Wednesday, June 14, 2006
5 steps to building game levels quickly
This summer I've been creating quite a few high quality game maps with the Valve Source engine for the game Counter-Strike: Source and I've come across some steps that will increase your speed while developing game levels and making them look good. Most of these apply to creating game levels in general.
1. Use decals everywhere! If you have a wall showing someplace that doesn't have a decal, your first question should be "Why doesn't it have a decal?" If you have to think about it for more than a second, it should probably have a decal on it. In case you don't know what a decal it, it's a texture that has an alpha layer to it so that it's transparent in places. Things like grafitti, sewer lids, water spots, exposed brick and signs are all great decals and should be placed all over your map. You map will go from boring to exciting very quickly with decals.
2. Props are your friend. Use them everywhere. When I say everywhere, I really mean it. Don't ever worry about whether or not your computer will be able to handle drawing all those props on screen. If you get to the point where your computer is actually having a problem, then deal with it but never before. Try not to use Physics props more than 50 places on a multiplayer level but static props should be used all over the place and don't spend more than 30 seconds placing most of the props. Make sure to place a lot of little props. Don't just only use those big oil tanks or cars but use a lot of garbage and small poles.
3. Build cities or closed in areas. Outdoor areas with expansive vistas are highly over rated. Few people will look at the view but if they do look and they see that something is wrong with your skybox land off in the distance with how it meets up with your land, it'll deduct some major cool points from your map. Large vistas also take a ton of time to build well because it's a lot more detail that needs to be added to the map. Focus on a small area to map and do a really good job with it. Focus on smaller maps that are enclosed by city buildings. Even long streets are to be avoided since it's so much extra detail thats needed. Whenever I've seen a long street in a mod, I've never seen it pulled off well.
4. Never create your own textures or models. It's a waste of time. No one knows if you created the textures yourself or if they came from the game anyways and few will care. Unless you're making the level for a contest and it requires custom textures, creating new ones is a waste of time. Occasionally you'll need a model like if you're building a recreation of the Lourve in France, you're going to need a model for the three glass domes most likely.
5. Never try to recreate a real life place or at least only recreate a portion of it. Often times, while creating a real life place, you'll create the outside first and the building will look correct. Then when you start building the interior, you quickly realize the inside is way too small. This happens because when you run around inside of a game, your game character likes to have more room to run around and dodge than is in a real life building so give the character some room and don't build an exact replica of the building. Generally if you build the outside, people will get the idea of what it's supposed to be. ¶ 9:39 PM
This summer I've been creating quite a few high quality game maps with the Valve Source engine for the game Counter-Strike: Source and I've come across some steps that will increase your speed while developing game levels and making them look good. Most of these apply to creating game levels in general.
1. Use decals everywhere! If you have a wall showing someplace that doesn't have a decal, your first question should be "Why doesn't it have a decal?" If you have to think about it for more than a second, it should probably have a decal on it. In case you don't know what a decal it, it's a texture that has an alpha layer to it so that it's transparent in places. Things like grafitti, sewer lids, water spots, exposed brick and signs are all great decals and should be placed all over your map. You map will go from boring to exciting very quickly with decals.
2. Props are your friend. Use them everywhere. When I say everywhere, I really mean it. Don't ever worry about whether or not your computer will be able to handle drawing all those props on screen. If you get to the point where your computer is actually having a problem, then deal with it but never before. Try not to use Physics props more than 50 places on a multiplayer level but static props should be used all over the place and don't spend more than 30 seconds placing most of the props. Make sure to place a lot of little props. Don't just only use those big oil tanks or cars but use a lot of garbage and small poles.
3. Build cities or closed in areas. Outdoor areas with expansive vistas are highly over rated. Few people will look at the view but if they do look and they see that something is wrong with your skybox land off in the distance with how it meets up with your land, it'll deduct some major cool points from your map. Large vistas also take a ton of time to build well because it's a lot more detail that needs to be added to the map. Focus on a small area to map and do a really good job with it. Focus on smaller maps that are enclosed by city buildings. Even long streets are to be avoided since it's so much extra detail thats needed. Whenever I've seen a long street in a mod, I've never seen it pulled off well.
4. Never create your own textures or models. It's a waste of time. No one knows if you created the textures yourself or if they came from the game anyways and few will care. Unless you're making the level for a contest and it requires custom textures, creating new ones is a waste of time. Occasionally you'll need a model like if you're building a recreation of the Lourve in France, you're going to need a model for the three glass domes most likely.
5. Never try to recreate a real life place or at least only recreate a portion of it. Often times, while creating a real life place, you'll create the outside first and the building will look correct. Then when you start building the interior, you quickly realize the inside is way too small. This happens because when you run around inside of a game, your game character likes to have more room to run around and dodge than is in a real life building so give the character some room and don't build an exact replica of the building. Generally if you build the outside, people will get the idea of what it's supposed to be. ¶ 9:39 PM
