Arid | Sebastianbinder

Over 1.000.000 downloads on Steam

Summary

Project Information

Genre:

Team Size:

Project Duration:

Engine:

Platform:

Primary Role:

Secondary Role:

Survival

September 2020 - July 2021

Unreal Engine 4

Released on PC

Lead Level Design

Scrum Master Responsibilities

Description

Arid is a gritty, exploration-survival experience that challenges players in surviving the most arid place in the world. By using your skills and adaptation, you must face the loneliness, the extreme temperatures, and mysteries of the Atacama Desert.

Link to Steam Page

Level Design Process

Early Stages:

The early stages of the project consisted of researching and creating core documentation such as the LDD in which I planned out key level content, established level design rules and creating the level design pipelines.

I created a playable prototype map in order to test the core mechanics that were in development at the time and created a modular build kit.

The modular build kit was later used for almost every building in the game which was very important because we wanted to be very efficient with the art assets we requested from the art team.

Planning out Documentation like the Node Map

Level Design Pillars

Creating Modular Build Sets

Planning out Documentation like the Node Map

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Creating Base Mesh in Houdini

Implementing Full Functionality for a Playable Experience

Playable Result

Creating Base Mesh in Houdini

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Content Creation:

Once the groundwork had been laid out I was able to smoothly transition into working on the level content.

Utilizing Houdini I was able to blockout the the cave section of the game which also served to onboard the player into invisible AI.

I then dressed most of the caves and placed all the interactables and safe zones that the player might require.

Finally I integrated functionality such as the save volumes and death planes.

Progress Example of Core Landmark

Planning

Blockout

Whitebox

In-Progress Art Pass

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Finished Level

Valuable Experience Because:

This was the first time that I worked on any single project that was longer than 8 weeks. It gave me the opportunity to follow through on a project from the very first stages of concepting all the way to our full release on steam.

This meant I was able to learn a lot of new skills as well letting me further progress old ones.

Working With a Large Team:

This project gave me the opportunity to work with a group of almost 30 people (including outsourcing) which alongside the fact that I lead the environmental team greatly helped me develop my communication and teamwork skills.

Due to the scale of the project I was able to improve my skills in resource allocation as both art assets and mechanics had to be carefully distributed throughout the world in order to fill in the map.

Learning About Open World:

I was able to learn about what steps are required to plan out a large map and all of the different level rules that need to be established in order to create a consistent player experience.

By creating a open world map section I was able to learn not only about the iterative process required to complete such a task but also about necessary tools like the landscape editor.

It also taught me about the complexity of aligning 3 separate map pieces into a single unified open world and how quickly having a larger map increases the scope of the project.

I was able to greatly improve on my blockout skills by creating architecturally accurate structures that both sold the setting of the game but still provided a satisfying player experience.

Utilizing New Tools:

This was also the first time that I requested procedural tools from an outsourcing team and worked closely together with them to have it be integrated into the engine.

The project let me work with tools like Houdini to generate sections of the map like the caves and the terrain.

I learnt about the full extent of the foliage tool and alongside some procedural generation and was able to utilize it to provide gameplay since all the foliage is interactable.

By being responsible for the level streaming and subdivision of levels I was able to both experience the benefits of providing the team with a better workflow and drawbacks when the level streaming breaks and sets the project on fire.

Finally I was able to learn about how early testing can help shape a project through the different phases and what it means to work with an active community.

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Arid

Responsibilities

Level Design:

My responsibility was to oversee the environmental team of 3 level designers and 4 environmental artist ensuring cohesion between the playable space and visual elements.
I was responsible for creating 1/3 of the games total map, by creating blockouts, integrating core mechanics, creating missions, scripting key events & improving the map flow based on player feedback.
I designed the onboarding cave section which served to introduce the enemy AI and fully implemented the AI within that space.
I created core level design documentation to ensure work consistency, planned out all level content, establish key level metrics and modular build sets.
I was responsible for the level streaming and sub-division of levels in order to both improve the performance of the project and increase the productivity of the environment team.

Other:

Through the use of Jira I handled the sprint planning and daily scrum as a scrum master for my team.
I worked on (together with other team members) implementing the lighting both for the dynamic sky, transition into the caves and the lighting in the caves themselves.
I was partially responsible for the level dressing throughout my map in order to facilitate the implementation of the art pass.
I worked on implementing and balancing both the enemy and bee AI.
I was responsible for working with various outsourcing people in order to design and integrate tools like the procedural caves into engine.