False Sky

A third-person action experience
Summary

A combat-focused level that incorporates elements of stealth and exploration to create a tense and atmospheric cyberpunk experience.

Specifications
  • Solo Project
  • Made in 3 weeks half-time
  • Unreal Engine 5.6
  • AGLS 1.6 by Jakub W.
  • Plugins
  • Assets made by me in Blender

Video Walkthrough

A summarized version of this page in video form.

Pre-Production

The first step in every project I work on is gathering references for the general aesthetics and vibe of the area I want to build.

For this one I looked a lot at Ninja Gaiden 2 & 4 and Ghostrunner 1 & 2 for the high tech, neon lit, cyberpunk environments.

While this piece isn’t based on any specific location, there are elements borrowed from various areas in Malmö and Copenhagen.

Towards the end of the pre-production phase I took a trip over to Nørreport, one of the areas that inspired me, to get a feeling of what it’s actually like to walk around there.

Progress Timelapse

Combat Design

     The main idea of this piece is to explore two distinct areas of combat encounter design:

  • Free roaming Deus Ex-style areas where the player can choose whether to explore stealthily or go in guns blazing.
  • Combat arenas with mandatory gunfights where the player has to constantly stay on the move and dip in and out of cover to stay alive. 

Encounter Design Mentality

Both sections are finely tuned to make sure the experience always feels fair to the player.

If they chose to stealth through the first section, the one with mandatory combat shouldn’t feel too overwhelming, but should still pose a challenge to the players who are used to the more hectic gunfights.

I employ the use of refuge space heavily in this piece. The player gets frequent access to safe areas they can escape to when things get a little too hot.

I couple this with usage of prospect space to allow the player wide shots of the various areas and secure lookouts to carefully plan their approach, allowing them a sense of security and confidence.

Working with the Third Person Perspective

The base for the free roam section was originally designed for a first person perspective. One of the challenges I faced when reworking it was how to adapt the level to work with a third person perspective.

A lot of areas have been expanded to accommodate the wider perspective and avoid the camera colliding with the environment too much. Some angles had to be re-done to better frame the subject when the player is also present in the image.

The new perspective also brought some perks such as allowing the player to “cheat” a little.

Being able to peek above and around cover allows me to be a little more liberal with enemy placements, while also further empowering the player to feel more in control.

Images taken from the old version of the free roam section.

Guiding the Player

Right at the start of the level while the player is briefed on the mission, they get an overview of the entire level where the goals are clearly showcased.

I also employ the use of leading power lines and well placed neon lights to further ensure the player never feels lost, even if they willingly stray off the main path.

An early sketch of a combat space that was later scrapped, which had the player fight across rooftops

Iteration Process and Feedback

With the first iteration out of the way the level went through rigorous playtesting to ensure proper balance.

One of the biggest learnings from this project was the importance of visually distinct elements in hectic areas of the level, for example combat spaces. The player needs to constantly move around and can very easily get disorientated if they lack some kind of POI or landmark to take note of.

Some less major points of feedback focused on things like smoothing out traversal in certain areas, and deincentivizing the player from just sitting around in the safer areas during combat.

Conclusion

Working with this project taught me a lot about designing different kinds of combat spaces and gave me a lot of insight into details I hadn’t even considered prior.

It also gave me some lessons in adapting to other developers’ systems, using the AGLS-Template. I spent many hours struggling to get the numbers right and begging the AI to play nice with me, and it paid off massively in the end.

If I were to go back to this project and keep working the first step would be to improve readability in certain areas, I’m not entirely satisfied with the color choices even if they’re meant to be prototype-ish.

I am part of The Game Assembly’s internship program. As per the agreement between the Games Industry and The Game Assembly, neither student nor company may be in contact with one another regarding internships before April 15th. Any internship offers can be made on April 27th, at the earliest.