"Bluebeard" Week 4 - William Marshall - Level Design Creation and Experimentation
"Bluebeard" - William Marshall
Week 4 - Level Design Creation and Experimentation
Intro
A lot of experimenting and changes to the overall style were implemented this week. After being reminded that I was almost halfway through my deadline, I decided to force myself to work on something that I hadn't thought about before now - my art style.
Since I would never consider myself to be a particularly impressive 2D artist, it was incredibly important that my art style was simple and easy to re-create across a wide variety of assets, so I could maintain consistency whilst also making my assets look the way they should.
As I mentioned last week - I had considered 3D assets, but due to time constraints, I have decided to drop that idea entirely and focus on 2D assets. It will also provide me with a decent challenge, giving me the opportunity to practice and experiment with 2D properly.
Level Select Screen
My level select screen was something that I had been ignoring up until now. As I was thinking of ideas, I instantly knew I didn't want to simply place buttons on a blank screen, as I know I can do better.
I then decided that I wanted to create a floor-plan of Bluebeard's castle after stumbling across some castle blueprints on my Facebook feed.
Task 1 - Planning
The top left is the reference that I found on my Facebook feed. There was something about how simple it looked - yet it was detailed in a way that called to me. Even though there was a distinct lack of colour, I knew that this was something I wanted to emulate.
I started by mocking up some UI and button features, placing them onto the reference in the way that I would want them to be seen at my game.
Task 2 - Castle Layout
Using my reference, I created Bluebeard's Castle layout in the exact same way (with the same colours) as the reference that I really liked. This was done by drawing various outlines with a black brush, getting thicker lines for the exterior walls and thinner lines for walls that were not part of the main shape of the castle.
It starts from the bottom, leading into a hall that has a staircase. There are then various rooms which I knew that a castle would need to include, such as a dining room and guest bedrooms. (I decided to include multiple bedrooms due to the amount of wives Bluebeard had).
Looking back at this now, I know that I need to include colour in some capacity, as I'm worried that making my menu too grey will make my game overly boring. Dark Purple/Red seem to serve well for my style of game, as well as Dark Blue.
Potion Creation
Last week, I stated that I knew I would be capable of creating a potion for the game, in order to force myself to start making assets, rather than simply planning lots of things.
Task One - Sketching
Using my reference material, I came up with a few little sketches for the overall shape of my potion bottle. This was also a chance to experiment with what perspective I wanted my assets to be in, as this was the very first game asset I was designing. (When I mention perspective, I am referring to the general angle that my camera will view my game from).
I wanted to focus on shapes that strayed away from stereotypes, but I feel like they were a bit TOO unusual. They would most likely confuse my player, even if I coloured it red like a stereotypical health potion.
Speaking of colour - I should have done a few experiments with colour, but red is essentially the industry standard for health and wellbeing.
Task 2 - Potion Creation
Using my sketches, I decided to go with the most circular (and most stereotypical) shape in order to avoid confusing my audience. The outline was created by creating shapes with Photoshop tools, before using Photoshop's effects to create the glass, reflections and liquid effects. These were the 'stroke', 'inner glow' and 'outer glow' effects.
I'm actually very satisfied with this example. Since I've never been very confident with 2D, it surprised me that I could make something of half-decent quality with just a few steps.
Task 3 - Particle Effect
Using the sketches that I developed last week, I came up with this small particle effect that would fly around my health potion. The 'Red Cross' is the standard for health, so I decided to be simple and incorporate it in a fancy graphic style. I also made use of Photoshop's shadow effect to create the shadow seen here, as if the cross had quite a bit of depth.
Compared to my potion, I feel like I could've done more with this example. It's a bit boring and basic, but will not be seen very much by the player.
Level Design/Style Selection
As I have mentioned in the introduction to this blog post, I have been working on the overall style and presentation of my game, now that I have made a lot of plans and feel like I should step out of the 'planning phase'.
The style looked absolutely amazing and took about 20 minutes to make. Even someone as confused as me could make something like this if they put in the proper amount of effort and practice (since someone picking up this style obviously won't be as good as the original maker).
Since I loved this style so much, I decided to have a practice run of my own with it.
Style Experimentation
Task One - Experimentation
Using the video, I decided to create my own version which used the same workflow. I was incredibly pleased with the result - especially since it only took me around 15 minutes to complete. It could certainly use improving in places, but this was the first step to me discovering the style that I wanted to use for my game.
It was completed by using a combination of the lasso tool (to create the hills), brushes for the highlights and a tree brush which I downloaded to create the foliage with simple clicks.
