Learning Objective: My focus was on creating a small combat location, set within an art gallery. My three key objectives were:
- Design a space which provides entertaining combat
- Build a better understanding of architecture
- Able to communicate a story to the player through the environmental storytelling
Game Editor: Unity Plug-Ins: Blockout/Third Person Cover Shooter
Level Design: Max Pears Enviro Art: Jos Heuvelink
Before starting the blockout I gathered as much research as I could to give me a greater idea of how I wanted the layout to look and feel.
During my research, I was looking for a few different elements to apply to my blockout. Firstly was a more off the grid layout of the building, this way it would feel less boxy but also a great way to show with the layout it is more free form like art. Secondly was the uniqueness of the structure of the building itself, in the references you can see how some buildings use their roofs in an interesting eye-catching way. Thirdly was the expo itself, with there being many different and engaging expos across the world I wanted to try to find one as well.
After sifting through the research I created multiple layouts on paper before deciding on the one I was going to move forward with.
Once happy with the 2d map I created a gym to allow me to test my metrics for my level.
From here I could test to make sure that the cover was the correct height for combat, that the LD – Kit was not clipping with the camera of the character. Another element I focused on was colour coordinating my cover, so that way anyone working on my level would know/understand which elements were important, such as cover or interactable objects. Any of these objects would have a grided texture and a set colour:
Low Cover = Orange
High Cover = Blue
Interactable = Purple
With all the foundations of my level now in place, the fun began as I started to build and iterate on my level.
Once I was happy with the layout I spoke with Jos, who was interested in helping me take the level further by doing the environment art for the level. We synced up and discussed many different elements of how we can improve the level and make it feel even more like an Art Gallery.
It was a great collaboration between us, I felt it went really well and one of my most proudest moments of our team work was when we were pushing the ‘Crazy’ to make this art gallery feel even more inclusive. The main gallery is based on Jellyfish and water, so together we though a great technique to help push that and highlight cover, was to make the floor look like water but also have jellyfish swimming around cover to help guide the player.