have grown dull and I need a bit of revitalization. The breadth of games available nowadays is wider than ever so it always seems to strange to me to not have a game that I feel like playing for any particular moment. It’s easier for me to jump into something familiar since I don’t want to spend times learning complex systems for games I’m unfamiliar with. It’s a time sink and can be stressful when things don’t click from the get-go. But if I continue to stay in my same comfort zone, there may be a game that I’d love waiting for me that I’d never get a chance to check out. At a time, I had no interest in RPGs. Now many of my most favorite games are RPGs. I need to maintain that sort of open-mindedness and patience.

The post What I’ve Been Playing: Dec. 31, 2015 appeared first on blog.sokay.net.

An Example of UGUI Button OnClick events

The beauty of having this drag and drop functionality is that it makes it easier to modify the logic of your project without having to dig into code to make changes. By partnering this with a set of specialized components, you can easily create a system for modifying aspects of your project without having to dig into code.

It’s actually quite easy to setup something like this for your own project. This is great for UI Events but also for game events (collecting items, level complete, etc.). To accomplish this all you need is to make use of the UnityEvent class. Just to be clear, these aren’t the same as the standard C# Event system.

Here’s a simple example of how it works. First I setup a new scene with a CustomEvent gameobject and a DemoScript gameobject. The CustomEvent object will have the interface to setting up events to be triggered. The DemoScript object has a script with the public functions that will be called from the CustomEvent gameobject.

I created a CustomEvent class to drop onto the CustomEvent gameobject. This contains the code for setting up the UnityEvents. Here’s what it looks like:

Notice that you’ll need to import the UnityEngine.Events as well as the System namespace (for serialization). First, you’ll need to create a type for your event. In this example I gave them the type of “TestEvent“. Next, you’ll need to create a variable for each event that you want to trigger. For this example, I used the names “SelectEvent“, “LevelCompleteEvent“, and “PowerUpEvent“.

Setting up the events automatically generates this interface within Unity.

Next I’ll setup the DemoScript class and drop that onto the DemoScript gameobject. Here’s what that looks like:

From there, go back to your CustomEvent gameobjects, and hit the “+” icon for a blank slot to drop your DemoScript object into. Once you drop your object on there, the function dropdown will allow you to select a public function on any component of the gameobject.

An example of the event dropdown.

You may notice that there are some types of functions that don’t show up. I believe the main reason is just that the interface isn’t compatible with certain types of function parameters. From my understanding, it works with these common types:

• No parameter
• Boolean
• Float
• Integer
• String

I’ve managed to get around it not supporting types like Vector3 by using another public variable in the targeted object’s scripts that can hold a reference to a targeted position. In the case of using a Color as a parameter, I’ll just refer instead to an integer index of a Color List or Array.

Here’s an example I setup for this demonstration:

Event calls to functions with different parameter types.

Now that the events are setup, you need to Invoke them. I added a simple function to check for a click in the CustomEvent class’s update loop to demonstrate how this works.

So when clicking, you should see something like this in the console:

Debug.Log() calls triggered by a click.

Similar to standard Events, remember to check if the event is null before making a call to it. You don’t want it to throw an error if there’s nothing assigned to the event.

One downside to this is that if you setup a bunch of events in your project and you end up wanting to change the type of event for some reason down the line, you could possibly lose all of these connections. It can be frustrating and tedious to re-set all of those connections.

And that’s it! You can download the complete example scripts below. Let me know if you’ve got any issues, I’ll see if I can offer some clarification.

Peace!

Links:

• Download the complete: CustomEvent.cs , DemoScript.cs
• Download Unity UI Source code
• UnityEvent documentation

The post Custom Drag and Drop Events in Unity appeared first on blog.sokay.net.

Please don’t take this guide as the absolute truth. The tools are constantly changing so some stuff may have been correct at some point but wrong at the present. Also, in the future, some things will definitely change. This is only intended as a starting point, a primer. If anything’s wrong, please let me know. There’s a lot to learn!

The Hardware

Here’s a quick rundown of the hardware that you may need and what role they play in development.

Samsung Gear VR

The Samsung Gear VR consumer edition

You probably already know this by now, but the Gear VR is a VR headset in which you plug a specific Samsung phone into and it becomes a standalone VR device. With hardware manufactured by Samsung, and software by Oculus, it was first introduced Fall of 2014 and a few models have been released since then.

