Unreal Tournament 4

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Level Showcase

Highlights

Development

Context

As part of our preparation for the games industry, BUas’s IGAD study program had us design and build a multiplayer deathmatch level for Unreal Tournament 4.

The Theme I choose: Weapon Testing Facility

Body of Work

Structure of my work in terms of level design milestones:

Research – Learn about architecture and level design, gather metrics, and test block-outs.
Design – Pick a theme for the level, then design it using graphics and rough block-outs.
Iteration – Build and iterate upon the level using Unreal Tournament Editor.
Polish – Introduce basic lighting and architectural features to make the theme identifiable.

Research and Ideation

Research
Concepting, Blocking out, Planning

Acquiring the Necessary Knowledge

Since I didn’t have much experience with shooters, architecture, or visual design, I had to start from the beginning.

My mission – understand 3-dimensional space and how it relates to level design.

I tackled this phase following this pipeline:

First came the fundamentals that dictate multiplayer level design – composing geometry relative to tactics and dynamics.
Analyse UT4’s maps and extract logic behind design decisions.
Analyse UT’s weapons. Understand how geometry could add to a weapon’s attributes to create drama.
Conduct research into the chosen architectural style and look for opportunities to organically integrate gameplay gimmicks.
The UT Editor provided a gym level. I used that instead of building my own, jumping straight into building my blockout so I had more time to iterate.

Research presentation. This deals with the biology behind our perception of 3D space. Lays the foundation for proposing techniques to play with that perception.

A bunch of gathered references aiming to cover most if not all spatial patterns observed in factories.

A quick and easy analysis of the game's weapon set. Done in manner to later on help me setup specific rooms to reward and punish specific behaviour.

Designing the Level

I designed the level by producing a variety of artefacts – rough blockout, nodemaps, reference materials, LD Document, etc.

As the engine tool which would be used to build the map was readily available to us and there was no explicit restriction on using it, I went a bit off-script and started building before sketching a nodemap or designing a layout.
Once I had something good, I developed the aforementioned graphical abstractions to help me overview various aspects of the map. This made my iterations more strategic and purposeful.
To complete the blockout, I simply tried out ideas inside the level, as opposed to doing it in separate gym level.

As soon as I had an idea, I blocked it out and tested it, thus learning on the go. This area taught me the for dividing bigger areas into more parts due to the general lack of exciting skillchecks to perform (in UT4) when having to fight in open areas.

The first arena I made and used as a gameplay and scale benchmark.

This picture perfectly captures the feel I was going for. Movement, chaos, improvisation, verticality.

A node map displaying how the rooms connect to each other. Used to predict and design the macro flow of movement. Coloured nodes feature vertical connections, and make it easy to see just how extremely connected the level is.

First rough Blockout

Final rough Blockout

Construction and Iteration

Initial Whitebox
Medium Whitebox

Narrowing Down on the Design

To advance the map, I focused on enabling and supporting the game loop – balance, navigation, weapon rooms & locations, pickups, etc.

There was a concrete list to check off:

For navigation, I refined the geometry on a smaller scale. I framed focal points and exits, tweaked accessibility between areas, reduced visual noise, etc.
This organically flowed into the next step – pickups. Almost all of my pickup budget was allocated to breadcrumbs that would help navigation. The trick was to place them so that the most rewarding outcome came from utilising the map’s most dynamic features.
Placing the spawn points and allocating the weapons were issues that had to be resolved together. This warranted adding new verticality to certain areas and even rebalancing the entire map several times.

In order to keep moving, I focused only on enabling the game loop so the level could be optimized for lots of testing. I would need that to finalise the map.

A combination of focal points and leading lines create micro goals for the player.

Walled of elevator to make sure players don't get to activate it randomly. Notice how there are holes with pickups behind them to make the area more memorable and add depth.

Introduce entrances to other rooms as well as make the room support the weapon it contains. Introduced dissonant shapes to help guide players along the required path.

