Constructive Designing...

Hey everyone, 

So, it's been awhile, and leaving those awkward cliches behind, let's get on to the familiarities of these posts.

Now, I'm sure our followers will be happy to know that work has once again started up on the map project, as long as the team doesn't keep getting distracted with side projects and the like.

Things like witnessing some 3D models and real life photography shouldn't come before the map project, unless they spice up the task of continuing to build the map. Well, there was a few things...

Grove St - San Andreas

Seeing an image of the all too famous street in GTA:San Andreas just made it too hard to resist...

 

 Arched Building - Monaco 

This one was more of a modelling challenge, rather than a fully-featured level.

 

 Library Rooms - Our L4D Map Project

Of course, here is the progress made on the actual map.

 

That's all for this update,

Stay Tuned,

Atamarashi (Lead Modeller at Blitz Design).

Milestones and Correcting Workflow

Hey Everyone,

This week you're going to see quite a bit of construction and testing happening in the weeks ahead. Most of this is due to the core route and gameplay features being tested and rapidly built. 

There's a strong possibility we may have a working dev version of the first map now that we've decided to split the level into two maps. It will not only help performance with rendering the entire level (which just reached another milestone - yay!), but also for balancing and pacing the gameplay flow. 

Milestone Number 2 ~ !

 Maybe it's better to keep working as we are. I've been also thinking that progress in terms of sheer level building speed has been declining at an increasing rate (forming a log graph - hehe). It could be due to the major presence of schooling and assignments plus work for some of our team, though that might not always be the cause. A strong cause of the delays and development procrastination has been motivation, or lack thereof. 


A few weeks ago, when Schmooze released the teaser trailer, it was extremely well received by all of our fans on Facebook. Their reactions and positive feedback gave us a enormous boost in confidence over many aspects. Our entire team was in great spirits for those weeks up until now, where times and development (unfortunately) has reversed roles. Time is speeding by us and leaving development in its dust, much like our intro sequence ~ hint hint.

Needless to say, we're aiming to carry on through these pressing times, and bring this project to the level of detail, playability and enjoyment that it deserves. Our community expects nothing less than that, and it's up to us to deliver what we are capable of.


On that note, stay tuned for more updates here and on the page at Facebook:
www.facebook.com/blitzdesign

Atamarashi (Lead Level Modeller at Blitz Design)

Livestreaming.

Hey Everyone,

I think it's time we considered taking a bit of time out from our busy schedules to inform you about something quite intriguing in getting further insight into our level design process. That is, 'Livestreaming'.

Now, if you've been around the Internet long enough, you'll know that real-time video where the creator of the video can actually interact with their fans and those that are interested, can supersede those videos we upload, as well as the pictures/text posts we can offer in terms of communication.

Updating all of our fans and followers on our Facebook page as well as on this blog can prove to be an exciting and varied process, so that means we can add that to our enjoyment of designing/testing/developing the project. In addition, our Livestreams would allow fans to directly interact with us as the developers and fellow gamers, as we continue the development process to its deadline (it's getting closer - 9 weeks away!).

We will be streaming alternately throughout the weeks, separately from the normal updates, with mostly our development work and the odd gaming session between our team, on Battlefield, Left 4 Dead, the current Mass Effect 3 Demo and more...

That's all for this post,

Atamarashi (Lead Level Modeller at Blitz Design).

A peek at the design of the [Introduction]

Hey Everyone,

 As you all know, development, documentation and much more behind-the-scenes activities are going by in full swing with 10 of the 11 weeks to go until first release. If you haven't found out that date, it is once more, the 26th of April, so note it down somewhere safe if you'd like to take a journey in the map for yourself. 


Likewise, we have been taking attempting various designs for each section of the map, critiquing and experimenting with each one. Even though I had literally learnt most of my Left 4 Dead advanced mapping techniques from included Valve maps and mapping forums, we had decided to go with one of the more radical yet exciting ideas for the introduction sequence. 


It may still be rough ideas, after storyboard-ing the idea on our group design meetings on the start of the weekend, though we're definitely sure that it works excellently. If we had all the time in the world for development, I'm sure we'd have this sequence at least or even greater than Valve quality (which is quite an impressive feat). 

For issues tension and idea originality, we're not able to share exactly what is to occur in the introduction sequence, though what we can detail is that it involves some discreet dust trails and a point of no return. Possible yet rejected ideas involved a subway, and an exciting, high-intensity vehicle entrance cinematic, where those ideas simply did not fit the design brief, structure or theme we had set.


That's all for this update, stay tuned for more on this blog or on our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/blitzdesign.


Atamarashi (Jon), Lead Level Modeller at Blitz Design

Week 3: Teaser Video!

Deadlines and Design Plans

Hey Everyone,

We've been away for a bit more than we've realised: We apologise for the inconsistent updates, as lately, we've been somewhat more disorganised than usual. 

