I feel like this question and your next question go hand in hand. Good and bad practices lead to good and bad levels. There are a lot of reasons why a level might feel bad, but for me it comes down to complexity, does it support gameplay, and the player’s ability to mentally map your space. If a space is cluttered, complex, or its purpose is unclear, players will become frustrated and walk away from your game. So anything that makes the level more easily used by players is a good practice. Design patterns that providing visual cues in the environment can keep the player on the right path, such as orienting the environment around an important focal point or aligning all the elements to the path the player is supposed to follow (think a village with one road that all the buildings sit on). Gameplay is king so make sure that your level allows the player to use all the actions they spent time learning in other parts of the game. Finally, mental mapping is the player’s ability to learn, remember, and master your space. This is also known as cognitive mapping. Make sure that it is clear where the player needs to go and how they can use your level. This is improved by doing things like making it clear what is a climbable surface and what isn’t, what spaces can be jumped over, and what items have interactions.
I absolutely love to see when a good experience comes together. When the Level Design is clear for me as the player, interesting, and integrated into the game world. When it feels like it’s part of a much larger space and not just some linear experience even though it may be exactly that. When the Environment Art and Sound Design all come together to communicate emotion.
I am not one of the experts here, but without a doubt, Unreal Tournament. The levels were so thought out and easy to maneuver. At the time, the graphics were awe-inspiring and seemed almost real. I still have memories of playing them as if they were real-world locations. I was so happy to be able to make my own levels and spent hours in the editor creating DM maps. I did have visions of being a level designer at Epic Games, but my career took a different path. I still like to jump in and make new levels once in a while.
Everybody’s journey into level design is different. For me, I spent years reading articles, blog posts, even books without any advice really clicking for me. I even attended university although we only had one class on the subject. All of that really didn’t click for me until I joined a class at CGMA on level design that was taught by two Senior Level Designers that had been in the industry for awhile, 10 weeks of foundational skills and live mentoring. The mentoring was the most important part and I recommend that to everyone. With this strong foundation, suddenly all the things I learned with all that reading material made sense and I’ve been able to build on it ever since. That said, I have been creating an ongoing 14 part tutorial here on the Dev community for the beginners to help teach these foundational skills. Currently, it’s on part 4 with part 5 coming soon.
Sweet! Is there a link for where to find your tutorial?
Hiya … i am sorry if this message wasalready posted I have made a map that could engl8be ctf Dom dm tdm … and this was an on going pet project of mine … however the mem issues have just deflated my enthusiasm… where b4 I had so much room to juggle I find myself over maxed at every corner … these limitations kind of hinder me wanting to move forward seeing as how it seems that detail should be overlooked when creating a map in case of the maxed memory issue. I used to work as an fqa in creative specificaly in 2020 wich gave me the itch to do something grand … now if i delete anything at all i cannot put it back because of mem max issues where there were none b4 . Loll so sorry loonng runaround to ask … will mem max be upped or do i just put a nail in it … i would.l9ve to show you … but i dunno if i can link videos from xbox but just in case …
P.S. creative mode not uefn
Download size is determined by things such as with texture size. If you change the LOD bios to reduce max in game display size, this will change the download size for the map. A good practice is to reuse as many objects / textures as possible, this will greatly reduce your project sizes.
One way to create superpowers is by combining items with verse that give you an effect like an explosive punch or turning invisible for example. There are plenty of examples of people doing that on Youtube.
Sure! You can find my ongoing tutorial series here on the Epic Dev site or through my introduction thread on Twitter/X.
Is there a certain issue you’re having? This could possibly be a problem if your new landscape is under the water level.
One of the best pieces of advice I can give when concepting a level is to work fast and dirty. Don’t worry about making your level pretty or even in-engine at first, start with “paper design”. Grab a sticky note, napkin, anything–and start drawing designs with basic shapes and lines. Scribble as many layouts as you need until you feel confident in your player-pathing, then start blocking out the level in-engine.
Currently the best way to do something like you want is using teleporters and spreading out areas in the map to lower memory usage. Enabling streaming on a map and spreading everything out really does a great job in lowering memory usage.
If you look at the UEFN feature examples, we have two lighting templates that do a great job in showing just how to setup lighting.
One important CTF principle is to have a mirrored map(create 1 base and clone it), no team should have an advantage created because of bad map design. Avoiding things like a bowl map where there is no cover from bases is another good principle. Successful CTF games usually have a leveling or class mechanic so no two players are alike. For example, you can make a scout class that is fast and jumps high and an opposite class like a Defender that moves slowly but has high health/shields.
UEFN is excellent for creating a Greybox level. With the huge number of devices and art pieces available, it should take a short amount of time to create a layout. Once a map is created it’s very easy to create a playtest group and let people test your map through an Island code. Also, members of your team can help you edit in real time while being connected to your UEFN edit session in Fortnite.
My process when starting a new level begins with the design doc. I like to know about the setting, narrative beats that happen during the level, what actions the player is capable of, and what gameplay will be introduced during the level. I then start collecting reference images, lots of reference images. I look for images that help inform the setting (in real life and in other games), the architecture style, lighting, and mood. The more images the better. Next, I convert that into a Node Map, almost like a dot map where I note the connections between different important player decisions in the level. I organize these together into spatial clusters and give them themes, such as ruined building, clocktower, and so on. This map then becomes my graybox so that testing can commence. Finally, I iterate on the design until it’s in a good place.
Absolutely, gameplay is king when making your designs. Level designs should always be planned around the gameplay you want to feature. For example, if you plan to have the Grappler or Ballistic Shield in your level (like I do. I love both) you will want to include paths that only can be reached using the Grappler and weapons that can overcome the advantages of the shield. Likewise, when using devices like the Class Designer device, you want to make sure that your design takes into account the specifics of each class.
Plz suggetions to lower mem usage as an example i have linked a short video … i used. Alot of lighting and had to max grow lighting assets ( wich are few )to get the wanted effect
View Capture | Xbox xbox in blue will lead you to it … but you prob know that
Is changin the aspect or growth a major memory gobber compared to just placement or realtivly minamal ? I guess what i mean does it have a major impact morso then other changes made to assets
When designing levels in a game where players can build, you can–and should design areas that are out of reach via traditional movement. This challenges players to use building mechanics to fully explore their environment which can be very engaging and rewarding. However, when designing levels without building mechanics, you should ensure players can access areas without said mechanic.
I would have loved to work on Everquest. It’s the first game I played where I really felt like being inside of the world not just playing a game. I learned so many great concepts on class and level design just by playing that game.