Trying Your Hand at Level Design? 382
Utawoutau asks: "As a student nearing graduation with high interest yet no game industry experience I have been taking a serious look at the position of Level Designer. In order to apply for such a position of course, I would need an impressive portfolio. I am aware that a number of games, Neverwinter Nights for example, come packaged with level development tools and that a number of other games have tools (official or not) that are readily available on the Internet. I am interested in hearing opinions from others that have experimented with the level design tools for a number of games as to what they found the easiest, the most fun, the most in depth, and the most impressive to work with. In particular, I am interested in a game whose tools strike a good balance between all four of the above criteria."
I'm not a game programmer (Score:5, Insightful)
You end up working long hours on a game that will be released when you know it's only half done, only to be laid off the week after the game ships.
Do yourself a favor and buy a Vanagon and go on a long road trip instead.
Before you start (Score:5, Insightful)
Whatever you decide to design start with pen and paper and a good idea first. Pointless mods that merely throw a bunch of monsters at you feel pointless.
Check out some classic mods for Half Life like They Hunger for HL.
Easy? Intuitve? Powerful? (Score:5, Insightful)
The tools you are going to work with will constantly evolve, your tools availble will be added and removed as the game moves on.
To create an impressive portfolio that will pop eyes where you apply. Design very good levels for a wide area of games. And last but not least, they have to. Absolutly HAVE to be well balansed. Especially with a multi-player game. I have seen some very pretty levels done for counter-strike but that was very poor balanced. So they where never played.
Another big thing when you design a level. Make sure you make your own textures. If you have solid texturework you will have a far better shot at the job.
-L
Learn more than one thing (Score:5, Insightful)
I recommend that you'd also take your time to learn a little about:
Programming
Scripting
Photoshopping (Sorry! I said GIMP'ing, of course)
3d modelling
Sound editing
Re:Before you start (Score:1, Insightful)
So naturally, when you don't want to do the work yourself and don't have any skill or talent, you ask
I like Build. Go make some games with that. Oh yeah. Modern ones too, with colors and stuff.
Apologies to Ken Silverman. I actually DO like Build, but it's not appropriate for 2004 which is, of course, the joke.
Re:I'm curious... (Score:2, Insightful)
Perhaps I'm reasing his question incorrectly, but it sounds as if he hasn't tried any of the design tools available. That led me to wonder: how did he get the idea that he wanted to do level design, in that case?
Re:I'm curious... (Score:5, Insightful)
Everything is attainable but you've got to be passionate about attaining it - Utawoutau the poster seems not very passionate about mapping if he failed to produce any maps, mods, models, etc, so far.
Map designing takes a lot of skill, passion, and interest in a huge variety of subjects such as architecture, interior decorating, gaming experience, multiplayer, psychology... the works.
Level Design as outlet for a programming degree? (Score:3, Insightful)
I agree with this (Score:4, Insightful)
Most of the really good things that define a highly playable mod from a 'cool, lets try something else' one are in the basic mechanics of the game.
Where are the weapons and are they appropriate for the playspace? Do they work well for a few players? Lots of players?
What about the playspace itself? Does one side have a clear advantage? How about a particular path? Many of the classic levels avoid dead end ways making it tough for players to just sit and wait for others to show.
For games like capture the flag, where is the balance of power? Is it possible for a team to cover all their bases without being forced to venture off for new weapons/ammo?
Visuals have never been as important as play mechanics are, but they do play an important part. A dark spot or interesting texture placed just so, might allow a player to hide for a bit, or clash horribly with the target, making for either a sneaky element of challenge and tension, or a frustrating experience...
Spawn points should be in areas where players have a fighting chance at actually spawning without being camped too often. Best ones are those where the player forms near the action while campers always are watching their back.
All of this is specific to Q3A --hey, I still play the game because it is well balanced and interactive, but other games have similar issues. The parent is right, you gotta play.
If it were me, fun first, beauty later, but that's just me.
Having played Q3A a lot, I have been thinking about this too. Be sure to check out other mods and play them. You will get a great sense of what you want to do. --Then do it!
Re:I'm not a game programmer (Score:3, Insightful)
I work as a level designer for a game developer in europe, and it is anything but fun and games.. working on games. That illusion is quick to fade.
But then again, it is a good job. The hours are really really long, but it's creative.