Created a new weapon room to house the rocket launcher in a location that makes it shine. Here the weapon is framed very attractively, and the neighbouring areas all support its usage, but the tight pillars also make the user vulnerable to the flak cannon and the grenade launcher.

A showcase of the pickup trails and how they guide players to combat.

Increasing number of options by making upper areas accessible via a ramp. Also leads the eye towards potential flanking route.

Fixing flow issues by making more the dynamic paths more accessible.

Adding ninja routes and access points from below.

Changing weapons in battle areas. This room suited the aggressive nature of the link gun due limited opportunities to break line of sight at medium range.

Beyond simply guiding the player by the nose, you can use pickups to help them understand what the map is about.

Rapid Iterations, Massive Improvements

Previous efforts allowed me to test the map extensively. This revealed multiple issues.

My general proportions were off. I used to have thin walls and noisy arenas. So I made walls thicker and reduced the clutter, increasing negative space to give navigational and visual breathing room.
To open up the general visibility as well as bind the map together via consistency, I introduced octagonal entrances. It got the map its memorable style.
Funnily enough, solving these problems seemed to then solve the issue with weapon imbalance.

Generally reducing the clutter and providing some respite between beats did wonders for enjoyment levels.

The multi vertices shape is seen constantly throughout the level but in different forms; it signifies an entrance/exit to a different area or a smaller room.

Arena style shooters generally need more breathing space due to their high level interactions with the world as opposed to a tactical shooter’s more detail-oriented mechanics.

Providing more visibility and opening up FoVs within the shape language.

Polish and Finalisation

Final Whitebox
Finalising Textures and Lighting

Finalising the Level

Once the level achieved what it was supposed to do, it was time time to finalise everything gameplay related – fine-tune the pickups, weapons, and spawns as well as remove the last flow-breaking clunky geometry.

I first directed my efforts towards trying to improve the balance. There were ways to make it better by examining heat map data (3rd party plugin) and cross referencing that with complaints gathered from playtests and surveys.
After the map was tuned appropriately, it was time to fix the flow by adding small polish that makes traversal easier and the level feel more like a professional product.

These final acts of balancing could make or brake the level. I made sure to go through the motions correctly.

It was time to fix smaller issues like making drop downs smoother and entry ways bigger.

Adding emissive lines in the floor to help guide the player to the optimal areas alongside the optimal path.

Since stairs prevent players from dashing, I placed blocking volumes over them to help them behave like ramps, yet retain their aesthetic look.

Fixing final few problems with Navigation

Another instance of removing geometry in an overall attempt to make the space feel more spacious.

Flow seemed to stop here which led to high number of deaths. Made the room more spacious to help keep players moving.

Removing geometry and increasing room space for better flow.

Making it Pretty

The final step to make sure my level ‘sells’ was to make it visually appealing in a way that complements UT4’s gameplay.

I needed strong information design to combat the interconnected complexity of the level.

I started off with the fundamentals – matching colours of rooms with their weapon, texture-coding the floors, then complementing all that with lighting.
While doing this, I experimented with all sorts of materials. For example, I used translucent glass to increase drama and afford better flanking opportunities.
Lastly, I simply talked to people on what they would like to see more of.

The visual polish I put together helped the level stand out. The textures and colours gave a pleasant vibrancy to the world. It also helped players memorise rooms and travel along the layout.

The horizontal half of the rooms on each floor are divided by warm and cold colours.

An effort is made in each room to match the colour of the walls and floor with the associated item at the center of the room.

The vertical half of the rooms on each floor is divided by contrast - the grid on the first floor is present everywhere and is much more pronounced due to me using a complementary colour scheme (blue and orange) to convey contrast.

Crafting the Visual Information Design

I added twisted stairs to better convey the idea of a passing piston.

I changed the material on the elevator to convey that it’s unusual and that it’s not going to work as a standard elevator.

To help make the space seem less cramped and constraining, I raised the ceiling.

Adding nice little touches just because it makes it feel better.