Subject Specialism - Research

Research 

For this assignment I have been asked to carry out research that is related to what I am creating. In my
case i would need to look at level maps, specifically the models and textures and why they have put
certain objects in certain rooms. I will also need to look at modeling and textures techniques and how i
could us them for my project.

Fable 3 - Sanctuary 

In the game ‘Fable 3’ you are able to go to a set of rooms called Sanctuary at any time, each room has
a purpose for the player and ach has a different design and layout. The first room that you will see
when you enter Sanctuary is the map room, this room contains the world map, character stats, gifts
and your dog. The room is circular with the world map being in the dead center and the doors to the
other rooms being placed at the back wall in a row. This is a great setup as a first view as it lets you
see everything important straight away. If you approach ach door it will display what room you are
about to enter, you cannot see into the other room as it's just black. Entering causes a load screen to
appear as the game rendered out the contents of the next room. The door frames are somewhat basic
in there design, the real work is the symbols that are displayed above each door. They look good and
can be easily identified by the player so they don't have to walk up to each door to find out what room
they are going to. 

The character stats are accessed when the player walks up to a statue of a man on the right as they
enter the sanctuary. Is smart that the chose a statue of a human as this will register in the players mind
that it's about the character.  On the left is the gift section and the dog basket. The gift section is a
bunch of shelf layers that are built into the wall, as you get a gift it will appear as a box wrapped up on
one of the shelves. This is a simple design for the player to recognize that there is a gift waiting for
them without even getting close to the gift section. Once again the shelves are a basic wood design so
nothing fancy and more to serve another purpose.

The wallpaper in room isn't a harsh colour on the eyes, it's a dark green with some pale designs. The
carpet on the steps to the doors is very similar but instead it is a dark blue with grey patterns. The
checker floor is a strange design choice to me as it looks a bit out of place given the very fantasy and
antique look to the rest of the room. If I was designing this room I might use a simple stone or carpet
design instead of the checkers as i believe that this looks much better. I like how the checker floor is
below the doors and you need to go up a couple of steps to reach the doors. There is no real game
purpose to the steps but it does make the room look a lot better than if it was all on the same floor. 

The lighting in the room is very bright, that comes from the large chandelier on the ceiling and the torches
next to each of the doors. I also believe that the chandelier leaves a shadow over the world map but does
highlight it with a glowing golden light. If this was intentional then they made a good design choice, the
golden halo of light surrounding the world map draws the player to it as it acts as a highlight on the floor.
Another small detail with the lighting in the room is the different colours at the foot of each door frame,
it's not that necessary but like the highlight for the world map, it's a nice design choice.

The model for the world map looks cool as it has a 3D element to it, it would be simple to keep it as a
flat plane with a map texture over the top. The bottom design looks good and relatively simple to design. 

The sound for this room is great, it's mainly the ambient music score in the background and Jasper
explaining the rooms and your options of what to do in the sanctuary. Fable has always made use of a
choir type of soundtrack for important locations and the sanctuary makes use of this theme, it's not
distracting when you are trying to think but it also doesn't fade completely into the background. Having
Jasper talk to you can get a bit annoying after awhile but at the start it's basically a continuous tutorial
that you can ignore, I can understand why they had this as a feature because it could be easy to forget
what each thing in each room does.

The weapon room

The first room on the left is the weapon room, as the name suggests this room contains all of the players
weapons that they have collected. The layout for this room is very simple, you have melee weapons,
spells and ranged weapons in that order from left to right. This allows the player to quickly identify what
each section is so they can quickly select their weapon. They make the design even more simple as the
weapons you have collected are displayed in the open on kneeling statues, the statues are made well
and makes use of one very simple stone texture for their design. They didn't have to model a new one
each time as the ranged and melee statues use the same model, only the spell section needed a new
statue design. 

The lighting in this room is much darker than the main room, i prefer this design as it's easier to see
strangely. They made use of the green pattern carpet again but this time it's on the floor and the walls.
This was probably done so they didn't have to create a new texture for the floor but it doesn't take away
from the overall design. The green also works well with the red for the curtains and the light brown on
the wood panels along the floor. 

There are some other models in the room such as the suits of armour and the candles, they are modeled
and textured well but this whole room is relatively low poly so these don't slow down the performance or
take anything away from the rooms design. 

The sound effects for this room are basic, they make use of a weapon clang or the sound of a weapon
being sheathed when you select what melee or ranged weapon you want. One of the more interesting
sound effects is for the spell options, depending on what spell you equip the sound will change to fit that.
This is much better than that of the weapons as it adds depth to your selection and makes each spell
feel very different. On top of this you also get to see what spell you are looking at clearly rather then
having to rely on finding the text to know what spell you are about to choose. 

