Yibing
Chen
Game Designer & Level Designer
Level Design Practices
Looping Dream
Engine: Unreal Engine 5
Download (Windows): Link
Looping Dream is my final project for the 3D Game Studio course. I wanted to create a dream-like yet eerie atmosphere. With this project, I practice using Niagara effects, creating post-processing materials and interfaces, and simple environmental interaction blueprints. I greyboxed and set dressed the level and interactions. Due to time constraints, I used pre-existing assets from asset stores.
Excavation Site
Engine: Unreal Engine 5
I took inspiration from Roman aqueducts and created a linear experience in an ancient ruins/excavation site. Players traverse through the map on top of the broken-down pillars, houses, and aqueducts.
I used the high tower as a visual guidance to show players their destination once they climbed up the first ramp. I added scaffolding and supports to show the theme of an excavation site further.
Office Set Dressing Practice
Engine: Unreal Engine 4
This is a set dressing practice for MANTRA (www.rubysharkgames.com), a fast-paced FPS game. I set dressed a room based on a concept art of the office. The office space in MANTRA is bleak, industrialized, and brutalistic. I explored a more horror-esque direction with the given narrative and concept art. I created two different sets of lightings, dusk and night, as both can demonstrate a sense of eeriness.
The concept art showcased 8 office cubicles. I aimed to showcase a bit of personality of each worker while maintaining the overall gritty, function-driven environment.
To do so, I designated a mini-story/theme for each cubicle. One person who just had his birthday, another was having a massive emotional crisis and overloaded their space with compulsive post-it notes. Behind them sits a highly tidy person who keeps everything symmetrical; at the corner is someone quirky who brings a doll to work ...
Above all, I designed an overarching narrative: the company was experimenting on a creature. It escaped the container, entered the office space through air ventilation, killed the manager, and left. Players can follow the paw print, blood trail, and frantically knock over pieces of furniture to decipher the story.
Concept art & environment (dusk) comparison
Slide for more images
Theme Park Town
Engine: Unreal Engine 5
I practiced a level design that encourages exploration with this scene. I used the ferris wheel as visual guidance to show players the direction of their destination. I scattered collectible coins around the map to encourage players to walk around and explore on the rooftop and the ground level. I established multiple parts where players can climb the rooftop to avoid excessive backtracking.
Doom (1993)-Inspired Level Sketches
I took inspiration from Doom (1993) and sketched a series of levels from easy to hard. The overall theme is an ancient tomb: players venture into the tomb and encounter many fantastical scenarios, eventually descending to hell. While keeping a constant theme, each level has a mini-theme based on a Doom mechanic or enemy type.
E1M1-Ancient Tomb: This is an introductory level. Players learn the basic mechanics and two enemy types (former human and sergeant) and traverse four rooms. I added poisonous ponds to emphasize the theme of the level.
E1M2-Garden of Flame: This level is fire-themed. I designed several islands surrounding the islands and scattered many explosive barrels. This teaches players to mind their distances. The enemy types are more hell/fire-themed: Demons, Imps, and Cacodemons. I also introduced the mechanic of using keycards to unlock doors.
E1M3-Aquariums: inspired by aquariums. I created many "fish tanks"-rooms with large windows adjacent to the critical path-with walls, and they contain enemies. Players need to shoot and kill the enemies through the windows. In the end, players fight a Mancubus in the middle of a room, like a cylinder colossal fish tank in many aquariums.
E1M4-Fractured Maze: For this level, I repeatedly used the teleportation features. Players need to try out different teleports in each room to figure out their path, much like a maze.
E1M5-Caught in a Web: The theme of this level is spider/spiderweb. The level is shaped like a spiderweb; players must reach the middle of the web by circling through the "thread" (paths), much like being caught in the web. The main enemy types are Arachnotron and Spider Mastermind, both spider-like. I added human enemies in the small rooms adjacent to the paths like they were other prey being caught in this web.
E1M6-Lost Soul: Like the name, the main enemy types of this level are Lost Soul and Pain Elemental (which produces Lost Souls). I created a labyrinth-liked flow and added many secret paths for exploration.
E1M7-Head of Hell: Narratively, this is where players reach hell. The shape of the level is inspired by the head of the Baron of Hell, which is also the final boss of this level. This level contains outdoor and indoor sessions, and I added all hell-related enemy types.