Gameplay Video
Project Type: Personal
Witch Haven is a third-person level with a mix of ranged and melee combat wrapped in a dark, spooky, medieval fantasy genre. The main goal for this experience was to create an extensive and detailed level that elicited specific emotions within the player. Player engagement and how a player feels while traversing a space are critical to me as a designer. As a result, I created this project to show that through detailed environments and environmental storytelling, I could increase overall player engagement and foster an emotional connection between the user and the level they are experiencing.
Responsibilities:
- Developed a mood board to evoke specific feelings within the player as they traversed the level
- Assembled a reference board to outline specific features, architecture, aesthetic, and essential level design techniques
- Designed the layout of the map on paper and then transitioned to Illustrator for further iteration
- Created 36 proxy assets in Maya to support a more detailed level of whitebox construction
- Constructed and iterated on a whitebox of the level using UE4 BSP brushes, terrain tools, and custom proxy assets to develop a space that promoted a mix of ranged and melee combat
- Populated the space using multiple asset packs to create a cohesive and consistent environment that met all aesthetic goals while focusing on environmental storytelling techniques and unique gameplay moments
- Lit the level in engine using various lights, fog, and post-processing to emphasize the dark and eerie feelings brought on through traversal of the space
Software Utilized:
- Unreal Engine 4
- Blueprints
- Maya
- Adobe Illustrator
Inspiration:
- Resident Evil 8: Macabre décor, dark and dangerous aesthetic, eerie/cautious player feelings, and color schemes
- Blood Borne: Player mechanics, enemy encounters/combat, additional explorable areas, lighting, fog, collectibles, and post-processing effects
Preproduction and Design Principles
Establishing A Mood Board:
The first constraint I wanted to establish for myself was to determine how I wanted my players to feel while experiencing this level. After watching the trailer for Resident Evil 8 days prior, I was inspired to do something dark and dangerous. However, unlike RE8, I wanted more eerie creepiness, with moments of increased anxiety with intense moments where it spikes, rather than pushing straight into the horror genre. I wanted the player to feel small, alone, and anxious compared to their complex, dark, and looming environment which surrounds them.
Creating a Reference Board:
After determining the emotion I wanted to elicit within the player, I set out to explicitly identify how I would bring about those feelings through architecture and the construction of the level as a whole by deconstructing pop culture elements, lighting, and architecture. Additionally, I wanted to highlight some of the specific level design techniques I wanted to implement, ensuring that I built the space from the ground up with those ideas in mind. I used the Peek-A-Boo method, where I showed the player the end goal at the start of the level from far away, and periodically the player gets closer and closer as they traverse the space. I also used Breadcrumbing throughout the level by utilizing lanterns that highlighted the pathway for the player. These methods supported player orientation and guidance through the level while also remaining unobtrusive to their experience. Additionally, I wanted to increase player engagement, and to do that; I added several explorable areas with hidden loot to reward those who explore off the beaten path.
Layout Design:
The Layout was designed to be a mixture of indoor and outdoor areas built in a linear capacity. The final area of the level, the Castle, can be seen from the beginning area of the forest and then periodically throughout the level using a peek-a-boo style to guide the player. The map is broken up into five unique areas, the Forest, the Graveyard, Desecrated Church, Hangman’s Tree, and the Castle. These are consistent with the aesthetic and vary enough that the player is constantly experiencing something fresh and engaging. In order to contain the player within the space, many of the areas used steep cliff sides surrounded by tall mountains to accentuate the feeling of being small in a world that appears more vast than it truly is. Enemy placement on this map is no longer reflective of their placement and the amount of them within the final level. Through playtesting and iteration, the playable space evolved into something more engaging and manageable for the player. I knew early on that I had to consider the multiple styles of combat the player could utilize, such as the stark contrast between close-combat melee and long-range magic. But, through iteration of the physical space, I was able to construct more engaging and player-friendly combat situations through enemy variation and updated cover placement than initially depicted on the map.
Production
Building the Whitebox In Engine:
The next step in my process was to begin laying the foundation for my entire level. For this, I chose to use the terrain tool inside of UE4 version 4.25.4 to create a large base for the space. I then began to sculpt mountains, steep cliffs, and valleys to break up the terrain into the five sub-areas.
