The final blog post

Well, this blog has come to its final post.
Most people would just say, "Hey that's all folks!" and just ditch but I want to leave you guys with some useful advice for the future, "It is never too early to be looking into internships".
I know this one first hand, even if a company isn't looking for internships at the specific given time, be sure that they have a copy of your resume and portfolio, so they know who you are. Also be sure to keep in frequent contact with them, you will develop a personal connection with who ever you are talking to and will lead to being, more likely to be chosen first for a position.

With the first semester of this year over, it is a good time to be looking into companies for the summer, there are several game companies around the world and most likely one that isn't too far from you!

Do the research!

Before you go in asking for interviews and internships, know what the company wants and what you can provide, don't try and mold yourself into something that you aren't. Stick with what you are good at and build a reputation around that, it will help you make it farther in the career!

And now, it is time for me to say goodbye, I hope to see you all in the video game industry some day!

Thanks for reading,

Ian.

Podcast

I went ahead and broke down level design into 3 major points in this blog post's podcast!

The Source SDK :: Guest Blog

Guest Blogger: Forte

A great way for beginners to get into level design is through the Source SDK's built in level editor: Hammer.

What is the Source SDK?

The Source SDK is an easy to use software development kit produced by Valve for use in games that run on the Source engine, such as Portal 2, Team Fortress 2, and Half-Life 2. Of particular interest to the beginner level designer is the Hammer World Editor. The best part is that it is free to anyone who has installed Steam (Valve's digital distribution platform), and can be downloaded from the "Tools" tab in your Library.

Intro to Hammer

Hammer is a relatively simple world editor that allows its users to quickly develop simple levels. Of course, to make a working level for a game, there are hundreds of factors to consider, depending on the kind of game you want to design for. The basic interface shows you four windows within the Hammer window: 3D View, 2D View (Top Down), 2D View (Left Side) and 2D View (Right Side).

The Windows

The four windows are your workspace, like a blank canvas in Photoshop. The 3D View window is a visualizer into your new level, allowing you to see sort of a rough draft of your level without having to compile it and run it in a game. The 2D Views allow you to drag out brushes along the X, Y, and Z axes.

Brushes

The term brushes refers to what can essentially be described as platforms. These are (usually) the physical objects that make up your level, but can also be scripted sequences to activate things within your level, depending on the texture you assign to them. To draw a brush out, you first click on the brush icon: , and then simply drag out an area in one of your 2D windows. Don't worry if you don't get your brush exactly right when creating it, you can always resize it by clicking and dragging on one of the white squares that appear on the outline of the shape while selected. The best part about Hammer is that every brush always remains self contained, so you can edit it as much as you would like after its creation, including changing the texture on it.

Textures

Textures are of course the "skin" given to your brush. The texture window is on the right hand side of your screen by default, and looks like this: . To select a texture, you simply click the browse button, which will bring up a dialogue containing all of Hammer's built in textures. You can type into the name bar at the bottom of the textures dialogue to help make your search more specific, or you can just look through all of the textures to pick one you like. When you create a brush, the brush will have the currently selected texture on it, but your texture can be easily changed by clicking on the brush, finding a new texture, and then clicking the reskin button:

Entities

Entities are pre-scripted objects that you can put into your map, the most important of these being the "light" entity and "info_player_start" entities. To create an entity, click on the entity button: , and then click on the position where you want the entity placed in the 3D view window. The listed entities are the most important because one, info_player_start, tells the game where to spawn the player, and without it, the player cannot be spawned. The other, light, simply creates a light to make your area visible.

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With four walls, a floor and a ceiling, and the entities listed here, you can make a quick and easy map which can be compiled and instantly ported into any Source game, so you can see the fruits of your labor almost instantly.

