Week 5: More Level Stuff & Bug Fixing

Development on the game build was a little shorter this week due to spending time on my progress report. For this week on the game build, I worked on refining the level by adding more assets. I started to work on blocking out the underground tomb area and also planning out how each area of the level would connect to the tomb. Along with this, I discovered some bugs with the weapon switching and the health scaling for the zombies which have now been fixed.

Temple Area

My first task for the week was to finish the custom temple just after the starting area. Last week I set up the initial shape and started adding in some assets. This area was a bit more tricky to work with because I needed to make sure that both the exterior and interior looked good as both viewpoints would be visible.

The actual play space still needs some more work to it to fill it in a bit more but this is where I have left it for now.

Underground Tomb Area

When it came to designing this area I wanted to have something that stands out and is separate from the rest of the level. I looked back over the reference images that I collected during my pre-production to get some ideas for what I wanted the space to be. I already knew what I wanted the purpose of the area to be so that also helped to influence the design.

I really liked the designs of these circle spaces that are connected with bridges and passageways. It gives a lot more focus to the center objects which I felt could be used for my tomb for the level.

This picture in particular has a great set dressing around the edges of the area which helps tell the narrative about the area.

I started by using the landscape visibility mask to cut holes in the landscape. This will allow the player to go underneath the landscape which will allow me to build the tomb directly underneath the playable level.

This will mean that this area will need fully sealing to make it feel like a fully enclosed area and it will also not be able to take advantage of the global illumination which will mean it will need a lot more work to get the lightning looking the way I want.

I Started by putting some primitive shapes underneath the landscape that would serve as the main part of the tomb. As mentioned previously I really liked the circle designs so that is what I opted for with my own design. I then started to add in some assets to help bring it to life a bit more. Just by adding in a couple of assets helps me to visualize what the final version could look like.

My next steps for the tomb is to get the connecting rooms completed in each section of the map. These rooms connect the tomb entrance in each section of the level as seen in the picture just above. The stairs from the top section of the level are just outside of the entrances so it all connects together quite well.

As for the bug fixes they were pretty serious issues however the fixes are not that in-depth so I won't cover them in detail. A couple of tweaks to the logic in some of the functions as well as how those functions were being called got the features working as intended.

As I said this week's development is not as large as previous weeks due to putting most of my time going into finishing the progress report but now that it's complete I can return to working on the project as normal.