The clothing room 

The clothing room has a lot more additional sections and detail to it when compared to weapon room.
The first thing the player will notice is the four mannequins that will be wearing any clothes that you have
collected, this allows you to have a quick interface and select the costume that you want with ease. The
mannequins are just a basic human model with a neutral grey texture over the top, it's what it needs to
be and nothing else. Behind these you will see a bunch of boxes and folded clothes, these serve no
purpose but they do add to the feel and look of the room. I imagine each of these are very low poly so
it's okay to have them in the background. The one thing that is strange is the amount of effort they put
into the design of the background, it looks better than the main doors in the sanctuary. 

On the right of the room are the two other important sections that the player will probably use during the
game. The first is the cloth and hair dye section, this is the same layout as the gift section but instead it
has small colloired bottles of dye that the player will be able to see from afar. When you use one of the
dyes you can hear the sound of liquid moving around in a bottle, it's little noises like this that make the
game more immersive. The second section is a section that allows you to quickly remove any part of
clothing you currently have on. 

They used the same green and red combo for the floor and wall texture in this room, I would have liked
to see another colour instead but I guess it saves time. The lighting in this room is okay and you are
able to see everything. 

The store

The store room is probably the least used room in the Sanctuary because it's linked to multiplayer and
buying items from the online store. Despite this room being very situational, i would say that they put a
lot of effort into making it look nice. There are paintings and different types of furniture all around this
room, they serve no purpose other than to make this room look fancy and social. The room layout is
very similar to the other rooms, which is okay but using the same green texture for the floor is a bit bad
as this is an online room i would have expected a different textured floor and walls. 

There are no real noticeable sound effects in this room apart from the basic noises that you would hear
when selecting an item or scrolling down on a list. They show new items in a similar way to the gift
section in the main sanctuary room, each of the additional content bundles is wrapped up in a box that
you can click on to open once you have purchased it. The texture on the painting are okay and you can
make out the people in the photos which is a nice feature, I imagine they just took the assets from other
parts of the game for this room. 

Jasper is once again in this room and will start running through a verbal tutorial with the player as soon
as they enter, i nice feature but a bit annoying after a couple of hours. 

The treasury

The treasury does not serve as big a role as the other rooms but still worth talking about. This room is
much brighter than the other three, I think this was done to make it seem like the gold that you have
collected is giving off a radiant light. The shape of the room is a bit different as it looks like a big corridor
and at the end is a large circle space that contains the gold that you have collected. The green pattern is
used on the floor and walls again. This is a bit disappointing as the use of some different colours would
go a long way in making each room stand out. 

On the right is a wall that contains all of the achievements the player has unlocked for the game, it's a
simple design and it wasn't really needed in the game as you can check on the home screen of the
console but having it in the game means you don't have to stop playing to check. On the left is a bunch
of shelves that hold all of the important trophies that the player has earned during the course of the
games campaign and additional side missions. I like the aged wood texture that they used as it makes it
look a bit more interesting then a clean and polished wood style would. There are some unique sound
effects in this room, when you walk on the gold you can hear the sounds of coins moving. This is an
easy effect to add but it does add a lot to the overall experience and the room itself.

Overall i think that the Sanctuary is very nice level layout and has some smart features and ideas in it.
Some of the things that I would change on it would be the use of the same texture for every room, i think
a different colour for each would help the player to identify what room they are in much faster and may
even help them remember what room to go into. Another thing I would change is an option to talk to
Jasper and turn off the constant tutorial he gives you whenever you enter a new room or look at any of
the features in that room.

Cyberpunk city concept art

As one of my rooms will be in a sci-fi setting i want to make sure that I know the theme and feel that I
want for the design before I actually start designing the models and creating the lighting. 

I like the idea of a dystonia society, much like the film Blade Runner. The use of bright lights is great
when the rest of the world can be dark and dirty, this contrast naturally has a very sci-fi feel to it. This is
why this piece of concept art is great because just using different shades of blue and purple light, they
are able to highlight the rest of the city and ships without having to use many colours for them. The
picture is probably a bit too sci-fi for the feel that i was going for but the basics are there for me to draw
inspiration from.

To show the influence of the bright colored light in my work I might have it coming through the windows
of the appointment, this why it acts as my ‘daylight’ and the lights in the room can be just basic yellow
and white lights. The only thing I would change about this picture is the structures in the background as
I can't figure out what they are but I imagine that they are some going ship or maybe another series of
building and apartments where people can live and work.