Updates based on testing session

Week 13- Updates/ Planned updates based on the testing session. 

The last Devlog of this project will talk about the testing session that took place on the online tutorial for KIT109 class. It will also talk about the implementation of updates to the game based on feedback received during the testing session.

This week work started with the online session in Discord (Online communication platform), where students from KIT109 class worked together to show their project prototypes (DemoGame) and test other students' demos. Also, the students filled a feedback form where constructive feedback were gathered to help the developers polish their final games.

For this project, the feedback received was positive. I collected information that highlighted many issues that needed to be improved. 

The information showed that the game needed improvement on areas such as : 

• Adding a “next level” feature for the end game of the levels, instead of just having a “play again” and “back to menu” options.
• Improvement on the score for the player to see their best score.
• Improvement on the terrain of the map (bugs on the level 1)
• Improvement on the visual elements of the game (water under the bridge).
• A glitch on the player game object, where the wheels of the vehicle become spinning multiple times and lifting the vehicle losing control. 
• UI canvas buttons dont work ( volume and the exit button on the main menu).

The next update made to the project consisted in adding a higher score system. Before this week's update the game score system was based on showing the current coins count of the player interacting with the gameobject “coins”. During the testing session a student suggested implementing something more than just showing the coins count.

To overcome this issue I came up with an idea of creating a highscore system. To do this, I created a new TMP_Text and added a script to save the best score using PlayerPrefs. It will be shown to the player after completing the levels, in the bottom part of the UI canvas (Gameover).

The project also improved some elements on the terrain map; a plank on the bridge would be rigid and stop the player (vehicle) momentum. The issue was spotted during the testing tutorial where multiple testers came across the bug. To solve this, I delete all Hinge Joint 2D from the plank and add all the components back again. I also made sure that the Hinge 2D was connected properly to the previou plank and the other side of the terrain. 

A feedback provided by a student also suggested changing the materials of the water under the bridge to be more appealing and realistic to the audience. The previous water texture (material) was inspired of a slimy fluid ( previously shown on the last Devlog). This week's work, I created a 2D waterfall to recreate the water under the bridge using sprites and a tilemap. 

For the last part of this week's work, updates on the  vehicle (player's Gameobject) where glitches on the Wheel Joint 2D connector to the chassis of the vehicle were misplaced. Also, adjustments on the damping ratio and frequency were changed to minimise the bug. Although all the work implemented, the glitch still persists. Improvement was but unfortunately I still can not figure it out. In future updates I will be working on this matter and improve some aspects of the player vehicle as well. 

For the volume and exit buttons on the main menu, a script was created to manually adjust the volume and the exit feature. 

Overall, this week work was based on updates and polishing the game project. The feedback from students helped improve the gameplay and discover major issues that testers encountered. I mainly work on those bugs this week and also creating a documentation file for the assignment project.