BIONICLE - Masks of Power Level Design Lead:
3D Level Design Process
(Private page)
BIONICLE: Masks of Power is a large-scale, open-world action-RPG fangame based on the BIONICLE franchise owned by LEGO. I am currently contributing to it as the Level Design Lead.
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This game is being created and released for free following rules and guidelines set by the LEGO Group, and neither Team Kanohi nor any of its members claim ownership over any elements of the original BIONICLE property. BMOP is purely a passion project by fans.
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Everything on this page shows a work in progress at this time.
Demo Area - Meandering Heights
Gameplay video of Heights intro.
The team's current focus is creating a demo for the game that will act as a vertical slice, giving players a taste of the exploratory and action-heavy gameplay loop, immersive world, and narrative of Masks of Power. Shown here is an overview of my contributions to the Level Design process of the Demo up to the point it is at so far.
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I have been the main designer responsible for the planning, layout, and sculpting/blockout for the Meandering Heights, a sub-level area in the Demo. The Meandering Heights is a high-elevation, dense jungle teeming with life and wandering paths, and it serves as the intro area for the Demo.
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My goal in designing the Heights was to create an environment that immersed the player in the world of the game while naturally teaching them its most essential skills and mechanics. I believe strongly in naturally integrating tutorials into the game world and flow, and achieving this was one of my biggest priorities.
Documentation & Layouts Stage
For each large area, the Level Design team creates an Area Overview Document that includes visuals and descriptive guides to the design and structure of an area in the game. This is some of the documentation I wrote for one of my sublevels, the Meandering Heights. It's a living document that I come back to and edit as changes are made to the sublevel. Some parts have been omitted to prevent spoilers ahead of release.
Some of the documentation I wrote describing the flow of the very beginning of the demo and Meandering Heights. My goal for these first moments of the game was to make players feel immersed in the game world while learning the most basic mechanics of the game and how they could use them to traverse and interact with this world.
An early top-down layout I drew out in Photoshop while planning the level layout of the Heights. The design has since gone through significant changes, but this acted as a solid starting point that I built off of.
For each large area, the Level Design team creates an Area Overview Document that includes visuals and descriptive guides to the design and structure of an area in the game. This is some of the documentation I wrote for one of my sublevels, the Meandering Heights. It's a living document that I come back to and edit as changes are made to the sublevel. Some parts have been omitted to prevent spoilers ahead of release.
(Click through with side arrows)
My first step in designing any area is writing out any ideas for mechanics and uses of them for obstacles and challenges, in tandem with themes and tones I might want to explore. After this I'll begin to organize them into a formal design document for the area. Our team as a whole uses this general process and works collaboratively on our Level Design documents.
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The Demo Overview document that the Level Design team has been using was first created and formatted by me, and all of the documentation on the Meandering Heights specifically was written by me as well.
Blockout Screenshots
Low-poly foliage by:
Rad-coders
(Click through with side arrows)
After writing out the structure and flow I had in mind for the Meandering Heights, I began creating the blockout for it in Unreal Engine. I used a combination of built-in engine features, free assets from the internet, and plugins like Blockout Tools, to create the blockout.
I used the landscape tools to sculpt the ground of the Heights and paint it with prototyping textures to indicate information such as the locations of paths, rocky cliffs, and other information.
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I also acquired a low-poly foliage asset pack in order to indicate the locations of bushes, ferns, and other smaller plants, seeing as the thickness of the foliage in various parts of the map would be important. This foliage was placed using Unreal's built-in foliage system. I took care to implement proper culling for this foliage, as even though it was low-poly, I thought it important to make sure performance was smooth enough even at this stage for the most effective testing.
I assembled trees using modular components created by team member Boxturret.
Game Trailers
The game's Environmental Teaser trailer. This had no involvement from me and all credit goes to the other members of Team Kanohi. Included here only to show the art direction, scope, etc. of the full game.
A recent combat gameplay showcase for the game. This had minimal involvement from me and is included here only to show what more functional gameplay and final art will look like for it.