However, that hasn't halted progress in our development. In fact, in order to seize the opportunity of displaying and demonstrating our project to a massive audience (our peers and those who may be interested, in their hundreds) at a traditionally annual school event, we've set an official dead line for this project to be finished from the design and testing perspective.

If you'd like to know the date of this early release, it'll be available as a Demonstration Build (packaged as a complete .vpk file) on the 26th of April. As hosting sites are difficult to come by, we'll attempt to upload the release to a multitude of hosts, including L4D Maps, Rapidshare, FileFront and MediaFire. 

I have a feeling that this dead line could inspire us so much with our development process and even spark a new project idea, but that's getting off on a tangent.

Stay tuned for increased activity and progress...

Atamarashi (Technical Lead/Mapper at Blitz Design).

Week 2 (Technical Stuff): Optimising a set of open corridors...

Hey Everyone,

 

For awhile now, I'd thought we've had a basic idea of optimisation for the map. As it turns out, having a ridiculous amount of portals with a few 'clumping' in with each other in some parts doesn't seem to be exactly ideal for the Source Engine. Although, since our computers definitely exceed the recommended system requirements for Left 4 Dead, plus having the Z Far Plane Clipping feature enabled in the main env_fogcontroller, there doesn't appear to be a frame rate problem from this. 

The problem though, is that visibility gets harder and harder to optimise in an increasingly outdoor, open environment. We may check and research all the visibility tutorials that we can throughout the internet, though there's cases in our map that exist beyond all of our comprehension. In fact, I almost tied an entire building (basic world brushes and all) to a func_detail entity just to get rid of some horridly formed portals. 

On the other hand, the interiors of all the normal (read: non-angled) rooms appear to be fantastic to optimise. Although we may have a mix of accuracy and believability in our measurements, they seem well within reason for players in L4D to explore without hope of suddenly dropping in frame rate around a corridor corner. 

Interestingly, we've begun construction on the other vital aspects of the map, that is: gameplay structure. 

From the Project Brief posted on the blog, we mentioned a branched path structure that will add to the re-playability and longevity of this map. While the main tests/prototypes and sketches have been completed, it remains to be polished and refined until we can implement it into the map once the geometry is fully complete. 

As it stands now, there's still about 5 sections to go before we can consider the geometry (just the buildings and therefore, location) to be done.

That just wraps it up for this post, I hope everyone isn't too disappointed that we didn't get that Week 2 Update post ready by Monday, it's being finished and edited by another team member from the last time I checked.

Anyway, stay tuned for more updates!

Atamarashi (Team Member at Blitz Design).

Brief on the L4D Project so far - Plus Mini Update

Hi Everyone, 

I'm sure you've all heard about this project of ours that's underway, the Left 4 Dead one that is. Now, we've been working on this for a bit longer than expected, mostly due to some delays.

Besides those setbacks, the project will be going ahead regardless.


But firstly, this is a custom Left 4 Dead map, which will be still packaged as a .vpk, and with a custom poster, however containing only one level (or two if there's too much to fit in with the restraints of maximum detail in each level), which is to be set in a suburban outcropping with a nearby school housing the final parts of the map. 

An early view of the school part of the map.

  There will be points at which the players will be forced to make a decision (ie. "Branch event"), with a set of two possible outcomes that are possible with each situation. As a result, for which ever choice that the players make, an appropriate challenge and reward will be offered to the players in order to progress.

This gameplay structure alone can offer various means of freedom for each playthrough for the players, with a complementary navigation mesh that covers all possible outcomes. By adding to the depth of exploration, this structure lets the players in on what it might mean to actually be a 'survivor' and the decisions made or ignored in a post-apocalyptic scenario.

While it might seem like quite ambitious for Left 4 Dead's linear film-style progression, our team believes that we can make our 'decision-based' structure work within Left 4 Dead whilst maintaining the atmospheric feel and themes of the game. The actual technical background of our efforts to get this structure working won't be revealed until our project is nigh-complete, of course.

Although, if we may interest you in hearing that unlike most 'survival' type maps for Left 4 Dead, our map and the adjustable narrative amidst the dystopian location have been simultaneously developed with immersion and appropriate themes, motifs and other literary elements in mind to engage the players. What will result of this narrative might not be totally evident to the players as they delve further into their dynamic experience, though it will be notable nonetheless.

Recent Progress

In a brief picture timeline in a rough chronological order, we'll take a look at the evolution of the map so far, ending this post with our most recent work:

 Blocking Process and Testing out the concept.

 

The built environment begins to take shape with some details.

Expansion of the school portion of the map.

Designing the windows, walls, doors, and general exterior of 'Hall Rooms'.

Finishing off the main exterior of the 'Hall Rooms'.

The first of many custom graffiti (subject to alteration of course).

Finally, our most recent progress with stairs and exterior construction of the 'Hall Rooms' is complete. There's more to come with the interiors and lighting tweaks, so this might not look the same with the first playable version of the map.

So that's all we've got time for at the moment,

Hope to see you later on next week for another update,

Jon aka "Atamarashi" (Team Member of Blitz Design)