Monday 16th October Week 5: Insider Test 3 & Shopify store.

TimeQuake Insider Testing Week 3

This week I took part in week 3 of the insider testing for the game Timequake. Some small updates were added to the game but overall the game hadn't changed much. Below are some of my bullet points of feedback that I provided to the development team.

Feedback list:

• shotgun sounds sometimes don't activate at all

• Shield is weird because its very visual, meaning it blocks a lot of your screen, adds to visual clutter

• shotgun feels not so powerful if you are trying to hip fire people, as you don't deal that much damage, sometimes having to land 3-4 shots to down 1 player.

• A lot of lag/rubber banding when using abilities, so far nowhere near as bad as last week (forgot to provide feedback on that, I'll provide it this week).

• tank kills inconsistently/has no indication that its going to shoot at you, e.g. a beeping sound for lock on.

• Audio seems to randomly cut out when you are in fights, e.g. you'll not hear footsteps but will hear some gunshots, or a gun sound wont activate when you shoot it.

• Again shotguns seem wildly inconsistent, I shoot at an enemy I deal 6 damage, they fire 1 shot at me, I die, same distance.

• when killing a player with a body shot the 100 exp/score will display "none" below it.

• No point in using any other grenade when the gravity grenade is so strong.

• LMG damage is really high, especially for some headshots, was able to hit people for 39 damage with 1 bullet.

• Really hard to locate people based off their shooting.

• Never use footsteps to find people as they seem quiet.

Normally my approach to providing feedback to the development team is by creating YouTube playlists with short videos added to them talking about the feedback, however this week I was extremely busy with my day job of working in GAME as well as having birthday celebrations for my partner & getting my new car fixed up. Due to these reasons I didn't have the time to use my normal process which the devs seem to appreciate, however they were more than happy with the feedback that I provided. In future I wish to provide more concise feedback in video format so that I can use it as an example of my QA experience. Overall I would say that I am creating a good relationship with the devs at Timequake. Below is the FULL footage video as proof of me taking part in week 3 of the insider testing;

Insider testing week 3 FULL footage:

Beginning of transferring my eBay store to Shopify

Throughout my time in University, from first year until now I have been running an eBay store as a way of gaining more money, a side hustle if you will. I didn't talk about it much throughout the years of being in the Uni as I didn't think it was that important or that it was worth talking about. However with it growing every month, it has turned into something entirely different, I've found that I've been having to package and ship off products at least 3 times a week over the last 3 months.

During my 2nd year of University I thought about changing my eBay store over to a Shopify store as the sales tax was 10% lower as was the listing price (eBay 30p vs Shopify 25p). So after making a lot more money these last 3 months when compared to the previous years, I decided that I would go forward and take the plunge with creating my Shopify store, over the next few weeks this will take up a lot of my time as I try to figure all of it out, logistics, margins, revenue, cost of products etc. However by the end of October I believe that I will have a functioning store that will provide me a much better revenue stream when compared to my eBay store.

How does this relate to Games Design?

At the brunt of it... it doesn't. However, what it does relate to is being able to handle money, deadlines, tax, refunds, google sheets, communication between customers from all over the world (USA, RUSSIA, ROMANIA,JAPAN, MAINLAND UK, IRELAND, AUSTRALIA). All of these things are great for me to learn as someone interested in business as well as a great interest in production & project management. While it doesn't directly make me better at UNREAL ENGINE 5, it does make me better at understanding a good deal, how to make money. running a successful business. All of these things have helped me in a variety of ways listed below;

• At one stage, my eBay store was bringing in more money than I was getting paid in my normal day job at GAME.

• Recently I passed my driving test in July, bought my first car in August using money that I had earned from my eBay store.

• Repaired my first car using money earned from the store. The car & repairs totalling just over £3000.

• My confidence in handling large amounts of my own money has vastly improved, I'm smarter with investments and don't spend as much on meaningless items.

• I can help keep both myself and my family afloat during this abysmal economy.

• If everything was to go away tomorrow, I couldn't get a job in the industry, I lost my day job, I failed a year in Uni and had to repeat, the store would still be there.

First car paid for by eBay business.

Short versions of eBay financial statements (not to be shared outside this blog)

I have included these as evidence that I'm not lying about the stores and as proof that they are benefitting me, I have reviewed the documents and the contents are fine for my lecturers to read but I wouldn't liked them shared outside of my lecturers for now. Please use these statements as evidence that I am actively working on this business.

Financial statement-02 Aug 2023.pdf

Download PDF • 219KB

Financial statement-02 Sep 2023.pdf

Download PDF • 218KB

Financial statement-03 Oct 2023.pdf

Download PDF • 218KB

How does this help me with my overall goals for University?

Over the course of the years in the university I have realised that, within the next 10 years it is very likely that Belfast is going to become a large hub for game development within NI. I would say that at the moment Derry with Hypixel Studios is currently the hotspot. But with so many new studios popping up and the new students graduating every year in our course, there will only be more and more studios opening.

The dream I've had from day one is being able to run my own studio. I wish that it was something that I got to do during my freelance year, but as said in previous blog posts, everyone I was relying on disappeared and did their own thing, leaving me relatively isolated from the UU games design. Moving on, running this business helps me prepare better than anyone I've talked to in the Uni for handling something much more major down the line, my hope is that the Shopify store a much bigger accomplishment when compared to the eBay store, something that I can share without people thinking "its just eBay".

Why Shopify?

The plan to use Shopify comes from it being a very powerful software with great customization and amazing insights into returning customers, revenue, best sellers etc. This will allow me to share with my lecturers that view this blog that while its not games design, I'm still running a business within my freelance year. (This is not my only plan I realise that this sounds like I'm solely focusing on the store but I am also completing Udemy courses and am always on the look out for freelance opportunities). Below are some reasons as to why I'm using Shopify;

• Easy to build a shop and brand using Shopify.

• Amazing tracking of products, best sellers, returning customers.

• Allows me to take screenshots of in-depth analytics to show off on this blog as progress.

• eBay currently takes 13% of all my sales, whereas Shopify will be taking 2%.

• A Shopify store looks much more professional when compared to eBay which will allow me to show it off on my portfolio, c.v. and to anyone that asks about experience relating to business.

Why include this in my blog?

At the end of the day I want anyone that views this blog to understand that while I may not be great at writing up exactly what I'm doing every week, I am always working, I never stop. Given it may not always be games design related, which is the whole point of the course, but it's all connected to my overall goals.

Overall

These last few weeks have been a rollercoaster, showing me that I need to rethink my strategy for the year when it comes to game design as a whole. What roles should I focus on, where do I go next, do I start my own company? A lot of questions, not a lot of answers.