The Facility Long

Jordan Cordina
Level Designer

The Facility

Genre: Stealth (First-person)
Players: Singleplayer
Platform: PC
Status: Released Prototype

Contributions

Position: Level Designer
Team Size: Solo
Using: Unreal Engine 4
Duration: 3 months

Responsibilities

Created project from concept to final blockout with blueprint visual scripting, showing the opening minutes of a level
Responsible for the design and creation, including level design, scripting and documentation
Focused the level on environment-driven player navigation and using space to elevate storytelling
Iteratively adjusted the level over seven key stages in response to feedback and critical reflection

Gameplay Summary

The Facility was a proposal for a first-person stealth-action game, with a similar theme to low-tech 60's spy films
The opening section is linear and low-action as the player starts without equipment, forcing them to rely on stealth
The mission is to covertly infiltrate 'The Facility' and the player must use tall grass and natural cover to stay hidden

Project Brief: The Facility

The Facility is a level blockout featuring the opening minutes of gameplay in a first-person stealth-action game. My main aims for the project were building on my level design and visual scripting knowledge. It was created as part of my honours project, examining the crossover in how architectural and level design techniques guide movement in virtual spaces.

My main goal for the project was keeping user interface elements to a minimum. Instead, I would incorporate level design and architectural techniques into the level's physical structure, guiding players intuitively and setting up the main gameplay beats of the level.

emotional and Narrative Goals

From an early stage, the high-level emotive and narrative goals of the Facility blockout were:

Introducing crouching and the stealth mechanic to players
Creating a sense of discovery as the player tracks down and starts to unravel the purpose of the Facility
Building a sense of caution to encourage the use of the stealth mechanic and ratchet up the tension

To successfully hit these goals, I included the following in the level sequence:

A graph demonstrating how the tension rises in the final blockout

Had the player begin unarmed, increasing tension as the level unfolds
Created an initial sense of disorientation by starting the player facing a view with no clear way forward, encouraging them to seek their own way forward
Linked progress to rightward movement on screen and used denial and reward with the facility reveal
Introduced hints of nuclear activities with glowing, "hot to the touch" green crystals in the mine
Employed a narrow tunnel as a funnel to connect crouching with progression before the stealth segment
Used the contrast of exiting the small tunnel and looking up at the large facility to create a sense of awe and tension

Level overview

1. THe BEach

Player begins at the beach without equipment
Environmental cues lead the player to the cave entrance
Player learns the facility is close

2. The Cave

Visible traces of a mining operation and hinting at the organisation's nefarious purpose
Funnel teaches use of crouching controls, used for stealth

3. The Cove

Player begins on high ground for an overview of the area
Multiple stealth routes with grass and obstacles for cover
Risk vs reward routes

The BEach

The player is not presented with a route in their initial field of view. Environmental cues (leading lines, implied space and framing) lead the players attention towards the intended route ahead.

A trigger volume in the cave triggers player dialogue and tugboat audio coming from a framed view ahead, showing that the player is close to their goal. The view composes of a previously obscured barge and a tugboat travelling from right to left; following the path left leads to a dead end and a mostly obscured view of the Facility.

With the route in the second view blocked the player turns around to see a switchback route, previously obscured by the cave walls on approach. A contrasting green light on the right side of their screen leads the player forward.

The Mine

Under construction.
Second paragraph.

Under construction.
Second paragraph. "funneling", "backgating"

The Cove