Over the course of the semester you will work on one programming project in addition to the regular programming assignments. The goal of the project is to develop a game in C# using the XNA Game Studio framework for release on the Xbox Live Marketplace.
The game you create should be able to be released on the Xbox Live Marketplace. This places a few restrictions on the game, both technical and on content including:
Additionally it your game should meet the following requirements:
Each week you will demonstrate or submit a deliverable that shows the progress that you have made on your project since the previous week. For the first four weeks the deliverables consist of each student submitting portions of a design document. For the remainder of the semester the deliverables will consist of a demo of your game on an Xbox in class.
Write a 1 to 3 sentence pitch for a game that 2 to 3 students in this class could develop by the end of the semester. Because of the shortness of the pitch it has to both convey a lot of information quickly and catch a person's attention. This is often accomplished by referring to existing work (existing popular titles, or genres) and how your proposed game inproves on it or distinguishes itself. Please submit your pitch on the course Inquire site before class on Monday January 24th. Also be prepared to share your pitch during class.
Write a 2 to 3 page high level design document for a game that 2 students in this class could develop by the end of the semester. It does not have to be the same game as your pitch. The high level design document describes what the game should be like from the perspective of the user. Your design document should have sections for each of the following:
Create a UML (Unified Modeling Language) diagram of the classes and resources (models, textures, sounds) for a game that 2 students in this class could develop by the end of the semester. It does not have to be a illustrated as a graph (it can just be text), but it should have a node for every C# class in the game (you can exclude classes from the book). Each node should have a description of what the class is for or represents, a list of instance data, and a list of methods (you do not have to include getter and setters). Each method should also have a description of what it does.
Create a design document for the game you and your partner are going to create for your final project. The document should include a pitch, a high-level design, and a low-level design as described above. It should also include a schedule for what will be delivered each week for the remainder of the semester. For each of the weeks starting with Feb 21, Feb 28, Mar 14, Mar 21, Mar 28, Apr 4, Apr 11, and Apr 18 give a high-level description of what will be added to your game that week. The sum of each of these deliverables should be the game as specified in design documents.
Show your game in class on the Xbox and demonstrate that it contains all content specified in the schedule of your final design document. Any changes to the design of the game (either high-level or low-level) should be reflected in changes to the design document. No changes to the design document's schedule should be made for the current week's deliverable.