Application
Hello, my name is Artem, i am 18 years old . In this presentation I will talk about creating my level.
ARTSTATION
LINKEDIN
INST
Gameplay (With Sound) (High Settings) :
Final Cut-Scene (With Sound) :
I started creating my project with pre-production. The original idea was to practice creating an environment related to nature. The first thing I did was to look for inspiration in different old games. I found it in one of the parts of Tomb Raider, there was a level where the main character was hunting for an artifact. (I'll attach a link below)
After that, I started searching for references for level design from modern games (In the future, when setting up blocking, I modified it), and I also began to write a detailed description of the level, future mechanics and draw a map of the level.
Link to presentation with level design references and level description:
https://teletype.in/@arteqq1/-5jxA15yN-D
Map of the level:
Mechanics:
1) Shooting, rifle
2) Somersaults in different directions
3) Parkour mechanics, climb a wall
4) Quick Time Event for lifting a door
5) Slow movement in water (waist-deep)
6) Opening a gate with a lever / button
7) Mechanics of walking along a wall
Setting: Present day Character: A young girl, an artifact hunter, dark hair, abrasions and dirt on her skin, dark-colored clothes, gloves.
2) Blocking
After all, I started creating the blocking. I tried to keep the real proportions by measuring with mannequins and standard UE blocks of 1 m.
Here's a short video of the level at the blocking stage:
At this stage, I worked out all the main mechanics for the character and enemies from scratch.
A short video demonstrating the mechanics:
4)Cut scenes At this stage I created the final cutscene for my game, where the character finds an artifact. I was inspired by one of the cutscenes in Tomb Raider. I set up camera animations and character animations. I took some of the animations from Mixamo, and the rest I generated using AI. I had to film myself and send it to the neural network, after which I had to spend a lot of time cleaning up the animation.
I started this stage by picking up good references for the environment. Before I started creating locations, I analyzed each reference separately and tried to notice things that I could add to mine. I wrote these things down on my Trello board.
Link to my references:
Miro
Link to Artstation :
https://www.artstation.com/arteqq1
After selecting references for the environment, I started creating locations. I did everything from large objects to small ones. You can see it in the breakdowns on my Artstation.
Although I used ready-made assets, I did a lot of work on the materials. I used a custom master material with two slots for vertex paint (flexible mesh distribution settings) and a large number of features to increase the detail of the assets. I also worked on Emmisive for the final artifact, completely changing the look of the asset.
Screenshot from the final cutscene :
I also did a lot of work to harmoniously combine the objects by color into one whole composition.
Some screenshots in unlit mode:
After I finished with the assets, I started looking for references for lighting. I tried to make the lighting beautiful and realistic. I used HDRI and the Ultra Volumetrics plugin for fog when creating it.
AI
You can also see in the references to the light of the first location pictures created by Artificial Intelligence!
Now I am actively studying them and applying them in my work. For example, I often use Midjourney to get new ideas and improve locations, it is also suitable for finding a cooler reference for light. Improving textures with neural networks and many other things.
You can see an example here:
6) Finalization
1.I started the finalization by creating the character and enemies.
2. After that I finalized all the mechanics with the already finished character (you will see them in the gameplay video)
3. I replaced the character in the cutscene and also added facial animation.
4. I added VFX, for example, realistic effects from shots, bullet marks, blood from impacts.
5.Added sounds to my game and cut scenes.
6. Made the interface and main menu.
If we talk about optimization, then here I used nanite for vegetation, and for meshes I had to use LOD, because nanite does not work correctly together with vertex paint on version UE 5.3. Also, in general, I reduced the number of triangles for most meshes, including characters. Optimized hair and removed simulation from them. After that, I removed unnecessary light sources, and also adjusted their radius so that they do not intersect with each other. I also made the light sources disappear at a certain distance from the character for an additional increase in fps. Reduced the overall quality of textures. After all this, I divided the level into sub-levels, I load and unload them during cutscenes so that the player does not notice the freeze. In the end I added DLSS to my game to increase fps even more.
Thank you for your attention! I really want to become a part of the team 😎😎😎