The Hidden Conquest
Third-Person Turn Base RPG
The New World
Third Person Cover Shooter
Platform: PC & Consoles
Team Size: 1
Role: Level Designer
Tools: Unity3d, Inkscape
Period: 10 Days
URL: https://bit.ly/38TLAeo
Level Walkthrough
❖ Narrative and Settings ❖
A long time ago, a young man get away from his family and started to live in the woods. As time went by he wrote many books, novels, journals and one day disappeared from the eyes of this world leaving the philosophical beliefs in his lifelong work i.e. reason of being.
His work exposed to the world and neglected by society but put a strong mark on the young generation of that time. After some time all of that work and his beliefs were forgotten and gave birth to the myth.
Time went by and in the early 70s, a group of renegades left the society to follow a myth of redefining this world and made the abandoned valley their home to reconnect with nature and reconcile their beliefs. The valley is filled with houses left by the civilization and has been occupied by these young group of peoples with books, novels and journal. Anyone with their goodwill can join the group and can learn more about the myth. They want to spread this philosophy to the world and make them believe in what they believe. They don’t want any harm unless something went opposite to what they believe in or they are under attack.
❖ High Concept Statement ❖
Player has been assigned a task to go into the valley and stole their journals, books and gather whatever information he can find about what they are doing in the valley.
Time of day: Dawn.
Duration: Maximum of 20 minutes.
Objective: The main protagonist has to collect all the information about them from their journals, books and find an escape route to home.
❖ Design Goals ❖
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Designing combat zones.
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Independent level with a huge emphasis around its narrative.
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Environmental storytelling and exploration.
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Enemy placement and their behaviours i.e. idle, patrolling and attacking state.
❖ Level Scripting/Beats ❖
This level represents an artistic experience using symbolic architectural design in which each area expresses its hidden narrative followed by the different combat zones.
Level events are divided into traditional three-act story structure which includes traversal, combat and exploration.
ACT I – “Dawn”
Our main protagonist starts with the deserted area which indirectly represents the safe zone and outer area of the valley.
[gameplay] In the start player will be standing in the deserted area in front of the green forest full of trees. Player has to move towards the forest which is branched into multiple paths and those paths lead to the first combat zone.
ACT II – “Conflict”
This is the open zone area where enemies are patrolling or in the idle state guarding the valley. The objective is to collect all the journals, written handbook stealthily or aggressively.
[gameplay] Player has to go cover by cover to complete the objective which eventually leads the player to the combat zone. After eliminating all the enemies, the player will see a large house in front of him. He has to traverse there alongside a little bit of interaction and exploration on the way which somehow leads him to the next combat area.
[gameplay] After entering into the big house player can see enemies from the second floor and analyse the situation of how he is going to approach the situation. The player will approach that combat zone and the objective is to collect all the information. Just after that fight, the player will experience shooting from the top of the next big abandoned house captured by enemies which he has to eliminate also to survive and collect the last piece of notes from the enemies on the roof.
ACT III – “Escape”
After collecting the last piece of information the player has to traverse forward to escape.
[gameplay] Player has to move forward which leads him to the tunnel and furthermore the way to the escape route. This final area is filled with red or pink flowers showing the player the calm and safety after the deadly combat. The tunnel will lead the player to the same deserted area, the other end of the valley and way to home.
❖ Level Layout ❖
The initial idea for the layout also comes from its narrative. An abandoned valley with lots of trees and greenery around it.
References for the level feel and mood
Started the level foundation with pen-paper prototyping with some random sketches that lead to the final layout for the level. The whole layout was designed keeping combat zones in mind all the time. So, designing the game space was heavily affected by the combat zones and their enemy placement.
Iterations of general level layout and combat zones
These above are some of the initial prototyping which leads to the final level layout including different combat zones.
This below is the final layout for the level which include traversal path with different decision points, objectives that are collectables journals and books, combat zone, cover placements etc.
General level layout
❖ The layout of combat zones ❖
Design of level architecture was completely affected by the combat areas. Many attributes like enemy behaviour, the field of view, idle and patrolling state were dealt very carefully as those all were affecting the intended experience.
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Enemy field of view values was tweaked up and down in the editor according to the design requirement and keeping the expected experience in mind.
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Cover placement is the core to the gameplay which provide defensive and stealthy gameplay when needed. Covers are placed to each other by some distance that gives the enemy a window of opportunity and creates danger in the player mind which make the experience more engaged.
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Enemies are in the idle and patrolling state, for the first combat zone two enemies are in the houses and other two are patrolling with the lesser field of view but more hearing capability around them. Fifth and the last enemy has the largest field of view which make sure if any other enemy AI misses the player presence.
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In the second combat zone, the first two enemies are in the idle state guarding the area followed by one behind them. Other two enemies are at the top of the roof securing the whole area and one from them is patrolling back and forth to make the level more realistic and believable to the current circumstances.
First combat zone
Second combat zone
