Looking for website.

[ChristopherM]

Hi, I am trying to find some inspiration & fellow mapper. So the thing is I am trying to find some website about level design but not in the matter of showing how pretty the level can be done in the engine/editor. There are plenty of sites that shows peoples art work. What I want is a site that shows people gameplay on the level made.

A site where people can post their sketches of a level. Where they shows the triggers/plots happening, npc vendor or mission giver. "Like to kill boss you have to pull level A to release dogs that will..... so on.."

And if no one knows about a site like that, someone should. There is more to a level than just pretty bloom effect.

Thanks for any advice.

[Adrir]

I'm not sure if this is what you're looking for, but have you checked out World of Level Design?

[ChristopherM]

yeah thats one of the closest site I found, but still its "Art" oriented. Hopeing for something more trigger/plot/script oriented. Like instead of teaching how the light should be, it be more about 'where a weapon should be or how a mission should evolve'

Trying to figure out how game designer design mission. I have the feeling its just random. Ok lets insert some mission here about killing X amount of monster and the return and give reward. Because most of the games just have awful mission or AI. So it would be nice to have a place where people could, deepen their mission and or level.

[Jtspring]

Sounds like you're looking for an "Architecture" website. Some place devoted less to the pretty trappings and more to the design.

I don't have any good suggestions for you, but I thought I could help refine your thoughts.

[ChristopherM]

yes finally someone that understands me. more about the building less about the prettyness

to bad you dont have any suggestions. should be some website,to gather fellow thinkers. the closest thing I found is thegamecreators.com -> forum and Game theory. Where you can talk about well ideas. To bad there isnt a devoted site just for ideas, where they make contest and have tutorials. Oh well I guess I will have to do as I do now and find bits here and there on other sites, for now... thanks again

[Rat King]

Not at all what you're looking for but nonetheless a worthwhile read: Brent Knowles: Videogame Area Design.

Other than that I agree that there should be some kind of site dedicating itself to that actual 'game aspect' of level design. Level design is my Achilles' heel, so I'd definitely benefit from something like that.

[Osmethne]

Originally Posted by ChristopherM

yeah thats one of the closest site I found, but still its "Art" oriented. Hopeing for something more trigger/plot/script oriented. Like instead of teaching how the light should be, it be more about 'where a weapon should be or how a mission should evolve'

That kind of content is usually specific to the engine you're using, so if WoLD doesn't seem to fit the bill, you'd probably want to find sites devoted to your chosen engine. A good example of this would be Valve's PDF on the AI of L4D. where you place your items, how you build your world and the manner in which you script your events will be highly dependent on how the mobs in your game world act and react to player behavior.


Have you looked at some of the modding sites? http://GameBanana.com is a good one for discussing scripting and level design for a lot of the more commonly modded engines.


It sounds, though, that you are not as concerned with how to create a level as you are with how to create a game itself - why the content is designed, positioned or functions the way it does. For that, I'd say start hitting up books on game design first and level design second.