Interview Brandon Cook

After interviewing Aaron, I was able to get in contact with an environmental artist that also works on Siege of Inaolia, I asked him very similar answers knowing that he held a different position I got some very different responses:

First off could you explain a bit about yourself and your work? (Name, a bit of background info, Position, Title of the game, and what the game is)

                My name is Brandon Timothy cook, I am currently a self taught artist who loves to work on any work that deals with scenery, Landscapes, Cityscape, Surrealism, and many other forms of three denominational or two denominational art. I'm currently a environment modeler for an indie group called Siege Of Inaolia. My job as a environment modeler is to create the props and textures that give the game its theme or setting. Siege Of Inaolia is a game were the land of Ilastria is divided in two by a great barrier of mountains. One side of the land the humans live peacefully and blissful of what the other side has done. The nasty creatures of the north are the Orcs who have taken once a neutral part of the barrier and had made it their own. This place is called Iniolia.

As an Environmental Artist what is your job as a whole?

                My job consist of working with the level designer to create an environment for the person who is playing the game to enjoy.  This line of work usually takes a lot of patience and time. An Environment artist takes the level that a level designer creates and turns into some thing that the player understands while playing the game or story that is in front of them. Players usually want to see a setting not just blocks and flat surfaces.  

What is the hardest thing that you have overcome so far?

 The hardest part that I had to overcome was setting up a collision model on a massive gate that was created by a team member that left a while back. This project nearly drove me insane and left me wondering why the model was not split up into individual pieces. The way the model had an interior were the player would cross to get to the other side of the gate. 

What is the best experience you have had making your way to where you are now?

                I would say that I have some time to go but so far the best time I've had is when I went to a competition to test my worth as a 3D modeler. I had about two hours to make the next cellphone that a company would sell to their customers. A friend and I work in sync to get this cellphone done and rendered before time was up. In the end we made it to second place in the state of Virginia and received a award for our achievement. I can tell you this was a thrill that I will never forget.

If you could give advice to new students who are pursuing a career in game design what would it be?

                I would say patience is a main factor of any art style. Not every one has the patience to be an artist but sitting there is going to be nearly 80% of your job but don't let that get you down. But that 80% is doing what you love and having fun while you work. Also make sure to consistently look for new inspiration and keep up on periodicals on art and game design to keep your imagination refreshed.

Interview Aaron Dordi

I had the chance to interview with the Project Lead for Siege of Inaolia, talking about game design as a whole and what his experiences have been, this is what he had to say:

First off could you explain a bit about yourself and your work? (Name, a bit of background info, Position, Title of the game, and what the game is)

My name is Aaron Dordi, I am situated in Dubai and currently studying for my degree in Interactive Animation in SAE Institute. The majority of my spare time is spent as a Project Lead/Manager and Prop Modeler dedicated to my brainchild, Siege of Inaolia, which I hope one day will evolve into the game that redefines the way Survival Games are played with its unique blend of action, co-op, survival and character progression mechanics.

As a project manager what is your job as a whole?

My job encompasses a wide variety of tasks which include prioritizing and distributing tasks, offering solutions to problems any team member may face, recruiting new members, deciding which features and fixes go into each release, article writing and community building on IndieDB.com, ensuring smooth communication and efficient workflow with each member.

What is the hardest thing that you have overcome as a project Manager?

Due to the fact that my entire development team is international the biggest hurdles (because being the project manager there isn't just a singular 'hardest' hurdle) that I've actually overcome is finding team members that are as dedicated and passionate about creating games as I am that are willing to actually put aside their spare time in an effort to create a very ambitious game. Another problem is actually enforcing deadlines as personal life can get in the way and that of course takes priority and I can never forget the most annoying problem of them all, that problem being the actual organization of monthly team meetings, as you can imagine the different time zones do cause quite a problem there.

What is the best experience you have had making your way to where you are now?