There are 3 versions of the Gear VR:

• First Innovator Edition: Compatible with the Samsung Note 4 phone.
• Second Innovator Edition: Compatible with the Samsung Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge phones.
• Gear VR Consumer Edition: Compatible with the Samsung Note 5, the S6, the S6 edge and the S6 edge+ phones.

The consumer edition is what’s currently available in stores like Best Buy and Amazon right now. You may be able to pick up the older versions on the cheap on eBay or whatever.

Gear VR offers an experience way beyond that of something like Google Cardboard because the Gear VR has dedicated sensors for making head-tracking more accurate and custom software. This helps to ensure a smooth framerate and high fidelity experience.

Click here for more information on the Gear VR.

Oculus DK2

It’s not absolutely necessary, but it’s incredibly helpful to have an Oculus DK2 for development. During development, you’ll be able to preview your application’s functionality in VR directly from Unity. This is a huge time-saver. Otherwise you’ll need to build to the device every time you change something to get a feel for how it looks in VR.

I’m currently using a Microsoft Surface 3 with Intel integrated graphics that doesn’t work very will with the DK2. During the development of Raybeem, I just used a mouselook script on my camera to test the scene during development. It worked well enough to get by since the interaction in Raybeem is really minimal. I wouldn’t recommend it, but it’s possible to get by without it!

Nvidia/ATI Graphics card with 2-3 HDMI outs (preferable).

If you’re planning on using a DK2, as you should, you’ll need to have a decent graphics card. Preferably more than decent. Oculus recommends a NVIDIA GTX 970 / AMD 290 card for gaming on the Rift, you’d probly want something similar for development as well.

As I mentioned before, I think you’re out of luck if you don’t have an ATI or Nvidia graphics card in your machine. At the very least, I had no luck with my Surface 3. Don’t be crazy like me and come prepared!

All you need is a video out for your monitor (DVI or HDMI I figure) and an HDMI-out for the DK2 headset.

Keep in mind though, if you’re building for Gear VR. It doesn’t matter how underpowered your development hardware is in the end, as long as it runs well on the device.

Bluetooth controller

Moga Pro controller

It’s a good idea to have some sort of Bluetooth controller. I personally use the Moga Pro Power controller. Oculus also says that the Steelseries Android controllers work, but I figure any Bluetooth controller with twin-sticks and a proper HID controller implementation should work fine.

Installing the Runtime

Oculus Config Utility, installed with the runtime.

To use the DK2 on your computer, you’ll need to install the Oculus runtime. The runtime is basically the drivers that you need for your computer to recognize the hardware and run Oculus VR apps.

You can get the latest runtime and other downloads at: https://developer.oculus.com/downloads/

Get Unity 5

Lucky for you, Unity 5 now has VR support built in. Even the free version of Unity! Pretty sweet, don’t you think?

Get Unity 5 at http://unity3d.com/

Get Android SDK

You’ll need the Android SDK for any Android development. Gear VR is still Android development, ok? You can download the SDK at: http://developer.android.com/sdk/index.html. Ignore the Android Studio stuff, you just need the SDK tools. Make note of the folder you install the Android SDK to. You’ll have to point Unity to the folder, and you’ll need to use the command line to run adb commands from time to time.

After installing the SDK, make sure you have an appropriate SDK version installed. The minimum you’ll need is Android 4.4 ‘Kit Kat’ (API level 19). ‘Kit Kat’ is the default OS for Note 4 phones. Run the SDK Manager to pick and choose which SDK components you want installed. Just get what you think you’ll need because all of the components can take up a lot of HD space.

Gear VR dev

To run a VR enabled app on the Gear VR, you’ll first need to sign your Unity application. This is similar to iOS development but a way more straightforward process.

To sign Gear VR apps, all you need is an OSIG file. You get this by getting your phone’s serial number or IMEI and submitting it to a form on the Oculus developers website. There are full instructions on how to get your OSIG on that page.

Enter your serial number or IMEI on the Oculus developers site to get your OSIG file.

After getting your OSIG file, you must place it in a particular folder in your Unity project. The folder is:

• UnityProjectName/Assets/Plugins/Android/assets/

You can rename the OSIG file to anything you want. You’ll need an OSIG for each device you plan on testing with and you can place as many OSIGs as you’d like in the folder. I usually rename the OSIG to tell which device it’s tied to.

Setup Unity Project

Enable Virtual Reality under Project Settings in Unity.

The Gear VR support is built in so all you need to do is enable VR support from within Unity 5. With this enabled, standard Unity cameras will function as VR cameras when running on a VR device. It’s pretty brilliant.

