Half-Life

Level Designer | Combat Designer | Scripter

Overview

Design Process

Tool

Fallout 4: Creation Kit

Platform

PC

Development time

~ 400 Hrs

Team Size

Individual

ABOUT

The Fallout 4 single-player level "Half Life" is a supplemental story set near Diamond City, preceding the "Institutionalized" quest. The player investigates the disappearance of Doctor Ironia's patient, Avernia, in Moon River town. Gameplay includes melee, ranged, stealth styles and tests skills like cover-shooting, weapon switching, squad cooperation, charisma checks, lockpicking, and hacking. With the new Surge Pulse Grenade, players can temporarily scramble Synth factions and strategize their battles in the factory.

Watch Full Playthrough

Design Goals

Dynamic Gameplay

Give players different choices to achieve goals, with each space providing various challenges and feelings. Give players some “limited freedom”, allowing players to explore the area as they want.

Clear Conveyance Elements

Give clear sightlines to the goals and intended paths.

Engaging Narrative Flow

Engage players through compelling storytelling, gradually unveiling the truth as they progress. Ultimately, empower them with a significant decision that profoundly influences the outcome.

Design Techniques

Dynamic Gameplay

To create dynamic gameplay, I approached it from the following perspectives, aiming to offer players a variety of choices, playstyles, engaging combat, and spatial arrangements, among others:

Different combinations of enemies
Multiple paths/playstyles to achieve the goal
Multiple skill checks & rewards
Mechanics-driven combat & balance
Impactful spaces: Cover setting
Reuse of space
Flow control (overall)
Flow between points of advantage and disadvantage (each combat area)
Verticality (Please move the mouse over the image to hide the text)

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Mechanics-driven combat & balance: Higher level enemy

This level features a new mechanic which can turn enemies hostile to everyone they see for seconds, including other enemies and the player themselves. To design combat around this mechanic, many situations are set up to encourage the player to use this mechanic and counterbalance it. (E.g., some waves have high-level enemies that are immune to the mechanic, and others can be affected and fight for the player)

Reuse of space: Three battles in the same space

Three battles in the interior central hall, each provides a different experience and challenge. This setup allows players to engage in combat in a familiar location but with varied strategies and advantages. For instance:

First Battle (Red): Occurs upon first entering the hall, featuring level ground combat (enemies on the same height). Players can quickly gain an advantage by using stairs.

Second Battle (Blue): After exploring many rooms, players re-enter the hall's second floor from another door, encountering enemies on the same and lower levels. Players can use vantage points or return to the hall for more cover.

Final Battle (White): Players re-enter the hall through another door and must choose a faction to join. Different enemy arrangements and combat styles are present depending on the faction chosen, impacting players' movement and available cover options.

Clear Conveyance Elements

Conveyance plays a crucial role in level design, especially in open-world games like Fallout 4. In my levels, I've employed a variety of explicit and implicit conveyance techniques to help players find their way, including:

Sightlines & goals
Landmarks
Lighting
Leading lines
Framing
Textures

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Landmarks

This level has two landmarks for both the interior and exterior. The exterior features a fountain in the middle of the town which can be clearly seen when arriving in the town, while the interior features a central hall that connects the entrance, exit, starting and returning of the middle rooms, and the final secret lab. Both of these landmarks give the player a sense of direction and orientation to help them maneuver around the space and help them find their way.

Engaging Narrative Flow

Beyond gameplay and conveyance aspects, I also place a high value on shaping the narrative. To create a more engaging narrative flow, during the script design phase, in addition to designing a compelling story and captivating conflicts, I also focused on the following two aspects:

.. Balanced choices

In the final major choice section, the two major choices are well-balanced and neither of them is biased based on the story. It’s completely up to the player.

.. Pacing & twist

The narrative adapts the pacing so that it goes faster as it approaches the middle of the game, and at ¾ it reaches the climax where a twist is set. After that, more truth pieces are revealed and all of them converge in the end to help the player make the choice.

Apart from these two points, in the actual development process, to highlight the differences between game narrative and conventional narrative mediums - Namely, interactivity, exploration, and choice, I also focused on the following two areas:

Environmental Storytelling
Consequences

Goals

Techniques

Process

Documentation

I began the construction of my level starting with a detailed map and a comprehensive document, which included all necessary gameplay elements (mechanisms, enemies, weapons, etc.), map layout, flow, pacing, narrative, dialogue flow, quest flow, difficulty design, and progression curve.

Check Full Level Design Document

(61 pages)

Development

Following my design, I then started building my whitebox model. With continuous feedback from classmates/professors and other testers, I rapidly iterated on my level. At each milestone, I aimed to fix all identified issues, progressively refining the level to its current state.
The images below represent the development stages of the level: Whitebox Milestone, Initial Gameplay Milestone, Game Complete Milestone, and Aesthetics Milestone (for "Launch Milestone" display please refer to "Gallery" section below).

PostMortm

Postmortem

What Went Well

Fail Fast

At an early stage, I had a bad layout. However, after expert and peer feedback, I promptly revised it during the Whitebox milestone. The updated version was satisfactory and met design goals, laying a solid foundation for further iterations and allowing more time for other aspects, rather than focusing solely on the layout.

Meet Priorities

My understanding of the project's priorities and requirements has been improved with iteration, enabling me to devise a more effective plan for creating a high-quality level that satisfied each milestone's demands.

Fast Iterations

By utilizing "quick iterations" for each milestone, I was able to address most problems before review by others. This approach allowed for more precise feedback on changes, preparing me for the next iteration loop based on that feedback.

What Went Wrong

Unforseen extreme cases

Overlooked certain extreme cases in AI control, allowing unusual playstyles to disrupt the intended game flow.

Lack of Early Narrative Focus

The initial level design neglected the narrative aspect, complicating later adjustments and control of narrative flow.

Insufficient Early Testers

The scarcity of early-stage testers resulted in more problems emerging later when testing expanded.

What I Learned

Small Issues, big Consequences

Some early problems (usually they are low-level problems and don’t stand out early) could have a big impact on later milestones if not addressed properly.

Early Design Impact

Early design (from LDD) can affect the narrative and the overall flow greatly in later stages and make it nearly impossible to modify at that time. So considering narrative and flow early is essential.

Importance of Comprehensive Planning

Implementing a comprehensive plan that includes all potential factors is crucial to prevent new problems that may arise from changes.

Early Completion Benefits

Prioritize completing more tasks and securing more play-testers early on to obtain more valuable feedback.

Gallery

Boss room, multiple paths, verticality emphasized.

Contrasting with the exterior decor and theme, the room instantly captivates players and reveals their goal as soon as they step in from the window.

Environmental Storytelling: Showcases the room's purpose for disassembling synths.

Environmental Storytelling: Illustrates the room's function for treating synths.

The room's distinctive light, color, environment, and layout immediately attract players' attention as they enter the indoor level, indicating the location of their ultimate goal.

When players look in from the window, highlighted light emphasizes the goal's location. Upon entering, the arrangement of shelves forms a frame, pinpointing the goal.

Starting Position: Displays current goal (the mayor), ultimate goal (the factory), potential goal (the clinic), and a landmark (the fountain) to players.