Price Gouger
ROLE
Level Designer
DESCRIPTION
My responsibilities on this project were to create and greybox the layout for the level that the game would take place in so we could playtest and make changes before the final positions were established and the art assets were applied into the game officially.
YEAR
2023
GENRE
First Person Shooter
PLATFORM
PC
INTENTS AND CONSTRAINTS
Intents
Constraints
- Make a level that generated the same energy as grocery store aisles
- Make the level small feels almost like you are passing by the same things multiple times even when you are making progress
- Force the player to optimize each and every turn they take or risk wasting a few seconds trying to recover
- Make sure that what the player was looking for was very clear, but could also easily be missed if they moved too fast
- Four weeks to make the entire vertical slice of the game
- Level must be completable within the set time frame (with some extra time to spare due to possible player error)
- Must be made in Unity editor
- Must not allow player to jump over or see through obstacles (as that would make the game way too simple to complete)
Design Breakdown
Tutorial Area
I created a tutorial level to allow the player to get a feel for the controls before being subjected to a strict time limit. I made a small obstacle course to help them get acquainted with movement, as well as a "target practice" type area for them to practice using their main scan ability. The welcome message tells them all about what will happen when they begin and allows them to start on their own time to make sure they are fully prepared.
The Store
The store is the playing field where the game takes place. I modeled it based on a grocery store with its seemingly never ending and uniform aisles that people tend to get lost in. There are not too many as I wanted to make traversal very possible, but I laid them out the way I did to limit the player's view of everything around them and really make them work to find the items they needed to scan. The uniformity of the shelves and the items was a detail I specifically told our artist to implement to further add to the chaos of constantly feeling like the player is running in circles around the same object (which, in a sense they are, much like a frantic employee).