The best experience is probably playing every incarnation of the game, there's nothing better for a gloomy day than an iteration of a video game that you've put your heart and soul placed into your hands a close second would probably be the random fan praising the game or even the length personal message from time to time  for an indie team it really means a lot not only to me but the entire team as at the end of the day the game is created mainly by the amazing talent I've somehow managed to convince to get on board, I just tie them together.

If you could give advice to new students who are pursuing a career in game design what would it be?

Try something different, if you notice that a particular genre has dried up start thinking of what could reinvigorate that particular variety of game, start small with your ideas but then slowly evolve the idea and stick with it, remove the clutter and crappy ideas till you've come up with a near perfect concept and then stick with it, development is more of a marathon than a sprint.
Oh and Coffee, lots of it.

Portfolio #3

In the last post I was talking about creating a portfolio using CarbinMade or Wordpress as examples. Now I will cover what you should have in your portfolio!
Now when you create your portfolio there are some things that you need to make sure to include:

• Only your work (if others helped in your work credit them)
• Your skills and past experience
• References
• Interviews that you were a part of
• Recommendations (if you have them)

Obviously you need to only show your work, but if you created a project that multiple people on it, be sure to give each person credit! As for your skills, and experience, this should be anything that relates to what your portfolio is about.

Now comes the tricky part, references, normally this covered with LinkedIn or some other professional networking site. If you don't currently have a LinkedIn, get one, and start adding contacts, it is a really easy way to find some great connections to any industry! But for now if you don't have your profile made and really need a portfolio, send your references a quick email asking if you can actually reference them, employers may contact them! 

If you have had any interviews or press coverage of you or work that you were a crucial part of go ahead and include it! More media references that better! (As long as they are positive of course)

Remember when you were applying for college and someone said something about recommendation letters? Yeah they still count for the career aspect too. If you can get recommendation letters from people in your career you can start building your cred-ability. Your portfolio is to speak about yourself and your achievements with out you actually having to be there. 

In the next few posts I have some interviews with current Indie developers in the industry! 

Portfolio #2

So, in the last post I talked about having a portfolio and how you should host it on your own domain. Well, this post I am going to talk about what you should do for your portfolio and also a free temporary solution for an online portfolio.

First let me talk on the free solutions before we make any decisions to spend money. A really simple website that allows you to host portfolio content is CarbonMade. This is probably one of the best temporary portfolio websites that I have used, due to the fact that portfolios can not be found without knowing the URL. So this means that there is no competition if you were to send this to anyone, it would only show your work and no one else. There are a couple of downsides though, CarbonMade only allows you to post 5 portfolio pieces on the free account, 35 images and the designs are limited, which for some people may be the best solution. It's all up to you, and what you want for the future.

Now lets move on to what you can do for a personal portfolio that will look best for employers!
So in the last post I talked about having a URL which is best if your name.com. Well, once you have decided on a URL you have to get a website frame, there are many to choose from and many of them are free to use! A very common frame is Wordpress, it has become very popular in the last few years with it's normally sleek design, fast load times, multiple plugins and iOS support makes it idea for almost any website.
I will cover more in-depth on what should actually be in your portfolio in the next post!

Portfolio

I will be talking about 2 different things this post, creating a portfolio: Where to host and why, and creating level design documents: What to use.

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Portfolios are essential to any artistic related position, level design is no different. Many have different opinions on where you should host your portfolio whether it is on: DeviantART, ModDB, or even your own domain. Well the truth is the best hands down is going to be to have your complete portfolio on your own domain which is normally your name .com or .net. Now the reason why we want to use your own domain to show to employees is to not let them be distracted by other peoples' work. Lets say you host on Deviant Art for your portfolio, it may allow you to show your work in sorted galleries but it also shows other peoples work.

Lets look at an example:

Now, domains can be a little pricey when trying to buy some top quality .com's. So if you run into a problem in which your name.com is already registered than try going for a .net or even a .org. Domain hosts are pretty common, I purchased mine through GoDaddy and haven't had any issues, but purchasing a Domain is only part of the deal, you must purchase Web Hosting, which will hold your portfolio and other files. This is where it can get really pricey really fast. I recommend Eleven2 both UTDTV as well as myself have had fantastic service and 99.99% up time. 

