UDK - Mine Level -WIP

toxicclowd

This is my first attempt at designing a level in UDK. It is to be a indoor/outdoor level. The outdoor portion will be what you see in the image below. The indoor portion will be mine tunnels running through the terrain. This level is going to be the deleiverable for two different college classes, Level design and Special FX. The textures were created in Genetica and Crazybump. The water is simply UDK premade particle system and water material that i put in to get an idea on the waterfall and river but will be replaced later. Please feel free to offer any criticism or tips, that's what i'm here for. Thanks

toxicclowd

Ok, it's been a few weeks and I've gotten some progress. I've done some tweaking on the terrain. Placed some trees and grass(which needs redone with the new foliage system:( ) I've built some mine shafts but they're not ready to be shown since for one they're not lit, and two they're really basic right now. I've added a mesh for the waterfall and added some more particle effects. I havnt really messed with lighting too much other than adding a Dominant Directional Light to get some shadows, my lighting really needs rebuilt but it seems like it's going to take days just to do a preview build, so if anyone has some tips for optimizing lighting in open outdoor levels, please feel free to give any advice. I've got three weeks to finish this up for class and I've still got a lot of modeling and other stuff to do so hopefully i can get 'r done. Anyway Thanks in advance for the input.

downarmy

Holy speed tree BATMAN!!!

Just a trick try to use more of your content and less what comes with udk, it will be more personal and more unique.

polygonfreak

Well, looks like a great start to me. I am still learning myself so take all my advice with a grain of salt.

Your environment as a whole looks way too uniform. The mountains almost look like steps. The world we live in is random and chaotic, its features in and around waterfalls are even more dramatic. A great example of a video game demonstrating realistic terrain comes from the Rock Star team that created Red Dead Redemption. Every time I play that game, I am in awe with how beautiful there environments are.

Another thing to consider is your screenshots. This is something that I recently learned and I am waiting to finish my current project to really put the techniques to use.
http://www.worldofleveldesign.com/categories/udk/udk-how-to-take-high-resolution-screenshots.php

Its just simple things like hiding the HUD and taking great screen shots with a simple code inside of UDK.

So give it a try and I look forward to seeing more of your progress.

Good luck.

SgtNasty

I think polygonfreak is correct about the formations. These rock formations are not believable at all. I think it would help a lot to either add some man made elements to the rock walls like supports, beams, etc OR fix them by making them less uniform, add cracks, moss, rocks, etc.

I would also recommend a bit more asymmetry. I realize this is for a design class, so the level has to be balanced and whatnot, so the asymmetry could just be visual or whatever (ie make half of the map a building or scatter debris, or have some sort of landmark or set piece).

Lastly, the entrance to the mine shaft has the same problem as the rest of the scene - not believable. Entrances to mine shafts don't look like that. Google image search "mine shaft entrance". Most of them feature man made supports and things like that.

Overall, I feel like this wasn't planned out well. I feel like it would benefit you to gather more reference, and maybe rethink some of the terrain.

erwilly

You need create and put big static meshes rocks in random places to break the the symmetry.

toxicclowd

@Downarmy - I actually wish those were speed trees, unfortunately i couldn't get speed trees to place using S-Click in static mesh mode, so i had to create my own tree, but i used the speed tree textures which I've been re-thinking. Also, though i am capable of creating my own content, i just don't have the time right at the moment. My schedule requires i try to balance design with custom content creation. I still have to model some tents, shacks and a few other things, those will be custom.

@Polygonfreak - I had actually wanted to do the terrain like giant steps, but it didn't turn out the way i expected, partly because it seems to be impossible to do with terrain. What i really wanted was more like cliffs, with overhangs and such. Ultimately i should have just modeled my terrain but i was afraid that with my inexperience and lack of knowledge, i wouldn't be able to figure out how to get the materials to look right on a huge terrain model. Thanks for the link by the way, i'm sure it will come in handy real soon.

@SgtNasty - You know what, i just looked up mine shaft entrance in google and not only does my mine shaft entrance not look like a mineshaft entrance, a real mine shaft entrance would have probably been a lot easier to do than what i have there so thanks for point that out, i'll definitly work on that for sure. Also you are correct, the level did have some planning, but it was minimal due to time constraints. I do however think that the idea here has a lot of potential and I'll probably continue working on it even after the class is over. Really i would like to replace everything with custom content since i didn't have time to make everything for the class.

@erwilly - yeah, i still have quite a bit to go but i do plan on putting some big rocks and such in there to help break things up.


Thanks for the comments guys, I'm going to work on some of this stuff and hopefully will have some more screenshots soon. Also, I'm still open to any tips on how to get the lighting build time down, right now it's totally ridiculous, i know it's all the trees, i just don't know how to optimize it.

toxicclowd

Hey guys, Well, the class is over and i got a decent grade on my level, it wasn't nearly as complete as i would have liked but i got a little too ambitious for a project i had to work on alone in a short nine week class, not to mention i had never really worked in UE3 before. Anyway, I've learned a TON working on this project and fortunately i get to take it further this next term where i'll have to implement my own playable character mesh and add scripted events and such, so it will be another busy term as again i'm starting out with no knowledge on how to do any of this, lol. Anyway, i figured you guys might like to see some screens of the final level that i turned in for a grade, So they are below.











Also while i was on a short break from school i started working on a water material that I'd like to get some opinions on. I started it with a tutorial by Chris Albeluhn and a material by John Heeter. Neither material really worked for me, so i combined them and heavily modified the whole thing to work for my purposes, ultimately I'd say about 50% of the original materials are intact with the other 50% being created by me. I have to say that in my short time working with UE3, i think probably the most fascinating tool I've worked with so far is the Material editor, Cascade is pretty cool too, but i found it a bit frustrating. Anyway, below is what i came up with for my water shared, which Is still incomplete and i'm sure is far from optimized. The terrain is just part of the test map i created.





Alright, that's all the updates i have for now, thanks guys.