First Batch of Bunker Screenshots

I promised you some real screenshots showing off the map, didn't I? Well here they are. Remember that the map is not 100% done, which is particularly noticeable in the lighting as I always do that last. Here they are though:

Outside the facility.

Close up outside.

The first fallback point.

The silo room (the top of the missile should be red, it didn't show in the screenshot.)

I'm going to show two more screenshots that our closeups from the first checkpoint and second checkpoint. I like doing subtle things on my maps that players who take the time to look around will notice and appreciate. The following screenshots are two "mini scenes" I created within the game, where you can look at the bodies or the situation, and imagine what may have transpired there.

A corpse with spray paint next to it, some desperate graffiti, and three covered bodies.

A body slumped against a barricade, weapons and ammo at the ready.

I think it's little details like this that really make the differance between a polished map and just a fun one. Sure, I could have just played the rifles in a row next to the ammo by the sandbags, but this gives the scene a little more character. The same goes for the first checkpoint in the bunker, there's no real purpose for the scene, but it adds some context and flavour to what would otherwise be a regular survival map with a fall back mechanic.

Check back for more in the future, beta soon!

Delicious Zoey Bait

I'm in the process of rapidly trying to get the survival map to beta so I can get as many people playing it as possible. So far so good, with it looking like I might have it up to beta as early as Friday. Though I do start working tomorrow so that's going to suck up some free time. Regardless, I've got a nice screen shot for you. This is a picture of me testing the Missile Room you can see in the middle of my SketchUp screenshots. You can imagine how this ended:


Real screenshots coming soon.

Mapping for Left4Dead

Not more than a few days ago, Valve finally released their long awaited SDK for Left4Dead and I promptly set about making a survival map that I've had bouncing around in my head for a while. The concept was that, instead of a single area with a few defense points that is typical of the standard suvival maps you have have a larger area with multiple "checkpoints" that you could fall back to. The ideal set up for this kind of gameplay is a military bunker, set into the side of a cliff. You start outside, fall back to an inner chamber and can close blast doors that will hold the infected at bay for a time. You repeat this process two more times falling deeper back into the bunker until you reach a command room where you can run no further and make your final stand.

I used SketchUp to lay the map out:


I actually have all of this laid out in Hammer already, but I'm having some difficulty getting the director to cooperate with where I want zombies to spawn in from. It has to do with the navigation mesh editing, which is only done in Left4Dead. Well it's kind of done in Counter-Strike: Source, but not to the extend you need to do it in L4D so I'm still getting the hang of it. Once I do I'll have a beta version up for download. At the least, expect screenshots soon.

DemoReel!

This is a short video that I put together to showcase some of the stuff that I've done during my schooling, both in and out of class. Mission 16 and Decay were done in free time, the War map was my level design final project.

Check it out:



And as always feel free to leave your thoughts, criticism is good.

Controversy: Six Days in Fallujah

I think it's time that I spend a little time talking about the recent controversy over Six Days in Fallujah, a game that was recently dropped by publisher Konami. The game was being developed by Atomic Games.

The reason there is controversy over this game is pretty interesting actually. It's not the actual content of the game that's come under fire. It's an action game that takes place in Iraq, maybe not the most tasteful subject, but it's certainly one that has been done before. The problem comes from how the devs and Konami initially tried to pitch it. It was touted as a hyper-realistic game all about the seriousness of war. A big pitching point of the game was that the developers interviewed American soldiers who were actually in the battle the game is supposed to be about. You were going to follow one squad through the second battle for fallujah in a documentary-esque video game. I think that's a really great idea, executed right.

Now on the one hand they have it pitched as this intense realistic game about war. On the other hand you've got Konami marketing VP Anthony Crouts saying something like, "We're not pro-war. We're not trying to make people feel uncomfortable. We just want to bring a compelling entertainment experience. At the end of the day, it's just a game."

At the end of the day, it's just a game? Man, are you that out of touch? I tend not to get worked up about these sort of things, but this kind of ignorance is unexcusable from somebody who is supposed to be marketing this thing. If you think you're game can try and pretend to be a serious game about war, but really just be about mowing down faceless soldiers and taking clips of bullets to the chest unflinchingly, you are seriously mistaken.

Obviously, there was some serious bumbling on the marketing aspect of this game, Shacknews covered that really well and I'm not going to hammer the point in anymore, but I am going to point something else out. As soon as the controversy began, Konami immediately dropped the project. I mean this game wasn't announced more than a month before Konami washed there hands of it. Regardless of the legitmacy of the controversy, it raises an important question about publishers. If we want to make something of real merit with some controversy, not only do we need to worry about public reaction but good luck getting the industry itself behind you.

It's a little depressing for the Triple A side of things, but it certainly chalks one up for the indies.

Announcement: Boosh Studios

Hey all,

Quick announcement about some of those plans I mentioned earlier. Boosh Studios has been formed by myself, Josh, and Mark and we've started a development blog for our ramblings about flash development and games. Give it a read!

You can find the blog over at booshstudios.blogspot.com !

What's In the Pipeline

It's been sometime since I had the time to get on here and write something up. The end of the semester has been pretty busy between our production beta, papers for other classes, finishing up our mod for a la mod, and some other side projects. Here's what I've got coming up:

1) As soon as I can I'm going to post up some screenshots and a download link to our completed a la mod project, Decay. It's a Half-Life 2: Episode 2 modification and it only takes about 25 minutes to play through. For the record, we did win a la mod!

2) Hypernova is a game that was conceptualized by my good friend Josh Terry who was kind enough to bring me on board this really cool project. Hypernova is a tabletop game of similiar ilk to Warhammer and Warmachine, except that the models you're commanding are space fleets. It's unique in that not only are the models made via papercraft (aka they're free if you have a printer and some glue) but the game takes into account the lack of physics in space such that your shifts can drift around each other while firing. Very cool.

3) Finally, Myself, Josh Terry, and Mark Desmarais have put together an (as of yet) unnamed production team for this summer to produce quality flash games for Kongregate. With the experience we've picked up from our Production classes and working on the a la mod project we feel more than up to producing something worth while for the masses of the internet. We'll see if I'm eating those words in a few months, but I don't think so.

So yeah, that's what I've been up to, and all of that on top of my other non-gaming classes. Stay tuned for more info on all of these projects.