Butcher:

This was one of the oldest trades to begin, dating as far as 976. Meat must have been of high quality, if it was mislabeled or poor quality, they would have been punished. A high level of cleanliness must have also been met to prevent the spread of disease, this could look different depending on where the trade is located: shopfront or market stall. If it were a market stall, there would usually be blood stains on the floor as it was hard to clean it all off the stone flooring. To show the idea that it is a butcher’s shop, hanging meats would be most important to include, specifically fish and pork, as they were eaten mostly by peasant families.

Culture

Trade:

When trading, common and low value goods were usually kept for local sale as paying tolls when crossing certain points were not worth it, this would end up with much lower profit for the seller, so only luxury goods were transported between villages and towns. Most goods were moved by ship or boat as it was much cheaper and safer than travelling by land, however sailors would have to understand potential losses as weather and pirates were a great danger. Although smaller markets were set up in villages, these only sold common items for everyday use. If someone wanted to purchase an item that was not considered as “everyday” such as cloth or wine, they’d have to walk to the nearest town which could take up to a full day. Shops were usually categorized for more competition and placed in areas that would boost their sales: armourers near the town’s council, or booksellers near cathedrals/places of learning. Placing ships near the docks would show the use of international trading if selling things such as spices or teas were in the game.

Technology:

When creating items and modelling structures, it is important to understand the types of technology that were most used in this age. Including wells in villages and chimneys attached to some housing would be quite important. Mirrors were also discovered around this time; it would be interesting to include something like this to learn about reflections when 3d modelling. Armour such as chain mail and full suits of plate armour were mostly used by the military, this is important if we are going to make a game that includes fighting aspects to keep accuracy to the era whilst also being able to explore the different styles we could apply.

Christianity and Social Hierarchy:

Christianity was the main religious practice of medieval Europe, and was the base for how the medieval society was formed. The Church was in charge of regulating and shaping an individual’s life, even if they rejected the teachings. They were also not to be questioned as it was all meant to be in the interest of God, however because of how unqualified they tended to be it was mainly in their own interests and how they wanted to build a person’s life to be. The hierarchy of the Church also defined their social hierarchy; they believed that it was God’s will that someone was born to certain circumstances, if you attempt to alter your life for the better you are going against God words and saying He has made a mistake. This made people accept their lives how they were. This caused priests and archbishops to abuse their power for more wealth, as this meant greater power. They would go as far as threatening nobles or even whole towns with being exiled from the church which would result in loss of power for them. I think including aspects of Christianity and representing them as how they were in the Middle Ages would be interesting for both characters and story, there is a lot to show and research for this topic but I want to keep it simple and brief as I am not 100% sure that we will be using this idea.

Bells:

Bells were used to tell citizens their set times for actions such as prayer, work, feast, crisis, and curfews. They were an extremely important aspect of daily life. Because the people of the Middle Ages did not hear many manmade noises, the sounds of a bell were both majestic and horrifying. They were seen as “supernatural”, they believed that the sound of a bell would save them from an attack, scaring off intruders, when it was simply just used as a warning. Depending on how our story is written, the sounds of a ringing bell could be used to represent an attack or certain large event. Bells were also usually placed in their own designated tower attached to a church.

CS:                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

Clothing & Armour

I wanted to research into different types of clothing to use in our game, both the types of clothing we decided as a team was Sci-Fi and medieval.

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People back in medieval times struggled to buy clothes due to how expensive they were so they

had to settle for cheap, self-made clothes that were usually a dull colour. This meant people of

low-class all wore similar clothing with little to no colour, but the high-class citizens wore detailed,

vibrant, colourful clothes and typically wearing the same dress more than once in upper class

families was looked down on.

They typically wore poncho type clothing that was usually not fit to size and was made from

sheep or cattle skins. In old transcripts we discovered that shoes were not a usual piece of clothing

till the middle Anglo-Saxon era, so we would probably not incorporate shoes in some of the

character designs.

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I think when creating clothing for the models we are going to make is going to be a reasonably

simple task by using the cloth modifier and putting a shell on it so that it fits the body to proportion.

Class Divide in Clothing: