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DESIGN PIPELINE:

LEVEL DESIGN

CONCEPT

CONCEPT ART

Today's concept art is from the Painted World of Ariamis level within the Dark Souls game.

Dark Souls has excellent level and mechanics design, and is worth a

playthrough just to see the complexity and clarity of the game's level design.

WHAT IS

LEVEL DESIGN

WHAT

IS

Level Design combines art and technological disciplines to layout the structure of a map,

determine certain features of gameplay (such as the day/night and weather system, avatar spawn location, interactive elements like doors and buttons, and weapon availability), specify locations of

LEVEL DESIGN?

enemies, add scripted events, serve as a vehicle for combining asthetic elements, and manage navmesh, some LODs, and some collision.

BOARD

GAMES

HERITAGE

Designers sometimes use concepts from board game design to further their video game design skills. There is a lot of overlap between designing for board games and video games, although of course there are many divergent challenges as well.

TRAIN

TRAIN

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/63933/train

PENS

Immersyve's Player Experience of Needs

PENS

Satifaction (whitepaper available on the pages portion of Canvas) provides a defined way to measure "fun" or player engagement with your game. It describes psychological factors that result in high game ratings, large sales, developer loyalty, and sustained player interest.

COMPETENCE

COMPETENCE

Comptence describes a player's need to feel a sense of mastery over the game. Feeling effective will motivate the player to further action, while feeling ineffective will only frustrate him or her. A sense of competence may be achieved through clever choice of and introduction to game mechanics, through clear feedback, and through challenging the

player without overwhelming them,

creating a sense of Flow, and allowing

them to demonstrate their

mastery of skills.

AUTONOMY

Autonomy is the player's ability to experience choice in his or her decisions and actions. In order to create a sense of autonomy, designers must think carefully about where to place interactive objects for the player and how the player might meaningfully interact with these objects to achieve goals or create new opportunities.

RELATEDNESS

Relatedness is the intrinsic desire to

RELATEDNESS

connect with others in a way that feels authentic. Multiplayer games are masters at this, however, even in

single player games, interctions with

AI can fulfill this need in players.

PURPOSE

With the PENs model in mind, let's now consider how to design a level with purpose, and enhance our players' engagement with our levels. One thing to remember in our level design is that our levels must support the core gameplay systems as well as the game's story.

PURPOSE

DIRECTING

THE PLAYER

DIRECTING

90% of level design is understanding how to direct the player using subtle cues, so that the player feels that they have choice even in very constrained situations.

COGNITIVE

FLOW

Simple, clear goals are satisfying to complete. Creating a series of

concrete goals with clear feedback

can facilitate this engaged state of

mind in which hours pass by

like minutes.

PACING

Much like in narrative writing, when creating your level, you want to have peaks and valleys of excitement and player engagement. If everything in the game is a non-

stop stress-filled shooter, your

players will never have time to

build up a sense of dread and

will become too emotionally

taxed to remain

invested.

POINTS OF INTEREST

Now that we have talked briefly about how to think about level design, we can discuss the specifics of how we direct the player. There are many ways to do this including choke points, linear pathways, lights, motion, and sounds.

CAMERA AND

CINEMATICS

CAMERA CUTS

Another way to break up the pacing of a level and inform a player of their next challenge is to use a camera cut or cinematic. This is a more heavy-handed approach, and should be limited in scope.

REWARDS

Lastly, it is important to reward the player for behavior

REWARDS

that you desire, and for which you have designed the level. If exploration is important to your narrative, add puzzles that can only be solved through exploration, and give the player loot

for completing them. Add hidden areas to

find and unique monsters

guarding them.

EXPLORATION

There are many ways to engineer excitement and joy through exploration. Since this is one of the primary tools leveraged by level designers, I will talk briefly about it here

NARRATIVE

DISCOVERY

SUPPORTING STORY

Level design not only helps integrate cinematics into the level, but can also help give the world a sense of narrative through interactable objects stashed

throughout the level, as well as through

the aesthetics of the level itself.

GEOGRAPHIC

DISCOVERY

LINEAR TRAVERSAL

Geographic discovery is the type of exploration that probably comes to mind first when you hear the word exploration. Adjusting even a linear level such that there is always a side path to

discover and the player never has to

backtrack can keep this type of

discovery fresh and interesting.

MECHANICAL DISCOVERY

Mechanical discovery is the

SUPPORTING MECHANICS

process of finding joy out of a deeper understanding of the mechanics of the game. As a level designer, you may help determine when and how these mechanics are

introduced to the player, and where

those skills will be most

challenged.

Remember that your level design

SUPPORTING

GAMEPLAY

MECHANICS

must support core gameplay mechanics. If you are creating a level for a cover shooter that only has 3 points of

SUPPORTING MECHANICS

cover, something has gone horribly awry. This means you must determine what

your core systems are, in order

to correctly design

a level.

5 STEP

5 STEP PROGRAM

PROGRAM

We'll be doing a four-week, five-step, iterative program to progress through building our levels.

BRAINSTORMING

PEN AND PAPER

This week you'll develop the initial pitch for your game design. You'll determine what type of game it is (strategy, platformer, shooter, etc...) and create a 2D mockup of your level design. It's okay if this design changes during the iterative process, but try to get as close to final as you realistically can.

BLOCKING

BLOCKING

In this pass you will put together a version of your game in very rough form. It may use a bunch of unreal primitives in order to convey the idea of height changes, or may use spheres to indicate enemy placement, but should be playable and have indications of the genre of game you are creating.

FIRST PASS

In this pass of the level design, you should try to create the first final

FIRST PASS

version of the level. Eschew perfectionism. If there are still a few assets that are in blockout during this stage, that is fine. However! You should use this time to identify missing assets and game elements, and make a plan to create any missing components.

SECOND PASS

SECOND PASS

This week, you should have revised your prior level design into a nearly completed version of your level. All missing elements from the week prior are expected to be in place and functional.

FINAL PRESENTATION

POLISH AND BUGS

This week should mimic milestone week in an actual game dev cycle. At the end of it, you are expected to turn in a final, fully functional version of your level for play by myself and your peers.

PIPELINE

Where does level design fit into a game development pipeline? Are there multiple places where level design might fit?

COMMON PITFALLS

PITFALLS

Let's discuss some common pitfalls you might run into as you design your levels.

SCOPE

It is vitally important that you scope you final level properly. Figure out your minimum viable product, and then supplement from there.

SHOW EARLY

AND

SHOW OFTEN

SHOW EARLY

You will have a better game if you show it to your peers, your teachers, your mother, random people on the streets, you get the idea. You don't always need to make any changes they suggest, but

take a moment to watch people unfamiliar with your game try to play it. Where do

they get stuck? Do they solve puzzles

the way you expected and/or

intended?

LEVEL DESIGN BUGS

Watch out for common bugs such

COMMON BUGS

as areas where players may push through the world geometry, objects that lower on top of your player (like elevators or drawbridges), or spots where your player can snipe enemies with little to no danger (locations outside of the navmesh, for instance).

SCOPE

SCOPE, SCOPE, SCOPE!!!

I cannot stress the importance of correctly scoping your game enough. This is a pitfall many early developers fall into, and one

that you, as producers, should be doubly

aware of so that you can actually FINISH YOUR GAME.

WHAT

TO

EXPECT

NEXT WEEK

WHAT

TO

Theoretically, we now have source control on these machines. Next week, we'll cover the source control and project organization lesson, and we will add all old project files into a class Unreal project, from which everyone can pull assets.

EXPECT NEXT

WHAT TO DELIVER

DELIVERABLES

Submit a video of the asset functioning in-game, a screenshot of your blueprint graph, and a zip file of all uassets associated with the trap or bomb, including but not limited to: the blueprint, model, all texture maps, and all materials for that asset.

GRADES

YOU WILL BE GRADED ON:

CREATIVITY

Does this have entertainment value? Will it be useful? What makes this unique or interesting?

TECHNICAL PROWESS

Did you create new models for both traps/bombs? How complex was your blueprint graph? Did you achieve the functionality you intended?

REVIEW

Was your object submitted on time for you to receive a review from your classmates? Did you submit the accompanying video? Did you participate in giving reviews to your peers?

HOW TO DELIVER

Turn all deliverables in on the assignments page on Canvas. Contact me if you run into any trouble attempting to submit your work.

WORK PERIOD

We will conclude class with:

1) A level design breakdown from the game Baldur's Gate.

2) A work period, during which I will be available to discuss progress or give feedback on your traps/bombs. You may also look through the PENS document during this time.

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