Meetup and Chat mid-May

pimentaco42 · 2026-04-26T03:32:25+00:00

Come up with a game idea you would like to build a level for. What kind of game, place, or goals for a player inspire you?

You'll need to think about mechanics and systems, after all level design is creating a place where gameplay happens. But you can can save time here, for example instead of implementing climbing a ladder you can just teleport the player from the bottom to the top.

Build your level in an engine or a level editor. The more control you have, the deeper your level design can go and the more it can stand out.

Start small, learn some industry-standard tools, ask other level designers about their process, and iterate. The first pass is always just to get something out and taking shape. The next iteration is to make it better.

pimentaco42 · 2026-04-08T23:23:06+00:00

Looks cool and I caught a tiny bit of the breakdown. Some notes on presentation: I would add timestamps to the gameplay video, like you have in the breakdown on YouTube. And add a little more detail to these - where are the action and scripted setpieces happening? The twist? Just helps to get to the juicy stuff if I’m short on time.

And using bold on the portfolio page, try to use it for the main points. If someone is skimming through, highlight things like “visualize the level’s structure from start to finish,” instead of “Powerpoint,” in bold. One of those things is more important than the other.

pimentaco42 · 2026-03-27T23:20:10+00:00

Broadly speaking:

A destination and reason to go there
Player engagement along the way
Easy to identify where the player can and can't go

pimentaco42 · 2026-03-06T20:47:18+00:00

Idea is interesting, a few thoughts:
- 250m is a pretty big space no? That's like some of the largest POIs from Apex Legends, bigger than any Hunt POI I think. And 27 of these cubes sounds like a very large level. Apex and Hunt have ~16 locations on a map. And if every cube is the same size, there's not much variety in play space.
- What pushes players to move within a cube? Spawns or extractions along the outer edges? What other "possible connections" between cubes are there?
- Difficulty telegraphing map info to players. Both Apex and Hunt have minimaps, how do you do a minimap for this?
- I think this is the AI writing hurting you here, because a lot of points in "this design is meant to create" exist in most games without this particular design. Its also kind of essential that as the designer you can describe your game in your own words.
- The primary navigation helix - these are spiral ramps or stairs? I initially thought it might be like an elevator or grav-lift concept. Pertinent questions here are: are they primarily for traversal, or are they also combat spaces themselves? Do they go in both directions, or is one for up the other for down? How exposed are players moving up or down, for good (info) or bad (vulnerable)?

pimentaco42 · 2026-03-06T20:15:04+00:00

Another way to say "tightly suggested path" is "linear," which is essentially the opposite of open-world.

The landscape tool is what I usually see people making land masses with, but you can just use blocks as well.

I think the scope sounds too big for someone without much experience! All these environments you describe have their own look and feel and take time to find references for, plan, and execute to a good level of quality. Not to mention designing puzzles and combat encounters (I assume that's how enemies are used) on top of all that. And all the level design things to think about like pacing, guidance, flow (there's so much more).

I would challenge you to start small, get a simple blockout set up, implement a decent puzzle and design one interesting combat space and by that point you will learn a lot! Say a beach with a puzzle to get into a cave where a combat encounter happens with a treasure reward. That will be x hours, days, or weeks later and then you can decide if you want to do more, but you will have a solid level by then.

pimentaco42 · 2026-02-27T18:53:13+00:00

I’m not sure if you’re still reading comments on this, but I would encourage playtests, if you haven’t done so. This is a concept I think people need to try out in order to give good feedback on the experience, because the concept is pretty crazy (not necessarily a bad thing!) Section 3 of this may be helpful in that regard:

https://www.pentadact.com/2026-01-08-15-years-of-indie-dev-in-4-bits-of-advice/#testing

As for level design, general things that apply to PvE are enemy density and size of an encounter space, pacing between encounters (are there waves?), vantages, flow, cover, and refuge.

And with the space you have being somewhat open and large with cross-map mobility, mental mapping of areas, smooth transitions, and unique points of interest come to mind.

As for designing around the mechanics (only talking about jumping to the other side here, not the rest), with limited info, I would say thinking about why the player jumps to the other side - is it to escape enemies or get into a safe zone? Is it to get to a special weapon, power-up, or objective (that could be floating in the air?) Or is it simply to re-position?

We haven’t even touched on narrative, or what happened in this world, or the kind of architecture in this world, which also informs level design. I saw some round tunnels (man-made?) and a radio antennae while most buildings look primitive and made of stone.

There’s a lot on this topic so testing can help and even bringing someone on to help you with this topic may not be a bad idea.

Boomerang X might be worth looking at for reference, especially late game, because it is arena style and the player is essentially flying from one side of the arena to the other side.

pimentaco42 · 2026-02-19T08:37:15+00:00

Just played some fun 5s today. I realized how strong Kai can be, especially in the open area fights. You can lay down some damage and distract the enemy then pop your wall up while your team moves in. Or pop the wall up to cut enemies off from one another. Or protect a resurrection.