Re:I'm curious... (Score:3, Insightful)
Not to flame either, but I think his career will be shortlived. The personality type that would succeed would have started messing with at least one editor before throwing the question out there. I think this is a case of him hearing someone say that the way into the gaming industry is to do level design. His first criteria was for a tool that was easy to use. Instead of diving into the tools and the community, he's looking for the easy route.
Storyteller first, level designer second (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I'm not a game programmer (Score:3, Insightful)
Forget it.
The gaming industry stinks as a place to work.
Why? The companies can't make much money at it. The value just isn't there to the consumer.
Computer Gaming software is amongst the most complex software out there. It always pushes the limits of the hardware and requires near artificial intelligence coupled with the complexity of a flight simulator. The code for these things are miles long, difficult to validate, and have to run on a variety of hardware platforms. Some of these things are taking up to 4-6 years to develop today. Compare that to how often Microsoft updates Office or even its operating systems.
At the end of all of this work what do end up with. Something that can't sell for more than about $40-$50. Mommy just won't spend much more on it no matter how much little Johnny pleads to her.
Even better, when I started out most games were on Apple IIs, or PCs both open platforms. Today most games are sold on Playstation or the like. These are closed systems so guess what? Sony will charge you a big royalty and take a big chunk of that $40-$50.
Better yet what happens if the game flops after a 4 year development period? Just one of these things can kill a gaming software company in a single blow.
Then end result is that there are a lot of people doing a heck of a lot of work but the company has very little money to reward them. That doesn't make for a fun atmosphere to work in.
Needless to say when I graduated college, the computer gaming industry was not something I that I was interested in pursuing as a career. From what I can see the industry really hasn't changed all that much today other than rampant software piracy that almost obliterated the industry back in the mid 80s seems to have been kept manageable.
Start with the basics or dive right in... (Score:3, Insightful)
But for learning the basics about the different aspects of level design you might want to try your hand at something simpler. Try finding "old" games like Doom or Warcraft2 (I think there was an editor for that?) and try your skills at designing levels that are only two dimensional. Believe me, there's a lot that can go wrong even without the extra options available in the 3D editors.
I know it may sound like a waste of time, but it will give you a few good experiences, I think. Due to the simplicity of e.g. Doom's level structure you can spend a lot of time working on the small details like how to align two platforms so a player just barely can (or, if you're wicked, can't) move from one to the other. You can experiment with how to let the player use different objects/walls/etc as cover when shooting large monsters and so on.
One of the other posts mentioned that you would undoubtedly be forced to learn to adjust to using new/different tools that what you're used to so another benefit of "working your way up" from the old games is that you will eventually have to move on to new tools. Make sure you focus on learning the fundamental parts of what level editing is rather than memorizing the exact functionalities of a single level editor.
Oh, and after having made levels for 2D games you'll definitely appreciate 3D editors and the freedom they give you.
A last piece of advice is to try and come up with something original instead of "yet another multiplayer map". Some years ago me and a friend designed a series of "Quake Hinderbahn" levels. It's basically an idea we got for a LAN party where we wanted to host a different kind of competition - and we made an obstacle course and had people record demos of their fastest runs.
I learned a LOT about how Quake works from that.
Good luck with it.
Re:Valve Hammer Editor (Score:2, Insightful)
If you're seriously about leveldesign: remember, rome wasn't build in one day!! I'm talking from my own experience
Pencil and Paper (Score:5, Insightful)
People are answering your question as if the goal is to design the best looking levels, or the easiest way to build them, or other construction related questions. But those are not the right questions you should be asking.
Just as an architect needs to find out what the goal of their building is, a level designer needs to have a goal for a level. An amazing house that doesn't have the rooms a buyer wants is still a failure. An amazing level that doesn't advance a game, or isn't any fun, is also a failure.
Before you start building a level, write it out. Put together a story of how the player will move through the level. Sketch storyboards of interesting challenges that will occur. Start with a rough layout of the rooms you plan to link, and describe whats going to be happening to the player as they move through those areas. Figure out which areas are dull, and either liven them up or cut them out. And once the flow of the level makes sense and seems enjoyable, a level designer passes the documents off to an artist, whose job is to make it look good.
Far too often, the process gets reversed. The levels are designed from an artistic perspective first, without first determining why the levels are there, or where the player will be. Time gets spent fleshing out regions that the player runs through once, hunting for something to do, and never looks at. Those areas may get thrown away in playtesting, or just kept in and bore the players. Not good.
