NavMesh

The next important step in the process of designing my level is to provide a virtual map telling AI where they are allowed to walk. Navmeshing is a very important part of level design within the Creation kit as without it your AI will simply stand still and not travel around leaving the immersion of the game completely ruined. Below you can see the auto generate navmesh. The next step for me is to take this navmesh and enhance it and make it less messy, I do this by going close to each segment of the mesh and manipulating the vertices and cutting and moving each point around until it is a clear and easy to navigate map for the AI.

More Cluttering

Whilst cluttering I am taking the time to look at the more in depth items as well as the bigger items that make up the room. By this I mean that an important part of making a room is not only putting furniture in, but putting items on the furniture.

In the picture below you can see how I have made a small area with some larger pieces of furniture as well as put some details in such as the helmet and arrows on the table.

Cluttering / Light

I have now started going room by room in my dungeon and began to breathe life into everywhere by using different items to ensure the dungeon looks lived in. The key to this stage it to always think about the player, when the player enters a room you need to highlight key areas to make sure that their attention will be drawn to key areas. You also need to tell a story with the props in your level, by this I mean, everything in there didn't just randomly appear, the place needs to feel lived in, everything is there for a reason.

Here is how the first room has come along so far.

Cave / Exit

I thought it would be pretty cool for the exit of the cave to be a small cave system, this way I could make the world hook-up for the exit nearby the entrance location but make it so the player is surprised at how close the exit was. I want to make the exit on the exterior quite well hidden so the player doesn't find it before finding the entrance.

Here is the cave from the inside.

Layout Complete

The layout has now been finished, here it is;

The next step now is to ensure there are no world holes anywhere and then go through and clutter. After that I will add enemies, traps and figure out a quest line. The final stage will be to hook the dungeon up to the world. 

Slowing the player

The threat is always present when designing a level of the different kind of players that will experience your creation, there are three main types of players;

• The player that will rush through paying minimal attention to detail, to combat these types of players you want plenty of obstacles, traps, and enemies that will slow them down and ensure they do not beat your level within minutes. 
• The player that will explore your level and pay attention to some of the finer details, they will look for loot and get a better feel for the story and quests than the previous type. This player requires a decent amount of authenticity to enable them to feel satisfied with the level. In order to ensure this player has a good experience I am trying to offer the opportunity for exploration by branching off the dungeon into different rooms where this player can explore and be rewarded for taking extra time out.
• The final type of player is the perfectionist, the person who will pay attention to all the story line, who will want to go through and make sure they have beaten and gotten everything out of the level that is possible. To satisfy this player I will use a same approach as the last and ensure everything is very authentic and looks as though everything belongs where it has been placed. A lot of the design for this player will happen through the cluttering and quest making. 

In the image below you can see that I have ensured players will have to go back and explore and come across more enemies before they are allowed to progress to the boss room. 

1. Player comes across a locked door
2. Player backtracks to find out why the door is locked and finds the lever in a "Fight room"
3. Player continues on original heading through to the boss room.

Layout Nearing Completion

The layout of my dungeon is almost complete. I now only have the players escape route to make. I am planning on creating a small cave system for the player to navigate in order to get out rather than the original plan of having the dungeon loop back around to the beginning.

The Catacombs

My development process so far can be described as experimental. By this I mean that I do not have experience with this kit and the different pieces within it and so whenever I need a new room I look at all the different types of pieces I could go for. This has lead to some quite interesting designs, you can see I have begun to add shafts and catacombs into my dungeon.

Later on through my level design I will bring in a couple of friends to test my level and get their feedback and make changes appropriately to fit with player needs and to get a real idea of how people like to play my level.

Bland

After having a quick test run of my level, I begun to notice a common theme. Everywhere looks so... boring, like no one has lived there, like nothing has ever happened there.

Now this is something I was already aware of but for the blogs sake I shall show you what I mean.

In this picture you can see that the room is just dead, the step which will come later on to combat this is called "cluttering", this involves adding random objects such as shrines, lights, crypts, rubble and so on to make the dungeon look believable. 

For now I shall continue with the overall layout.

Big improvements

I have now got my first big battle room and begun to maze some of the paths in order to make sure the hero has to explore and to try keep the level from being too linear.

