Jordan Cordina
Junior Level Designer

Half Life: Resist

Genre: Adventure / Action (First-person)
Players: Singleplayer
Platform: PC
Status: ​​Unreleased Blockout

Contributions

Position: Level Designer
Team Size: Solo
Using: Unreal Engine 5.3
Duration: 6 weeks

👉Responsibilities

  • ​Sole designer from concept to final blockout 
  • ​

Gameplay Summary

  • Follows up a fictional Half Life: Resist​

📝Contents

  1. 🎯Design Goals
  2. 🔍Level Overview​
  3. 🔄Iterations
  4. 🪞​Reflections
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🎯Design Goals

Goals
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • ​4

🔍Level Overview

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • ​4

🔄Iterations

🏖️​AREA

Initial area: x • y • z
​Final area:  x • y • z

☢️CAVE

Initial area: x • y • z
​Final area:  x • y • z

🏝️Cove

Initial area: x • y • z
Mid area: x • y • z​
​Final area:  x • y • z

🪞Reflections

Were design goals met?

✅ Guiding and encouraging movement via environment
  • Player movement encouraged via environmental guideposts
  • Lighting and level geometry successfully guided players in playtests​
  • Iteration and playtesting helped refine layout
​
✅ Building tension and creating payoff moments
  • ​​​Tension built through scripted events and audio
  • Payoff achieved by obscuring + revealing views
  • High risk, high reward stealth route available​
​✅ Creating a sense of mystery
  • Sense of mystery created through environmental cues
  • Scripted enemy text hints at a darker purpose
​
✅ Introducing the stealth mechanic
  • Engagement with crouching required to progress
  • Crouch segment preceeds stealth section
  • Players could plan their route from the first vista
  • Low-risk route features hard cover
  • High-risk route dead ahead, promoting level reset
  • Exploration is rewarded with a hidden route

Thoughts and takeaways

🙌Successes
Deep-diving architectural techniques while iterating on the Facility's design set me up for success, as this is what players felt I got right. These techniques built a sense of mystery, discovery and grandeur, and I found the more I leaned into them, the more effortless and fun player navigation became. Setting up scripted events also proved rewarding, making the blockout's flow easier to visualise.

📌Pain-points and Improvements
After improving navigation, players said the level's beats came too quickly. By slightly extending the cave section, foreshadowing the path collapse and breaking it up with a choice of routes, tension would have room to rise naturally. This could improve pacing and payoff, giving playes room to breathe.

In the cove, some players didn't see the building as a point of interest from the first vista. I'd adjust the trees around it to improve visibility, and would ground it with some grass in front of the wall.

​Additonal scripting would also improve balancing stealth routes - the enemies move on a set path without a 'detection' mechanism, which I'd add in future stealth projects to get timings just right.

✨ Key Takeaways
➡️ Rapid iteration and quick feedback early on is key
➡️ Intuitive navigation frees the player to focus on the fun
➡️​ Architecture and level design theory shapes space with purpose
​➡️ Scripted events improve visualisation and should be used often
➡️​ Incorporate scale from the start, and plan pacing with metrics in mind
Copyright - Jordan Cordina - 2025