So basically, if you want to be a level designer, design levels. Don't be a CAD designer; that is the artist's job. As a former game developer, I would have appreciated it. As a current game player, I would appreciate it perhaps even more.
The tools (Score:1, Insightful)
The road to level design is a long one. First you have to master the tools, then you have to master the gameplay, the flow of a level. Which is a very difficult thing. You must first understand the flow from a gamer perspective before you can ever even dream of creating a level with a good flow. When you play a level you need to understand WHY it works. Why it has good gameplay.
Over time you will accumulate more and more knowledge which you can incorporate into your own maps, maps which will be original works by you instead of just copies of good levels you've played before.
Join the community and start designing levels. That's the way many people get hired. Some rare exceptions even after the very first level they ever put forth. And many/most people never.
When every map you create gets voted as 9+ then you can talk about having an actual portfolio and start applying for a job, if no offers have this far come your way. Before that, don't waste your time for applying for a job with non-existent/no good credentials.
Of course, getting a position through your own design can happen too. Some freeware mods actually later turn into real published games.
It really is not so much about the actual tools you use but about the community, types of games that you actually like and just plain chance. It's more of an art than just an engineering decision.
Join the community and find your way.
UT2k3 (Score:3, Insightful)
Not that UT runs on Linux and Windows alike, the editors though only on Windows.
If you want to get into FPS level editing this is absolutely the first choice.
Note that there are other games and other genres using the same engine.
Build your strengths, then show them (Score:3, Insightful)
Assuming that you want to lay out levels, then study architecture. You want to be able to make things that look real, atmospheric, and cool. A good exercise is to find a dynamic and interesting space in real life and model it as precisely as you can in a game engine. This will give you a feel for the level of detail needed to build a truly immersive level.
Also, don't limit yourself to one tool or even one game. Some of the more full-featured and late-generation editors have a huge amount of crutches that you can easily get dependent on. Make an RPG dungeon and an RPG city. Make several RTS maps (these are great for gaining a macro-level understanding of balance and flow) for single-player and multi-player games. And, of course, make a lot of FPS maps. Even a dippy little fragfest map can show off your talents if you put a lot of work into it.
Finally, be aware of industry trends. For instance, single-player FPS campaigns are starting to veer away from the strictly-linear style of the genre's forerunners (look at MOHAA for an example of why... the levels are very stale and scripted). Play, play, play. And take lots of notes.
Re:Easy? Intuitve? Powerful? (Score:3, Insightful)
Most games nowadays have finalized editors before they even start. Having an engine and tools developed during a game's development is the exception, not the rule, and it's usually done by financially independent dev houses. (Though that's not always the case).
Re:I'm not a game programmer (Score:2, Insightful)
Sure, a lot, hell, most of these games have monthly fees, which is where the lion's share of their income comes from. But they also have costs beyond the programmers. How many servers has EQ added since it launched? How much hardware have they had to purchase or replace? Same with every online game out there.
It is incredibly easy to waste a lot of money on a game that will do nothing more then tank. (Daikatana anyone?)
At least with business software, there is a better chance at a guarenteed market. (Maybe not much better, but it has to be somewhat more profitable in terms of man hours spent coding...)
Kierthos
Just try it (Score:2, Insightful)
Games like neverwinter nights are a whole diferent kettle of fish, but it does require one thing in common.
You need to have a decent artistic and creatave ability, you need to decide what looks good, what doesn't look good, and you also may need for many games a passion for the mind-numbingly boring.... once youve aligned one texture, the next one is just dull
Re:I'm not a game programmer (Score:5, Insightful)
Translation: you had better be fscking INCREDIBLE and even then, be prepared to be an intern and move across the country or to a different country (say, Canada) to do so...and you'd better be able to do more than just edit levels. You'd better be a god.
I'd take the Vanagon, find the best programmers you can and start your own studio. The odds are worse than PowerBall, but they're more in your favor than competing with a million people for one of ten jobs.
I *do* work in the game industry (Score:1, Insightful)
I highly recommend looking at the Unreal level editor. Pick up a copy of UT2003 and start messing with it. There are a *ton* of companies using this engine for games, and will give you the best chance of actually getting into the industry with what you've learned.
Hell, Epic even sponsored Unreal University for the purpose of letting people come learn their tools from pros.
http://cde.ncsu.edu/uu/
If you're serious about becoming an LD, you want to use a common engine with tools you're likely to see used for a number of different games.