Catching up

It didn't take me very long at all to get a few start rooms up now and what I have figured out since my last version is that I want the hero to be led round in one giant circle once he has completed the dungeon...

By this I mean, in the picture below you can see a door to the upper right, this door is right next to the start of the dungeon but will remained locked until the hero has defeated the boss and it will be a shortcut directly out of the dungeon system, this will allow the hero to not have to back track all the way through and will ensure the experience the player has with my tomb won't be spoiled by the memory of trying to find the way back out.

Big Set Back

Well the reason I haven't done any work on this for awhile is the fact that my mod file decided to be a complete pain in my side and when I was trying to resolve the issues I was having I accidentally ended up deleting my whole level, I'm still not quite sure how I managed that...

So now it's time to start again, good job I didn't really make all too much progress really isn't it?

First Steps

I have started putting together some of the basic architecture for the entrance hallways for my level. To avoid a world hole (a player being able to see or enter the void) I had to bring in an extra boulder to block a hole which was in one of my hallways, you can see what I mean in the picture below:

Concept Ideas

After messing around in the creation kit and having it crash... sigh, I decided to draw out a couple of ideas for a map and start thinking about a basic quest idea.

- - - - - - Map - - - - - -

You can see in this picture I am trying to keep the layout fairly complex whilst still trying not to confuse the player, the idea I want to go for is to have a fairly realistic seeming structure whilst still maintaining a natural feel of play through for the player. I am thinking about achieving this by having lots of side rooms coming off of the main corridors, basic rooms that I can populate with enemies, bookshelves, alchemy tables, rubble and much more aesthetically pleasing items.  

- - - - - - Quest - - - - - - 

So far I have been thinking about the idea of having a boss called "Onstwon" inhabit the dungeon along with his loyal followers (some being Drague and some being Necromancers). The player will hopefully receive a quest from someone in a nearby town or from a pick-up such as a diary and will have to go through figuring out what happened to a previous adventurer that dared the tombs.

To aid in this experience I am thinking about littering the tombs with various skeletons and bodies and have the player searching through them trying to identify a certain previous adventurer. 

Getting to grips

Before I get too ahead of myself I thought it would be best if I had a bit of a play around with the creation kit to ensure what I wanted to create was possible and too make sure this sort mod would not be out of my skills.

Within 10 minutes of playing around with the Creation Kit and looking through the Creation Kits wiki I managed to create a small room with no void holes and managed to get the hang of the software and some of the basic techniques the developers behind Skyrim actually used. I'll link their youtube tutorials at the bottom of this post.

Here is the basic room I created within minutes of being on the software:

Creation kit tutorial

What now?

Now I have decided on creating a level for Skyrim I need to run through a few ideas, I mean, I want my level to flow with the game and not stick out as though it was obviously a mod and to do this I felt I should get some inspiration and what better way that to start playing through the game again and to visit some of the dungeons and quests already within the game.

After questing and exploring for awhile to get some inspiration and to ensure I didn't mess with the flow of the game or make something the player would question I decided I needed a few key features.

 - - - - - - Key Features - - - - - -

• A believable story line
• A mini quest or reason for the player to be there
• plenty of "cluttering" to make the dungeon or cave look believable and inhabited
• Rewards (why would a player want to go there if they won't get anything from it)
• A challenge (A boss scenario, maybe an ambush, maybe some traps)
• A mental challenge (The level cannot be a simple one route walk through)
• A believable world hook-up (Creating an exterior cell so the player can find it in the world)

Obviously these key features are very vague so far, but where I am now is in more of a conceptual stage, soon I will begin creation of some basic ideas and layouts of the cave system.

Introduction - Design Process

One of my modules in my second year of study in University is Design Process, in this module we focus on the process that goes into the design of various game projects and in particularly, level design.

For my project in my module level design I have been challenged to create a level mod for a game which is currently out in the market and my mind initially ran through a few ideas such as Garry's mod and Counter strike but then Skyrim took my eye in my steam library and since the "Creation Kit" is already supplied through steams tools by Bethesda I though this would be a great place for myself to start looking since I have been an avid fan of The Elder Scrolls series all the way back to Morrowind.

So I now I have my mind set, my level mod will be some sort of add-on to the game Skyrim.