After laying the foundation, I switch over from UE4 to Maya to construct any proxy assets I would need. I knew I needed the themes and ideals of this darker genre to be apparent and understandable, even at the whitebox level. As a result, I took special consideration when modeling the proxies so that the shape language was correctly represented and matched the theme. An example of this is evident in the tree model I used to construct the forest. It has many sharp points and a lack of leaves which align it with trees more often seen in spooky forests or dark fantasy-based pop culture. In total, I constructed 36 detailed proxy assets, including a Hangman’s Platform, Moloseum, Witch/Gypsy Wagon, Castle Towers, and Explorable Village Home while using the UE4 man for size reference to ensure that the models were represented as close to the desired in-game size as possible.
Now that all the pieces I needed were assembled, imported, and had their collision added, I began to place them into the world to build my whitebox. I started with the forest and ended with the mountainside castle, moving linearly across the level while performing several passes to ensure even and consistent detailing of the space.
After the initial architecture and white box population were completed, I began to add in the enemies. I playtested each encounter a multitude of times, adjusting enemy health and damage, player health, enemy placement, and cover placement as necessary. It was essential to me as a level designer who deeply enjoys creating combat situations that I got the combat just right for the intended gameplay feel. Through iteration and playtesting, I was able to get both ranged and melee combat, or any mix of the two, feeling excellent so that either way the user chose to play, they found support through the environment’s architecture.
Now that the environment and combat felt accurate to the dark-fantasy genre, the last element of the whitebox phase that was missing was the skysphere. Initially, I used the UE4 BP_SkySphere in the engine content folder to light the space enough to accurately place the proxies and build the space with precision. By editing the sun brightness, position, cloud speed, cloud opacity, star brightness, and sun height, I created the ideal dark and eerie night sky to represent the desired genre more accurately while ensuring a clear whitebox level of visibility.
Populating with Art Assets:
After completing and testing the whitebox, it was time to gather a plethora of asset packs that best represented the dark and eerie aesthetic. To keep my file size smaller for the level, I added all the packs to an empty project, and then I migrated only the assets I needed to build the level.
I began the set dressing portion of development by adding gameplay-centric pieces like the castle and village architecture and the larger structures used for player orientation. With each pass after that, I expanded outward to include the non-gameplay-centric pieces such as tables, chairs, debris, rubble, and tombstones until the space felt accurate to the Dark Fantasy genre and resembled my initial vision for the level.
Limitations from the asset marketplace offered me an opportunity to really cultivate my creativity through kitbashing the models that were unavailable to me. My favorite example is the Hangman’s Platform, which was constructed using a single wooden plank that I scaled and manipulated to build out the entire platform.
After several detailed passes of adding art to the space, I set my focus on the unique lighting style that I had initially depicted in my reference board. Adding fog to the level added an element of mystery and danger which pushed my level much closer to the desired aesthetic. I decided to use blue and amber lights throughout the level to reinforce the theme. Pocketed lights became a warm, welcoming leading light while the ambient blue lights enveloped the level in a blanket of cold despair and feelings of solitude.
Lessons Learned
Supporting Multiple Combat Types:
This was my first time building a space that supports multiple types of combat with such a stark contrast, such as melee sword fighting and ranged attacks. Finding that perfect balance between having supporting cover and sections with enough room to roll and dodge freely was tricky at first. Still, the further into development I got and the more iterations of the space I did, the easier it became.
The Value of Lighting and Fog:
Throughout the development of this project, I was practicing my lighting techniques, and this was a fantastic place to test what I had learned. The proper lighting, post processing, and volumetric fog were critical for me to meet the aesthetic goals of this project. Without the proper use of these effects, I would not have been able to make the player feel a sense of despair, solitude, and increased anxiety within the level.
Kitbashing:
Using limited resources from the Epic store really made me evolve in creative ways. I found myself using more modular pieces to build the world and combining assets from different cohesive packs to create something visually appealing and unique, rather than simply utilizing the assets of a single pack or strictly using what was available to me.
Improving Maya Skills & NCloth:
As a result of working in Maya frequently throughout this project, I was able to focus and improve on my modeling skills. I refined the methods for which I conveyed the space to the player in the whitebox phase by increasing the quality of my proxy assets. Additionally, I researched and learned how to use the Ncloth simulation tool to create a hanging body asset. Using this tool over the top of the UE4 Mannequin created the perfect hanging body to decorate the space. I credit the ‘WOW’ moment at the Hanging Tree to the bodies hanging from its branches in combination with lighting.