Textures? (Score:3, Insightful)
As a professional level designer... (Score:3, Insightful)
But, you will also work with really cool, creative people. You will get to do something you (hopefully) love to do. You will get to create games. If this small paragraph sounds better than the larger, first paragraph, then by all means, pursue a career in the game industry.
So... the nutshell I can come up with at 4:45 in the morning (yes, I've been working since yesterday morning).
Get a day job first. It's a different path for everyone, but odds are you won't break into the industry anytime soon (it took me a couple years). You might be able to get in as a tester or intern, but it's almost as hard to make the jump to the dev side as it is to just break in.
Grab the whatever latest version of Unreal2KX XMP Super Mega Championship Edition is out. Epic has done a good job of marketing their engine and tools to devs, and a lot of places have picked up the Unreal engine and it's editor, UnrealEd. This can give you a slight advantage just because being familiar with the tools can be a big selling point to some companies.
Next, learn how to use it. Not just part of it, all of it. How to make and import textures. How to make and import meshes. How to make and import sounds. Even learn the basics of unreal script. You may not be actually creating art assets/code in the position, but as level designer you are where 'the tires hit the road'. Everything has to come through you at some point to go into the level so you have to understand everything that is going on behind the scenes.
Make a few multiplayer maps of whatever flavor you want. Focus on a few key areas:
1. Look and feel. No BSP holes. No meshes intersecting each other at weird angles. Everything lines up. There is a good sense of 'space'. Lighting is good and reflects the mood appropriately but isn't overboard. Textures are aligned properly.
2. Wiring. Doors open and close when they are supposed to. Switches work the 'right' way. Events happen when they are supposed to. Areas are zoned or antiportaled correctly.
3. Gameplay. For learning, I put this last at this point. These maps your learning how to use the editor and trying to make them look as good as possible. In general, in gameplay the player shouldn't get lost or stuck anywhere. The next area to explore should be obvious. Paths are clearly marked. Framerate is good at all places in the level.
Now, you need to make some single player experiences. You probably won't get a job making multiplayer maps (I've never made one professionally) so you need to be able to create good single player experiences. This is the hard part (learning the tech just enables you, this is the actual work!). Even moreso than understanding the technology, you have to understand the game you are making and understand the game design.
To learn how to create good single player experiences, don't just play other games, analyze them. Watch how they create tempo and how the flow of the level works. When is the player challenged? How often? When is the player rewarded? How often? What types of challenges are present? How difficult is the game? Why were certain game and level design decisions made for that game? How would the level design be different if the character could jump twice as far? Shoot twice as fast? Once you start playing games with these sorts of questions in mind, you'll start to have a better understanding of what it takes to create a level. It will take awhile, as long or longer than it takes to learn all the tools. I'm still learning and I've been making levels since Q2 days.
Good luck.
Hmmm (Score:2, Insightful)
Then do level design on weekends for fun and give 'em out for the whole world to enjoy!
I suspect you'll be much more fulfilled that way.
After all, aren't you interested because you want people to see your work? You want to create something for people to enjoy? I've had more fun downloading NWN mods and playing Natural Selection, Team Fortress, operation flashpoint, and desert combat than buying new games.
Re:I'm not a game programmer (Score:3, Insightful)
That's a myth. It worked for Everquest and a few other games, but the bottom line is that people don't want to buy a $50 game and then pay monthly fees to keep playing. And even if they do for one game, it's not something they'll do for every or even most games they buy.
Level Editing and Game/Community Knowledge (Score:2, Insightful)
You've got it backwards (Score:3, Insightful)
That's like say, oh, it would be fun to be a writer, because they travel and drink whiskey.
Making games is damn hard work, and frequently frustrating, and frequently physically damaging, a frequently made unpleasant by dinks in suits.
If you want a job in the game industry, make sure it's because you damn-well *love* making games.
If you don't, then it will end up being "Office Space" with nerf-guns.
We do this job because the only thing that sucks worse than making games is not making games.
Re:I'm not a game programmer (Score:3, Insightful)
Go for it, my level design experiences (Score:2, Insightful)
I have been a level designer for almost 7 years now.
I started with Quake (qbsp) and then moved onto Halflife (worldcraft) and eventually to Unreal (Ued). I have turned out over 50 maps and worked on 2 mods using several different engines.