I found some recommended settings in a PDF Oculus used to bundle in the mobile SDK. These settings may exist in a more recent doc, but I haven’t come across them. This is a good starting point for Gear VR dev though.

Platform settings

I think these settings are all right aside from the Device filter supporting x86. It’s probably best to go with just ARM since all the supported devices are ARM.

Quality settings

For additional integration with the Oculus store and other functionality, there is also the Oculus Utilities for Unity 5 package that you can download from the Oculus developer downloads page.

If for some reason you’re still on Unity 4, you’ll have to use the Oculus prefabs from the Unity 4.x Legacy Integration package on the Oculus downloads page.

VR Development in Unity

An example of one of my VR test scenes.

While in Unity, you can use your DK2 to get a preview of how your scene looks in VR. Hitting play on the scene will beam the view directly to the VR headset. I typically layout a test scene with a checkerboard ground and box primitives to get a sense of scale when starting development.

If you don’t have a VR headset handy, a mouselook script on the camera is a poorman’s solution for testing within the editor.

Build to Gear VR

This what you came here for, right? If you’ve setup the project properly, all you need to do is build to the phone in Unity’s Android platform mode and you’ll be good to go. When the “Insert Device” screen comes up, pop the Gear VR in the phone and check out your creation.

If you get messages about the application suddenly quitting, 9 times out of 10 it’s an OSIG/signing related issue. See if you can get a simple scene with a few boxes or a checkerboard floor running to rule out other conflicts you might have.

Build to PC

There’s no trick to running VR builds on PC. Just switch the Unity platform to PC and you should be good to go! As long as the DK2 is connected and the proper runtime is going, a PC build will just work.

That’s it for Today!

This is a quick overview of how to get started with Gear VR development. If there are any questions or suggestions for things I left out, please let me know.

Good luck!

Links

Here are some links that may be handy during your journey.

• Oculus Forum : Bustling community of Oculus enthusiasts.
• Unity 5 Manual – VR Overview : Some details on how Unity’s VR camera works.
• Unity VR Forum : The official Unity forum
• Oculus on Reddit
• Gear VR on Reddit

The post Getting Started w/ Oculus & Gear VR Development in Unity appeared first on blog.sokay.net.

Raybeem! The first virtual reality concept from Sokay. It’s a step towards my longtime dream of creating a music visualizer. I spent countless hours gazing at the Milkdrop visualizer in Winamp back in the day. I had no clue how it worked – back when I just starting to dive in Flash ActionScript.

Here’s my homie giving Raybeem a shot on the Samsung Gear VR.

My concept for Raybeem started with imagining how great it could be if you didn’t need another person to give you a personal lightshow if you were at a rave. And what if you could take all of that great visual and aural stimuli with you anywhere? What if you never had to leave your couch to experience a spectacular show?

Above is a screen-capture of the playback controls. In the prototype, you can cycle through 5 embedded tracks. I tested using some of my favorite copyrighted tracks. I also got permission from the homies Eezir and Cryptic Circuitry to use their music in the final build. Each track has a different effect on the environment around you. Eventually I’d like the user to be able to load in their own library.

Here is a rough video demonstrating what it looks like on a 2D screen, from within Unity:

Themes & Environments

I designed Raybeem with the intention to allow the user to cycle through different themed environments on the fly. This allows the user to match their mood or the mood of their music at any a given time. My first idea was to create a relaxing environment for meditation or laying back and gazing at the stars.

Here’s a concept I sketched out:

I mocked up a prototype of this scene, roughing out the objects to get a sense of the scale and to validate the idea. It was promising.

I wasn’t quite sure what the exact visual style should be. Here’s a vector drawing I mocked up in Adobe Illustrator. I was leaning toward an abstract direction. I wanted shapes and colors to define the space rather than more distinct objects. I wanted to make use of negative space. The homie Gus suggested I take a look Psychonaut’s Black Velvetopia level for inspiration. It was a great suggestion since the blacklight stylized textures gave me ideas about how to appoach a grass texture for the scene. I’ll dive into it at a later time.

Eventually I ended up with this blue theme…

This is the final look of the “default” theme.

I started out by mimicking the one of the default XBMC/Kodi visualizers, which is 2 vertical audio waveforms on a solid black background. Once I had that, my twist was making the waveforms wrap around you in 360°. White wave lines on a solid black background was too harsh on my eyes after a while so I softened it up with a vibrant (familiar) blue color. A dash of soft gradient to add a bit of depth. I dropped in the particle system from my temple scene. I then added a flashing wireframe and some floating triangles to liven it up a bit.

