Sam Sussman
Level Designer
Description: Launch the SYNC protocol, where you are the ultimate weapon. Your job is to commandeer different robotic synth’s abilities in a high-octane, first-person frenzy. Master the art of SYNCing, and control the pace of battle.
Platform: PC Genre: First Person Arena Shooter
Role: Lead Designer, Level Designer
Date: September 2023 - June 2024
Design Process
Level Design in Sync
Syncs main mechanic of the Sync meter means the player can be at any place at any time and in one of three different character archetypes that each move differently, meaning the design needs to accommodate all playstyles at all times. We also wanted to make sure there was at least three different levels the player can complete, meaning I had to create three unique levels for the project.
Designing the maps
I decided that due to our short timeframe and characters already being set up I would design unorthodoxly and do the blockouts before the documentation. We prioritized getting a playable prototype as soon as we could which meant I sidelined documentation at the start and played around with the modular kit we used to see what types of gameplay and levels felt good with the character mechanics. It took a while to find it through many different iterations but I eventually found that most players enjoyed more linear levels compared to more open ended ones, so my philosophy around them became to create a "straight" line for the player to follow, making them always push forward and feel that power fantasy of mowing through the enemies.
As we progressed through development we found that players would complete the levels too quickly so I scripted and introduced environmental hazards that the player had to keep track of or avoid in certain parts.
One big piece we needed was motifs to guide the player. I decided to use a security tape material to indicate which direction the player has to go once a combat encounter is completed. On top of this, we made the doors in encounters colored laser gates with red indicating it will not open again and blue meaning forward.
Once the levels were blocked out and I knew were ready I started on the documentation to be handed off to artists and narrative designers. Since the levels were already blocked out, it made mapping them in the docs much quicker allowing me to focus on more detailed parts of the doc and balancing the encounters in each
Challenges
There were plenty of challenges and roadblocks that I came across throughout development. Making sure the levels worked with every character type alone made designing the levels difficult and take much longer than anticipated. There were times where it seemed like some levels may need to be scrapped due to scope issues but we all came together and made plans to make sure that they all worked in the end.
Postmortem
Coming Soon!