Level design is fascinating, the skills that you need are diverse. 2D skills with Gimp and Photoshop are essential to create custom signs, textures, intro screens and so forth. Then you need to become profficient at a 3D package. Ultimately 3D Max and Maya are the tools you should aim for expertise in, but this in itself can take 1 to 3 years to fully master. Then you should learn animation skills, how to make and articulate skeletons, kinematics, skinning, uvw wrapping and so on. An ability with sound would also help, basic waveform editing, normalisation, converting between formats. Lastly you should gather some decent coding skills, you need to master at least one language, Java or C++ is probably useful.
OK - now you have all these skills - what does it actually take to be a GOOD level designer?
Tp be a good level designer you have to
1) Play the game. Some people who never actually play the games they design levels for think they are level designers, they are not, no more so than a deaf guy who never listens to any tracks is a music producer. It is essential you actually play the game.
2) Through (1) you learn that a level is like a program. It is a finely balanced collection of attributes involving geometry, timing, lighting, and often a complex array of game logic such as pathnodes and triggers which all interconnect in space and time.
3) Games level coding is actually HARD, its usually implemented with polymorphic asynchonous stateful objects which have a complex emergent behaviour, but sometimes we like to look at single player levels as a pure state machines - whatever way you will see that large levels with many variables and objects become huge programs in their own right with complex issues such as network replication to solve. All of this is without getting grubby with the 'engine' and doing actual physics or rendering code.
4) Level design is also an artistic (thats why _I_ do it, for relaxation) endeavour. You can work from photos or just your pure imagination. However because it is 'artistic' you have to be prepared that audiences and critics will hold unquantifiable, subjective views, they may well think the level you spent weeks making is shit because they don't like the lighting color or the theme offends them.
5) Culture. By playing games you will understand specific knowlege like why you never place spawn points which are visible to each other, why you never use dynamic lighting with fast moving objects, why you have to check chains of causality in instigator traces, why you have to make bots not too greedy or they will get stuck on a tasty cookie. Games specific stuff.
Recommendations:
UnrealScript by Tim Sweeny and Mark Rein is a beautiful way to start , I wish it had been around when I started games design.
For real open architecture to work on at a _low_level_ then Crystal Space is probably a good engine.
Making money: I have only ever made levels for pleasure, although I may be so bold as to say many are superior to official levels I have seen in commercial games. I think the industry is growing and there should be plenty of paid work.
However - I would also say that given the _range_ of skills you need to be a good level designer you would expect them to be paid very well, this is not the case, from what I see level designers are considered a lowly position in games companies despite the fact they understand more about the software as a working whole than any other person in the company (including the engine coders)
And good luck, I find level design very rewarding hobby, and you will enjoy it as a job too.
Re:I'm not a game programmer (Score:5, Insightful)
I too am a career programmer, but I work in research in academia. My life is the complete opposite of his workwise. I actually have much more personal time to play games or whatever I want to do in my free time. I can take off when I like (within reason), while he has to schedule every second off up till the next milestone.
If you'd really like to show your stuff as a level designer, games a la quake and a la civilization have MUCH larger audiences than ones like Neverwinter nights. If you're really serious, you'll build some of each however. I think over a year/year and a half of building you could get 5 or 6 hits in various realms, and have a further 10 or so failures that show something good in them.
It's never too late. . . (Score:2, Insightful)
About three years ago (mostly because of Project Greenlight), I got involved with a group of people that also wanted to make short movies. So we did. Through the course of our first project, we became known as Lime Wrangler Productions. I've been a Prop Master, Script Supervisor, Best Boy, Editor, Gaffer and on two occasions, Director. My second directing job was for Caribou Moving Pictures and we premiere it here in Phoenix, AZ on February 13th.
I had twenty-three years worth of kindling under my ass before I found the match to start it. But now that it's going, I've been running at top speed, 'cause it's burning hot! I haven't made any money at it yet, but that's not really what's important to me at this point.
It doesn't matter when you start, just that you go for it when you're ready. Level designing does take knowledge in a huge variety of subjects, and so does directing. I personally feel fortunate that I was able to learn a lot of that stuff before I ended up in the big chair. Who's to say that our Question Asker hasn't been studying or even merely interested in the kind of stuff he needs to be a good designer?
There's skill and then there's talent. Skill, you can learn, but talent? That's what you're born with. If you've got both of those and determination, you can do anything you set your mind to. If you've got a good attitude it just makes things easier.
Moekandu