Here are some other concepts I had to get my brain churned at the beginning of the project:

This is a concept using 3d models for controls.

Above is an example of flat styled controls

Leap Motion 3D Jam

I submitted the Raybeem prototype to the Leap Motion 3D Jam a few weeks ago. If you aren’t familiar with Leap Motion, it’s a hand tracking device similar to the Xbox Kinect.

This is an example of the Leap Motion being used in unison with the Oculus DK2.

I ended up implementing the Leap Motion at the last moment. I waited until I got an app into an acceptable state as a standalone VR application before jumping into the Leap Motion stuff. I used the pass-through footage capability to superimpose your hands into the scene. I ran into some left/right-eye misalignment issues and some visual artifacts that a user pointed out to me with this screencap:

Here’s a screengrab from a Raybeem user.

I’m guessing there’s a straightforward fix to it, everything I built had this kind of artifact, I can probably find out info on a fix digging through their forum.

The hand support was optional, moving your hands will leave a yelllow trail. Pretty neat. But the scale was way off! Haha. I had to just submit it as is because I had to sleep at some point!

The competition was a good goalpost to shoot towards. I got enough work into it to prove out the concept without getting overly burned out on it. As for the other submissions, there are a lot of strong projects that make much better use of the Leap Motion tech than Raybeem so I haven’t gotten cocky and started popping bottles up in here. But we got a mention on the Leap Motion blog! With 189 entries, that’s worth something, right? Haha!

Inspirations

Child of Eden(left) and Rez(right) a la Tetsuya Mizuguchi.

In addition to all the Winamp music listening, Milkdrop gazing, years of reckless raving… my heaviest influences aside from those is easily Rez and Child of Eden. I was 18 years old when I first played Rez and it has left a crater sized imprint on me. I wasn’t able to get my hands on an Xbox to replay Rez HD (although I do have Rez for PS2 buried somewhere). I did the next best thing and replayed Child of Eden on PS3 for a healthy dose of motivation. Child of Eden has some jaw-dropping effects that I’d love to attempt to replicate. I was ecstatic to see just today that Tetsuya Mizuguchi‘s porting Rez to PlaystationVR as Rez Infinite. Overjoyed!

Links:

• http://lightshow-vr.com
• Raybeem’s 3D Jam entry page
• Raybeem mention on the Leap Motion blog

The post Raybeem – VR Music Visualizer from Sokay appeared first on blog.sokay.net.

For the first issue of the Zine we interviewed the homie, Gabriel Gaete (aka Gabotron). Check out it:

Photo of Gabriel Gaete (aka Gabotron) by Stephanie Sparks

So from my perspective, you do art and animation. Music and storytelling. How would you describe what it is that you do?

I use art, animation, music and storytelling and fuse it all together to create work intended to convey, explain and communicate concepts, ideas and information. I create work for myself and for clients but it all stems from the same communicative standpoint, although the understandability of my projects can range from, “Aha! I get it!” to “What the hell did I just watch?” it all has some kind of message to convey. For my clients I have to be very clear in communicating certain information. For my personal projects I use more abstract means to communicate ideas and concepts that can be more vague and difficult to understand, but represent the weird stuff that goes on in my brain.

I also take visual notes, I started taking visual notes in my community college classes and I found it as an invaluable and powerful tool to retain information. From client work, to games conferences to personal work I’ve created many doodle filled notes that really help me in synthesizing information.

Artwork by Gabotron

What are some sources of your inspiration?

I’m really inspired by brain science, culture, human interactions, different perspectives, experiential video games, the way music affects us, animals, plants and my cats.

What kinds of obstacles have you encountered with expressing your creativity? And how have you overcome them?

I’d say my biggest obstacle is having ideas that might be a few steps ahead of what I’m actually able to do, whether because of time, budget or skill level. A lot of the ideas that float around my head are for interactive media, unfortunately I’m constrained by my lack of skills in coding and development. But luckily I can somewhat compensate by being able to communicate some of these ideas using motion graphics and art. But the bigger dream is to let people interact with my concepts. As far as overcoming this constraint, I’m still trying to figure that out, but for now I’m working within my constraints always with my sights set on the bigger picture.

Some artwork for Monkey Side IPA.

I feel like you have a positive outlook on the world and that it’s reflected in your work.  Is that your intent?

I do have a positive outlook so I think by default my work tends to take on a tone of positivity. I would like some of my future projects to take on more of a neutral tone, but most likely they will skew towards the positive.

