I
previously worked for seven years as a London-based level
designer in the video games industry. In my experience, "level
design" for video games is the planning and creation
of real-time 3D game worlds and environments.
I
began my professional career in the trenches as a level designer
and worked my way up to become a department lead, always remaining
knee-deep in the hard work and taking on more responsibility
in the overall production. Most of my experience has been
creating 3D levels for online multiplayer video games using
technology created by id Software and the 3D package,
Autodesk Maya.
In
these types of games players go online to battle each other
over certain objectives in a level like destroying the enemies'
fuel supply or engaging in firefights where the player with
the most frags wins.
As
an idTech level designer I was responsible
for all aspects of creation for the game world, taking a level
from concept to fully finished environment and doing all the
technical & artistic tasks in between.
A
typical level design production pipeline might include:
- Research
the style & theme for the environment
- Draw
a plan of the layout/topology for the intended gameplay
- Build
a low-poly prototype of the environment
- Set up the gameplay entities/actions and scripting
- Play
test the level as much as possible, using player feedback
to refine the gameplay and strategies
- Begin
lighting & atmospherics, adding details and creating
a great level of polish in the environment
- Optimise
the scenes and assets for good performance on computers
and game consoles
- Work
through the publisher's database of bugs and issues
- Ship
it!
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