Holiday Plans blog - DevinSherry

I am writing this blog post as two identical cats are sitting on my bed with me back home in Levittown, Long Island. I have about 18 days back home to relax and spend time with family and friends, but I will also be doing some work on a level that I will be designing for a new project outside of The Afflicted. One of the biggest lessons that I have learned about level design from The Afflicted is the importance of pre-production and planning. For my level on The Afflicted, the only pre-production that I had done was doing a top-down layout of the map and create a setting concept for the environment. On my break so far, I have been reading a lot of articles about level design, and the proper procedures on how to ensure the level gets completed. I will be following the lessons that I learned while reading the articles, and continue to read more articles in order to find the perfect pipeline of the level design production. I will be creating a large document about the level I want to design and in this document there will be many sub-sections that I want to create in order to flesh the idea out as much as possible. In conjunction with that, I will be working the top-down layout of the map and begin defining landmarks and play-spaces. I will also be looking at images online that I feel represent the art style of the game, as well as the overall aesthetic that I want for the level. Lastly, I will be white-boxing the level in a 3D editor, cannot say which, and begin testing. There are a lot of steps to complete before testing begins and I am eager to begin this process. Happy Holidays everyone!