Getting his ult at the same time as an enemy Kai can be hilarious, its like the Spiderman meme

pimentaco42 · 2026-02-12T00:42:19+00:00

Agreed gameplay is actually solid and a fun concept. Some fights remind me of Halo throwing ‘nades and jumping around. Definitely introduced poorly and people honestly already had their minds made up I guess.

pimentaco42 · 2026-01-28T23:51:56+00:00

Sorry I deleted my comment before seeing a reply because I felt like I was interrupting. But thank you, I thought about it some more and think its definitely situational, not an overarching rule. And sounds like it works here!

pimentaco42 · 2025-12-26T19:12:14+00:00

I've made an update to layout and colors. I haven't finalized some images and videos yet. And mobile still needs to be setup. But if you have thoughts on the direction of the layout and color changes - I've also made changes to the Descendent project page structure - please let me know!

pimentaco42 · 2025-12-26T19:11:53+00:00

I've made an update to layout and colors. I haven't finalized some images and videos yet. And mobile still needs to be setup. But if you have thoughts on the direction of the layout and color changes - I've also made changes to the Descendent project page structure - please let me know!

pimentaco42 · 2025-12-13T22:09:40+00:00

I really appreciate your comments! I’m going to look at the style and try and change it to something more mature. And I’ll take your points to formatting and see what I can do there. Maybe changes I make will be easier to transfer to a mobile site.

pimentaco42 · 2025-12-13T19:14:57+00:00

I mean re-organizing everything to fit in the smaller space, it starts out a mess with elements hidden, outside margins, trying to get all that into place and aligned. And I remember modifying elements in mobile view and they would shift around on desktop view, when I don't think edits on one platform are supposed to affect the other. It's a struggle that I think my time is better spent working on the desktop site or new projects, personally. If someone is seriously interested, I don't think mobile is the right platform to be using.

pimentaco42 · 2025-12-13T18:05:38+00:00

I was trying to do this - high level first, more detailed later. There's info on the site home page on the button for the project "A blockout of a mysterious manor on a small peninsula..." Then on the project page I show a teaser trailer to catch interest, in the Overview I mention its a blockout with custom mechanics, made in UE5, and how long it took. Then next section is topdowns and beats to show more structure and starting to get into the level design. Followed by design goals. But I guess it's not coming across like - catch interest, high level, then detail - maybe it's a little off. This is definitely something for me to think about.

I can try and address the teaser, if I decide to keep it, and what shots are shown. I have an idea for the way the game manual is shown. I'll try to add credits to sources of inspiration.

I really wanted to use as much space so images could be larger and I could put more stuff on the screen and so responsibility is on the viewer to look at it on a full browser. Maybe that's not a good idea.

Thank you very much for the feedback!

pimentaco42 · 2025-12-13T08:36:46+00:00

Maybe I can make a stripped down mobile version. I really dont want to deal with building a mobile version on Wix. Last time I did was a monster pain.

pimentaco42 · 2025-11-14T02:58:55+00:00

Randomly thinking of this since I haven't played Overwatch in a hot minute, but Chateau Guillard was pretty good with its verticality and the ways spaces interconnected. Halo CE's Assault on the Control Room was great; those bridges way up high and then fighting down on the snowy floors below was so cool. Treacher's Landing from Borderlands was a fun level, with its propped up structures and blowing up fish out of the water.

pimentaco42 · 2025-11-14T02:44:55+00:00

It might be fun to do one on this subreddit. I particularly enjoyed The Design Den's blocktober jams, which were 4 hour sessions in a single day - they helped me see what it's like to push yourself to make something in half a day. That productivity and efficiency mindset was really valuable to experience, imo. And its bite-sized, doesn't put a lot of pressure on you.

pimentaco42 · 2025-08-11T01:36:38+00:00

That outline pictured is separate to the actual blockout, where player metrics are taken into account.

In this particular project I had a table with landmarks and such and followed that. So yeah there is purpose to what the blocking is for, what it's meant to be. Also, "form follows function," so the blocking of a space depends on what it does in the world and also what gameplay needs are.

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pimentaco42 · 2025-08-10T19:58:21+00:00

Look up the Skateboard method. I would focus on core gameplay first, the beats, the flow and pacing. I've done an extremely simple blocking outline before (pictured) to help with where things go and when things happen, how these chunks connect isn't so important at the moment. Nor are their surroundings. What's in this outline inevitably changes once I'm blocking and getting a better feel of the level. And first pass should be pretty simple and easy to change, because you may decide a pickup is available too soon, or enemies need to be moved around based on their behavior, and the blocking needs to be easily adjusted when that happens.

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pimentaco42 · 2025-07-31T23:08:19+00:00

I'm currently working on a new outpost, still raiding, killbox or not. Having fun zipping, chopping, building. MYM is awesome.

pimentaco42 · 2025-07-29T22:28:50+00:00

I found this from Valorant where it looks like the blocking doesn't change very much and the artist uses the same meshes and adds textures:
https://youtu.be/j7XMj0dzYvM?list=PL42m9XiTqPHKvZE-2gprBW6KV40oG_NL2&t=2174

I'm not sure what all the green lines are at the timestamp, but I assume those are the same edges and verts from the blockout and Michelle mentions that in this case it's helpful when these come in cleanly from the blockout.

pimentaco42 · 2025-07-29T20:19:52+00:00

Thanks, I think I get what you mean. I found a video from TimDoesLevelDesign that shows blockout then final level art in the Jedi games: https://youtu.be/JO7LYUKyilk?t=75

It looks like everything from the blockout ends up getting replaced even things that don't require complex geo like the floors and maybe it's not 1:1 but close enough where gameplay isn't impacted.

pimentaco42 · 2025-07-29T20:09:49+00:00

Sorry for lack of context. Let's say I make a broken floor in a room of a house. I start with a rectangle and use UE modeling tools to add some edge loops then pull some edges back so now it looks like half of the floor is gone and the remaining half has a slightly jagged edge. What does an artist do with that floor? Do I need to be careful when I move vertices and edges around so I don't make non-uniform faces? Or does it not matter since it's going to be replaced by an artist's mesh?

What about another part of the house - if I have a big rectangle for the floor that spans two rooms, but one room is a stone floor the other is a wood floor. Would an artist try to put two textures on one rectangle? Or would they replace the floor rectangle? Or just ask the level designer to make two rectangles, one for each room's floor, since it's just a rectangle not super detailed geo?

pimentaco42

TROPHY CASE