An example of Gabriel’s recipe illustrations

Last I heard, you were working on a book of recipes. What’s that about and what’s going on with it?

I was born in Chile, my momma makes excellent Chilean food. So I’m trying to capture all of my mom’s recipes in a visual form so my sisters and I can make her recipes in the future. Once in a while, I’d bring over my notepad to my parent’s house, and while my mom is cooking, I take visual notes of the ingredients, methods and techniques. I still have quite a few recipes to jot down, and when I get a few more drawn my plan is to draw and write a small cookbook and share it with the world.

Our paths first crossed during the Global Game Jam, how did you become involved with that?

I had recently become interested in the idea of making games around that time, was it 5 years ago?! Anyways, I was playing around with some interactive stuff on my own, when I heard about the game jam. I was a little scared and intimidated by the idea, but it turned out to be a really enlightening experience. I got to meet some really awesome people (Bryson included) and one can really learn something about themselves and about humans in general. The things I’ve learned in those experiences have really carried through in other aspects of my life.

An image from MOON.

What’s your most memorable project?

I would say TREEE is my most memorable project. It’s a collection of little wordless comics, accented occasionally by small musical moments. One of the stories, “MOON” is an interactive story/musical instrument, although crude and somewhat simple on a technical level, it is representative of the kind of projects I’d like to create in the future. It’s a blend of all the things I do; art, music, storytelling and animation with an extra element of interaction, an ingredient I’d like most of my future projects to have too.

Where would people go if they wanted to see your stuff online?
You can find a portfolio of some personal and professional work over at www.gabotron.com and find the TREEE comics over at www.TREEE.me .

So that’s all for the interview, here are some links:

• Gabotron.com – the work of Gabotron
• Gabotron’s Twitter
• MOON – interactive musical toy
• Sokay Zine

The post Interview: Gabriel Gaete aka Gabotron appeared first on blog.sokay.net.

We’ve gone and done it. We went backwards from the internet to print. Introducing… Sokay Zine!

Download Issue #1 PDF at http://zine.sokay.net

Sokay Zine (zine as in magazine) is an idea that had been tumbling around in my head for a while. It’s a 20 page 4.5×4.5″ booklet. During the development of Donut Get! I was printing out a ton of flyers for our monthly LA Art Walk show, Sokay Play. To come up with the art for the flyers, I was digging through folders of old art work gathering dust on my hard drives. Looking through all of the unseen or unfinished assets got me thinking. There was a ton of stuff that I forgot we even made. I figured something should’ve been done with it.

When I was out on the streets hustling Donut Get! and Sokay, I made a buncha flyers, stickers and buttons. It felt good to be making physical stuff again. Reminded me of drawing on line paper in class back in the day. I’d seen people online making zines about things they’re fans of and I thought, “Why can’t I do something like this for Sokay?”

A Sunsoft newsletter from Summer 1988

I remembered back in the 80s and 90s game companies often used quarterly print newsletters to reach their audiences and let them know more about their games coming out. Nintendo Power started out as one of these. This was another source of inspiration.

The making of our first game Thugjacker became the focus of the zine. We made Thugjacker before I had started blogging so it was a fresh topic to write about. To put it together, spent a ton of time digging up artwork, exporting frames of animation out of the game, looking at cut content and trying to piece together the story. It was a challenge to put it to words and be concise with it (unlike my blog posts).

Example of a Japanese guide for Faxanadu (1987-ish)

My last blog post was a review of The Untold History of Japanese Developers. On the behind the scenes DVD I got glimpses of just how in depth the Japanese game world’s print industry was. You could find a thick strategy guide for just about any game you could imagine. Seeing how they laid out game levels in those books became inspiration for my “walkthrough” of the first stage of Thugjacker in the zine.

So after assembling the zine digitally, I had to print these things out. I had a short timeline since I was aiming to print about 100 for my trip to Bitsummit in Kyoto, Japan. So I opted to print them in my bedroom rather than look for a professional printer. For 2 weeks, I was swimming in CMYK. I learned a lot through trial and error but I’ve got a decent system for printing up batches when I get a chance. Up to now I believe I’ve printed about 160 copies but I’m always short. Hit me up if you’re interested in a copy! Still need to look into a printshop though!

So take a look and let us know what you think.

• Download the Sokay Zine Issue 01 PDF at http://zine.sokay.net

The post Sokay Zine – Issue 01 – “The Making of Thugjacker” pt 1 appeared first on blog.sokay.net.