Reflection on the Titanic VR Project.

The current status of my Titanic VR Story and Jigsaw Puzzle – I have just had a moment of enlightenment and thought of a T_VR as a name for it, is quite satisfying.

I managed to build and nearly complete three key scenes. The Opening Scene, with a huge table in front of the player, is 100% ready. It has all the elements in place: models, audio, interactions, UI (welcome canva audio instructions), a nice book animation and a scene change mechanism. The only thing I could add would be a nice animation – Star Wars style – of the big sign above the table. 

The second scene, which I call the Story Scene, is almost 100% completed. It also has an environment built, sound, interactions with objects on the table and a scene change trigger. What I would like to develop further is the pop-up book. That is the element I especially like and wanted to incorporate in my project. I built the actual book, and added to it models; some of them have animations. My ambition would be to create an even more interesting pop-up book with a lively environment. I am pleased with the look and the feel of two little animated boats and the particle system I added as a smoke from the chimney. 

The third scene of my experience is the jigsaw puzzle element. I am pleased with the way it turned out, with not only all the jigsaw puzzles and a huge Titanic appearing after the task was completed, but also with the style and  the mood of the scene. Fantasy sea animals and fireworks add extra character to that virtual environment I created. 

What needs extra attention is possibly the scale of the jigsaw puzzles as they might be slightly too big for the player when they are grabbed. That influences the game, and also makes it not that easy to complete the puzzle – which is quite ok. I would just want everything worked well in terms of mechanics etc.

The fireworks should be triggered by the completed Titanic, but unfortunately I could not get back to this task due to unforeseen illness and therefore, lack of time and energy to polish details off. Another thing missing and worth adding is the UI informing the player about completed tasks and finishing the game – again, did not manage to work on this element.

Since the project has to be submitted within the next few hours, I need to focus on having the right documentation in place and, if time allows, small necessary corrections and the final build of the game. 

I am planning on working on developing this T_VR experience further over the summer. I would love to see it completed with the fourth scene, called What If. It would be the scene when, rebuilt by the player, Titanic reaches a land, not necessarily NYC, but maybe some exotic island?

Working on this project was quite challenging until May as I didn’t really have any time during the day to focus on studying. Since then, me and my family managed to make child care arrangements allowing me to go to LCC twice a week. Thanks to that I was able to continue with my studies and (almost) finish this project. 

Other obstacles, next to the time shortage, were the equipment efficiency or rather lack of it as the laptop I use is not a VR ready machine. It was struggling and processing data extremely slowly. It is however, the only machine I have for now and I am glad that I managed to build my project on it. 

My skills are also worth mentioning here. I do realise that my work is not always fast as I need to double check, or ask, or search for the right solutions or tutorials, or scripts. I, however feel, and this and the other project I have worked on this term can prove that I have developed as a Virtual Reality Creator. I know that there is still a long way ahead of me to reach the level of the expertise I will be satisfied with, but I am getting there with each step I take, and with each project I complete.

I have created an online photo album called the T_VR Experience that contains photographs and videos of the project at various stages of its development. 

While working on the album, I also made a video which I called a T_VR not-reel as it is 1m34s long and typical reels should be much shorter.

As we are going to present our projects to the group, we were supposed to prepare PowerPoint slides supporting our show. My presentation is available here.