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​

Contents

  1. Project Brief: The Facility
  2. Level Overview
  3. Design Goals​
  4. Processes and Challenges​
  5. Takeaways
  6. Gallery: The Facility

Project Brief: The Facility

My motivation behind this project was 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 when planning the blockout was to keep 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. 

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 Mine

  • ​Visible traces of a mining operation, 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
For an annotated breakdown of the layout and techniques used in each section, please select the buttons below.

Project Design Goals

1) Encouraging movement with environmental cues
2)  Creating a sense of mystery
3. Building sense of tension
Lighting, level geometry and audio cues are used to lead the player to the next location.
Clues about the Facility's purpose are slowly revealed as the level progresses.
Players are
From an early stage my design goals for the blockout were to:
  • Encourage player movement through environmental cues
  • Create a sense of mystery as players unravel the Facility's purpose​
  • ​Build tension to enhance the danger and make payoffs feel great
  • ​Introducing the crouching / stealth mechanic to players
​
To meet these goals, I included the following in the level sequence:
  • ​​Players begin unarmed, increasing tension as the level unfolds
  • ​A disorienting start to the level offering no clear path ahead, encouraging exploration​
  • Linked progress to rightward movement on screen, using 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​
  • Used multiple blueprints across the level to control audio, trigger gameplay events and control enemy pathing

Process and Challenges

Initial plans and Early rescoping

Picture
A top-down comparison between the first and final level layouts.
  • The project scope changed early on - the initial focus was to be a level sequence featuring the facility itself, with a brief introductory stealth sequence at the beginning
  • After mapping out the first iteration of the introductory stealth sequence, displayed to the right, I realised it didn't meet my design goals as it left no room for building atmosphere, tension or discovery, making it feel a bit tacked-on
  • Instead, I pivoted to focusing on this sequence, expanding it to create a really tight opening to the level in the three month timeframe, weaving in narrative hooks and multiple ways to build tension to increase the stake and buy-in from players
  • ​It also provided an opportunity to explore creating larger natural environments with multiple routes for the stealth section in the cove, offering risk vs reward choices to engage the player​​
Picture
Initial top-down plan of the Facility level.

Feedback and Iteration

I ran five rounds of playtesting over the three months, giving me the opportunity to iterate and incorporate feedback over seven key stages of development. 

      The BEach

In the first blockouts some players found that the cave path looked like a dead end, citing that the shadows made the area look flat. I also found that the visibility of the distant boat from the starting area allowed players to enter the next area, negatively impacting the sense of discovery and tension I sought to build throughout the sequence. 
​I tackled this by:
  • Altering the layout of the beach shoreline, giving the sand an incline
  • Introducing a protruding low section of rock from the cave wall, behind which the now-raised sand bank was visible
  • Adding additional lighting to the inside of the far cave wall 
  • Changing the position of the boats, adjusting the cave wall layout and adding sea rocks to obscure the view

​These changes worked, allowing players to intuitively understand the geometry of the environment and that the cave route expanded past what was visible. I was also able to obscure the boats until players reach the first framed view inside the beach cave, ratcheting up the tension and building a sense of discovery when the dinghy gameplay event is triggered.

​ Be critical but not negative of what could be improved.

      The Mine

Some players found the switchback route difficult to see in the first iteration of the mine. Some also felt the segment did not sufficiently build tension, feeling like more of a diversion. In a later playtest, some questioned the purpose of the mine area - indicating to me that it felt like a diversion, and changes had to be made to increase the make the area feel more substantial, and to make the crystals feel dangerous and the mining operation more apparent.
I tackled this feedback by:
  • Modifying the geometry and lighting of the switchback route, making it more obvious​
  • Adding subtitles that trigger if the player gets close to a glowing crystal signalling their danger
  • Adjusting the mine layout, creating a false route with collapsing ground, building tension and back-gating movement
  • Directing the player's view towards the false route (see the mine technique analysis), hinting at mining activities
  • Triggering gunshot audio when exiting the mine, building tension and anticipation for the next segment
These changes appeared to improve players' experience of the blockout as players stopped getting lost, had increased engagement through the mine section and many clocked-onto the sinister narrative being established by the subtitles and physical placements. Whilst enemies could not react to the player in the blockout, players would still engage with the crouching mechanic and navigate the cove using tall grass and cover to simulate stealth gameplay.
​

      Critical Analysis & Improvements

Towards the deadline I realised that the mine's pacing was good but could have been improved. This was because the false path and collapsing ground occurs slightly too early in the sequence without giving players the chance to acclimatise to the area. Expanding the pre-fall section and including a scripted event, such as enemies moving through the cave ahead of the player, could have improved pacing, built tension and made the mine feel more substantial.

      THe Cove

In early iterations, players seeing the cove from the initial vista said their focus was drawn to the wrong elements, confusing their objective. Later, players also found enemy routes harder to follow as the cove increased in size and in complexity, and through observation, players appeared to find the stealth route unstimulating as the 'critical path' was too obvious. Some players also found the stairs leading to the Facility entrance too exposed.
I tackled this by:
  • Changing the cove's layout to de-emphasise the pier and using colour to make important focal points stand out
  • Simplifying enemy paths, elevating the cove’s far end for better visibility and increasing the enemy count
  • ​​Adding a variety of routes to the cove, obscuring some of the paths from the offset and adding risk vs reward routes​
  • Redesigning the staircase to give a feeling of safety while also giving players visibility through the railings

Changing the layout of this section allowed players to consistently identify the Facility as their ultimate goal, and testers reported they felt more engaged during the stealth section. Players also spent more time on the stairs suggesting that they felt safer, and often spent some time looking back over the cove and the route they had traversed. 

Fewer players took the riskier route than I had expected. This is likely because the beach was more exposed, with the enemy on the pier directly facing the beach when collecting cargo from the dinghy. This could be fixed by partitioning the pier area with raised land and a fence, building a visual barrier to make the approach feel safer (despite remaining open). Additionally, I would reduce the pier in size and place the dinghy on the other side of it so the enemy carrying cargo faces away from the player.

Takeaways

What went right

What went wrong

What I took away from it & how it'll inform my work going forward
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Gallery: The Facility

Copyright - Jordan Cordina - 2023