I also played with various colour saturations and eventually came up with this gorgeous purple example, which looked a lot more interesting and impressive than the green/blue colours I had used previously. Since I liked this colour scheme so much, I decided to incorporate it into my game. The darker purples contrasted really well with the bright pink sky.
This is the first 'mock up' that I came up with for my level design. I decided to stray away from my previous level designs so that I could incorporate the large, dramatic castle windows more into my design (which then allowed me to demonstrate my newfound interest in the rolling landscapes).
I then decided that I wanted to create a floor-plan of Bluebeard's castle after stumbling across some castle blueprints on my Facebook feed.
Task 1 - Planning
I started by mocking up some UI and button features, placing them onto the reference in the way that I would want them to be seen at my game.
Task 2 - Castle Layout
It starts from the bottom, leading into a hall that has a staircase. There are then various rooms which I knew that a castle would need to include, such as a dining room and guest bedrooms. (I decided to include multiple bedrooms due to the amount of wives Bluebeard had).
Looking back at this now, I know that I need to include colour in some capacity, as I'm worried that making my menu too grey will make my game overly boring. Dark Purple/Red seem to serve well for my style of game, as well as Dark Blue.
Potion Creation
Last week, I stated that I knew I would be capable of creating a potion for the game, in order to force myself to start making assets, rather than simply planning lots of things.
Task One - Sketching
Using my reference material, I came up with a few little sketches for the overall shape of my potion bottle. This was also a chance to experiment with what perspective I wanted my assets to be in, as this was the very first game asset I was designing. (When I mention perspective, I am referring to the general angle that my camera will view my game from).
I wanted to focus on shapes that strayed away from stereotypes, but I feel like they were a bit TOO unusual. They would most likely confuse my player, even if I coloured it red like a stereotypical health potion.
Speaking of colour - I should have done a few experiments with colour, but red is essentially the industry standard for health and wellbeing.
Task 2 - Potion Creation
Using my sketches, I decided to go with the most circular (and most stereotypical) shape in order to avoid confusing my audience. The outline was created by creating shapes with Photoshop tools, before using Photoshop's effects to create the glass, reflections and liquid effects. These were the 'stroke', 'inner glow' and 'outer glow' effects.
I'm actually very satisfied with this example. Since I've never been very confident with 2D, it surprised me that I could make something of half-decent quality with just a few steps.
Task 3 - Particle Effect
Compared to my potion, I feel like I could've done more with this example. It's a bit boring and basic, but will not be seen very much by the player.
Level Design/Style Selection
As I have mentioned in the introduction to this blog post, I have been working on the overall style and presentation of my game, now that I have made a lot of plans and feel like I should step out of the 'planning phase'.
I spent quite an exhausting and irritating day trying to find a simple style that I really liked and didn't look too boring. I then stumbled across this amazing video:
The style looked absolutely amazing and took about 20 minutes to make. Even someone as confused as me could make something like this if they put in the proper amount of effort and practice (since someone picking up this style obviously won't be as good as the original maker).
Since I loved this style so much, I decided to have a practice run of my own with it.
Style Experimentation
Task One - Experimentation
It was completed by using a combination of the lasso tool (to create the hills), brushes for the highlights and a tree brush which I downloaded to create the foliage with simple clicks.
I also played with various colour saturations and eventually came up with this gorgeous purple example, which looked a lot more interesting and impressive than the green/blue colours I had used previously. Since I liked this colour scheme so much, I decided to incorporate it into my game. The darker purples contrasted really well with the bright pink sky.
However, the colours were EXTREMELY bland and boring, with no life to them at all. When I came back to do a re-design, I made certain to include a little bit of colour, even if my castle was supposed to be grey.
Using what I had learnt from my previous practice, I came up with some purple-coloured hills in order to make the landscape stand out more. I also made the path that the player runs along a lot thinner, as I took inspiration from my lecturer's example, discovering that the perspective worked a lot better this way.
In order to demonstrate that my castle was a medieval castle, I also added some blocks of various light/dark values to the wall, in order to break up the boring grey walls that I had in my first draft.
Testing out the saturation levels produced this orange/purple colourscheme that my Girlfriend actually came up with, as she claimed that it really made the landscape behind the windows stand out. It also added some colour to the boring grey castle walls.
Plans For Next Week
This week was full of experimentation and new ideas. However, from this point I want to focus more on getting things into the Unity engine, so that I can refine them now rather than at the last minute.
-Level One Parallax Scrolling Setup
-Level One Scene Setup
-Hazard Implementation/Creation
-Static Effect Improvement
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