Unknown Event
Project Summary
Unknown event is a single-player custom level for Dying Light, made with Dying Light Developer Tools. The player will experience 3 different landscapes: indoor space, exterior living quarters, and ruins. The external living quarters will allow the player to explore freely. The gameplay time is about 10 – 20 minutes.
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Tools: Dying Light Developer Tools
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Game: Dying Light
Level Overview
The first part of the level is the indoor space: the player will wake up in a dirty, messy apartment room, and he can get some melee weapons and resources to start exploration. After talking to his neighbor, he will understand that the whole apartment is full of zombies, and he needs to escape.
The second part is a small open-world residential houses area, the player can quickly go through this area or slow down to search and get rewards. This part is focused on vertical gameplay and battle design.
The last area is ruins. After climbing through a broken elevator, the player will enter a ruined building, drop down into a small square and defeat the final boss.
Maps & Layout
Unknown Event consists of three parts and is made using Dying Light Developer Tools. Map details of each area are listed below. Please remind that all the map images are original designs and do not represent the final level layout.
The indoor space
Area Map
The white natural lighting makes the player quickly fit into the environment. Dark and light contrast highlights the resources and guides the player to move forward.
Leading Lines
A vent is designed to provide a narrow place to ensure the player gets the critical weapon.
Residential Houses Area
Vertical battle and free searching are the two themes of this area. After the linear gameplay in the first part, the player needs something different. I prepared this small playground to adjust the gameplay rhythm.
Area Map
Because I don't know what path combination the player will choose, I divided this part into four different "Beats". Please look at the image below, the same-color area indicates the same difficulty and tension. The four colored columns, or we can call them four Beats can make sure no matter where the player is or what path he chooses, the gameplay difficulty is dynamically similar, and I can clearly adjust after the gameplay testing. This layering method can also be combined with other parameters to control an open-world level.
Challenge & Tension
Landmark: The red smoke indicates the destination, making sure the player can always notice where the goal is.
Landmark
Vertical Battle: it can be triggered by the player, he can move back and forth to avoid enemies' attacks.
Vertical Battle
Ruins
Area Map
I made the slopy ground in a ruined building to transfer the disharmony feeling to the player as the warm-up tension. This part has no enemies until the player meets the final boss.
Area Layout
The whole map overview
Tension Curve
Additional Gallery
Post Mortem
What went well?
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Realize design goals: Vertical battle design and aesthetic design.
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Make a quick iteration: remake the middle part of the level from a linear interior tunnel to an open space vertical living houses area.
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I gathered feedback from the supervising professor and peers to balance and adjust the level. It benefits me a lot.
What went wrong?
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The scope of the level is a little big, especially the building ruin covered with ivy, it takes me much time to finish them.
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The unstable of the editor and lack of tutorial forced me to rebuild the quest several times and fix the code logic for a long time.
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Zombies' alert area is hard to control, even if I set the value to stay at the position, some of them can still be activated at a far distance.
What I learned?
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Dying Light Developer Tools is the 4th editor I have learned so far, it introduced how to use a unique code system to construct the quest and drive events.
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This project provides me an opportunity to explore how to design vertical conveyance and combat.
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When receiving negative feedback, the first job is to analyze and extract the real reason but not immediately change the level.