I finally got the server to identify the different users. This is actually really interesting because it now allows me to run different functions for different users. What the code does now is that when a user connects into a room they are given a unique player ID.

So if 2 players join a room the first player will be given 1 and the 2nd player will be given 2. However, if the 2nd player leaves and joins a different room where he is the 1st player, he will be given a 1.

So with that situated, I am now able to have multiple users interacting at the same time because they are all given unique IDs.

Look for a working sample within the week as we just got the player cube and animations done on Friday.

As always, here’s the output trace back statement as a sort of proof.

The user has joined a room and the room as assigned him a new player ID. His user ID number remains the same.

This week we, again, did a lot of “behind the scenes” work.  Kyle worked on calibrating the head-tracking and setting boundaries, Chau worked on the server connections, and Deimler got controlled 3D animations working in Flash.  At our meeting Thursday, we went over everyone’s jobs for the week and then threw around more ideas for game scenarios.  After the meeting, we went through everyone’s code, bringing elements together and fixing some minor issues.  For this next week, we plan on setting up the actual game grid and having some interactions working between the WiiMote and the 3D characters.  Also, Todd is getting started on the Fourmation website, he’ll be putting up more designs this week.

Week 7 Hours

This is me testing out the Adobe Air fullscreen and window transparency capabilities.  We will probably use this in our application, not sure which part yet.  We’ll surprise you.

You can watch a higher-res version on vimeo.

This week I spent entirely too much time in front of my computer.  I really got into building the structure of the game and connecting all of the classes.  Theres a LOT of different pieces that have to fit together to make everything work.

Check out what I’ve done so far and then I’ll explain it:

Download .app for MAC | Download .exe for PC

To run the application on a Mac you need Adobe Air.

…or just look at the sample .swf (it won’t give the same effect as the actual application since but it’s good enough).

…or just look at a screenshot:

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Huge week.  We accomplished a lot of things that have been holding us back.  We starting building the actual game, got the 3D models seamlessly working in Papervision, got a socket server connecting with AS3, and had a great brainstorming session about our game design.  Now that the initial coding structure is complete, we can begin throwing everything together and creating the functionality.

This past Thursday, our whole group met for about 2 hours and discussed possible game scenarios.  We came up with a lot of great ideas, and will flesh them out over the next week or so.  There’s going to be a lot of room for cool effects and interactivity.

For this next week, we will continue to lay the coding foundation for the game, update our server connection tests, and finish more game design.

Updated Gantt Chart

Week 6 Hours

For this week, I got all the characters created and optimized in Maya. I then used a plugin called Collada . It allows you to export 3D models so they can be imported into flash using Papervision as a DAE file. It has come in very handy for 3D objects that are not cubes or other primitive polygons (which is what papervision provides). It also brings in any basic lambert texture that has been placed onto the 3D object in maya (another nice feature).

Once the characters were imported, I put them onto different 3D display holders (called character A, B, C, and D) and put them on their own sides of the cube. I also used papervision’s rotate methods (roll and yaw) to rotate the 3D objects. Papervision is also aware that in 3D space, the user is going to need to operate in the z direction, so they provide a function where you can move objects in the z direction (simply objectName.z+=n), which I used as well.

The example can be found here:

http://thefourmation.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/cube_v3.swf

The characters have all been finalized and given different clothing (just to distinguish them from one another). Below is a render of all 4 of them.

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So i found this thing called SmartFoxServer Bits which automates the basic functions of connect and chat within Action Script 3. It uses components and parameters to adjust everything. This is great because the biggest hurdle was to just get the dang thing to connect.

Here is the swf. I used most of the smartfoxserver assets because this is only a test run of the server running in AS3.

I just noticed Firefox generates an error when the server is down. I will be keeping the server down for most of the week except for saturday night til sunday night for Jervo’s testing.