CUBEALINGUS // Sept 2020
Level Designer / Product Owner
School Project
Unreal Engine
First Person Puzzle
10 developers (3 designers, 3 programmers, 4 artists)
4 weeks
CONCEPT
Escape hell by combining “Flesh cubes” in this first-person puzzle game inspired by Portal. The cubes consist of different body parts. By combining the correct ones, you trigger an effect that you can use to progress.
RESPONSIBILITIES
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Blocked out, iterated, and set dressed in collaboration with environment artist on four rooms.
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Conducted playtest sessions and adapted to feedback.
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Responsible for communicating the vision to external parties as a product owner.
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Contributed to establishing the setting, hero assets, and environmental storytelling.
LEVEL DESIGN GOALS
Make something different
Create a memorable world heavily induced with bizarro surrealism that balances between humor and creepiness.
Onboarding & Guiding
My goal was to create levels where players traversed in a frictionless and natural way
Element of surprise
I wanted players to have at least one moment where they felt surprised by the level design.
Core Loop
Find the available cubes in the room you are in, use them to solve the puzzle that prevents you from moving on. I wanted each segment to have a unique dominant feeling to constantly stimulate the player.
Enter room - Sense
Identify puzzle -
Observe
Find & match cubes - Explore
Solve puzzle -
Experiment
Level Design Process
Design Mission
2D maps
Blockout
Playtest and iteration
Set dress
Top-Down & Beats
Before starting on my designs, I defined the beats. The beats, together with the mechanics the player had to learn, defined my design mission. The design mission is my point of reference, from which all decisions should derive when I design a room. It helps me enforce a "form follows function" mentality and get past the blank page.
2
First Vista
1
World Introduction
Skill test / End of tutorial area
3
4
The Last Trial
1. Introducing the world
We see the main character, a cute and deformed imp, locked inside a prison cell. I made the space cramped and oppressive to make the player sympathize with the imp and build up to the more open space ahead
Using Plot Strcuture Curve for Levels
I wanted the overall intensity curve to be similar to a basic plot strucutre, since it's a proven concept. When I designed a room, I applied the same structure but in a micro scale. Each room have a beginning, climax and resolution.
The tutorial area that I was responsible for, ends with room 3. Here I wanted the intensity and threat to spike, before cooling of too underline the end of something, and the start of something new, and keeping player engagement high.
Onboarding Iterations
I was responsible for onboarding. Teaching our system to the player was a challenge. Below are examples of the problems I encountered with the tutorial and how I approached them.
Problem 1: First puzzle is too complex
I tried to keep things simple in the first room by having the player placing two cubes next to a device to open a door. Many struggled with understanding what they were supposed to do with the cube at all. My communication needed to be clearer.
Solution: Introduce stationary cube
I added a new starting room but kept the old one as the second room. The new puzzle had a stationary cube, that I framed in front of the player, drawing their eye towards the desired interaction.
Problem 2: Lack of signifiers
The number of players that understood the system now increased, but the puzzle still took too much time to solve for some. A big issue was that players didn't understand how the cubes interacted with each other.
Solution: Place hint signs
I added hint signs in the areas where players encountered new interactions. I placed them so that it's impossible to approach the cube without noticing the hint sign.
Problem 3: Progressing but not learning
With the first room now simplified, some players could progress without understanding what they did correctly. This led to a snowball effect, making the subsequent rooms almost impossible to solve.
Solution: Add intro tooltip
Me and fellow level designer Andreas Nilsson decided to add a tooltip instructing how to use the cube before allowing progress. Pace got slower on the start area, but the experience got smoother in the long run. I consider this solution a failure on my part. Optimally, I would like the player to learn the system by making them feel they discovered it themseves, but time was scarce at this point.
Guiding the player
To facilitate navigation, I used a blood drip VFX our talented artists had made for decorational purposes, and added a sound cue to it. I placed the blood drip close to important spots. Players would now more often go straight to points of interest when hearing or seeing the drip.
Project Management
The role
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I was responsible for communicating our idea to the outside and making sure team members had everything they needed to be able to work. I believe that the main ingredients to a successful project are clear communication, positive energy, and structure. My experience is that we enjoy a project more when we feel heard, and that is what I try to do as a project manager.
Shared creative vision
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Having a common vision is important to make everyone feel their contribution is meaningful. I did this by putting a lot of time into the conceptualization phase, making sure we were all on the same page before moving on to production.
BIG THANKS TO TEAM MEMBERS:
Jocke Lembke, Robin Ortryd, Leonard Fahlström, Albin Nilsson, Ali Hamad, Malin Tuomas, Philip Erlandsson, Ingrid Sugrue, Andreas Nilsson.