Reverse Level Design 2

Like I mentioned in my previous blog, I set myself a warm up project to map out level designs of games already on the market so I could analyse the flow and what parts of the level are easy to communicate and which are difficult. The games I went with are, God of War 3, Left 4 Dead and Oddworld Abe’s Odyssey.

I tried to pick games both different in genre and game style, God of War is adventure/action heavily combat orientated with some puzzles and exploration to break up the action set pieces. One of the things God of War has always been good at is keeping the battles varied and interesting through changing environment obstacles, enemy patterns/routines or simply because the game is great to look at graphically. Some parts of the level were more difficult to map than others, mainly when a puzzle was involved. The puzzle room towards the top of the map became very difficult to explain and show due to the complex nature of the puzzle. 

God of War is renown for it's bloody combat and large scale environments. Battles are often broken up with puzzles revolving around switches and box pushing.

Left 4 Dead I chose because I wanted a first person perspective game and developer Valve are renown FPS game designers so it seemed like a good candidate. Also, I thought it would be interesting as this game is heavily dependent on its co-op nature and the level designs must take into account 4 players will always be present in the game. This game was relevantly easy to map. Unlike the other two games L4D doesn't have many environment interactions or puzzles and is based sorely on the survival combat between the players.

Finally, I chose Oddworld most importantly because it’s 2D and therefore would be designed and communicated in a completely different way to the other two games. From all three of the maps this one is probably the easiest one to communicate. It's also probably the most accurate one for an artist or programmer to pick up as it clearly shows the exact positions of the obstacles whereas the maps for the 3D maps are a bit vague to the specifics and more a 'general design' for the level.

Oddworld is broken up screen by screen, presenting different challenges in each one.