Now next time I will show you some basic portfolio templates that can be used for your website!

By special request I am going to talk a little about what programs to use for designing a level layout and document.

Well, for level design it is all really personal preference, when drawing you can do it either by hand with a piece of paper and pencil or on a program such as Photoshop. Now, I do suggest that if you draw it by hand that you do scan in your paper to a computer program such as Photoshop to clean up your design and finalize everything before shipping it off to your boss! As for your document I would say any word processing tool should work, but specifically Microsoft Word or Open Office.

Networking

This week I will be playing a little catch up, I feel behind on my blog due to school as well as person life and I am terrible sorry about that.

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Networking is a very important part to any career, but more so in the video game industry. Networking is how you are able to get wind of new jobs as well as getting your foot in the door. In the past getting a job heavily relied on your experience, well this is true but with social media growing so fast you are recommended to be active in a social community and normally some game board. Now when I mean a game board, I mean a video game's online forum, posting relevant and constructive comments. For me I have been pretty active on Red 5's game forum, FireFall.


You can find me on there as "Shift`", feel free to add me!

Now back to forums and networking, well-being on a game developer’s forum gives you a limited way to contact the development team. I use the term limited because they are not required to use the forum or to respond to you. But it is a great way to connect with other gamers like your-self, and maybe just maybe catch the eye of a developer. This is one way to start your own connections; another is to attend game conferences and community events. These are normally gold mines for business cards, but just getting a business card doesn't mean that they are okay with you contacting them; it's just a formality really. Which means that you should go out and get business cards of your own! Be sure to include your name, email, and a link to your portfolio. Which I will go ahead and cover in the next post.

Well, I'm gonna go over my word limit here but... As promised here is my LinkedIn profile:

  Unfortunately, my connections were not comfortable with giving their contact information open on the web but I can make specific contacts if requested.
So just a recap for next time we will cover the basics of portfolio making as well as a special request about the process of actually creating level design documents and what programs to use to draw out the designs.

Adding on World Builder

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In the last post I talked about being a level designer and a world builder, well due to time commitments I do not have the ability to teach you how to actually do world building or use the specific engine that you want to use. You are going to have to do that on your own. Though There are helpful blogs and tutorials that you can find for the specific engine that you want to use. Unfortunately I cannot provide links to specific blogs/tutorials because I don't know what engine you would like to use, if you want help locating one for your engine please post in the comments below and I will help you to the best of my ability!

That was a general overview of what this blog is going to be covering and hopefully some helpful information on getting started. I will cover some important topics next time such as networking. Including some of my pre-made connections as well as my personal LinkedIn profile!

Be sure to subscribe, and if you have any questions feel free to leave me a comment, I will be sure to get back to you as soon as possible! If it is important enough I will even include it in the next post!

Being a Level Designer

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Let's first talk about what it actually means to be a "level designer". There are several terms floating around that are similar to level designer which cause some people confusion. The title Level Designer is not the same as World Builder or Mapper. A Level Designer creates the concept of the level in the regards to what is suppose to happen in the level, the purpose of the level and the over all look of the level. Now you might be thinking, that this sounds like a lot of drawing and art. Well, it sort of is. Level designers are normally expected to be able to produce top-down map layouts and be able to write, in detail, events that happen in the level and when they happen.  Now we run into our first problem, level design is a very abstract thing, and is hard to explain or show to anyone. It is also a very easy position to replace and doesn't have as much work as many other positions in game development.  So, solve this problem I suggest also specializing in World Building. In this blog I will be doing this, so you will be able to see the results for yourself.

Next post I will cover the basics of being a Level Designer and World Builder!

The Introduction

Want to get into the game development industry as a level designer? Well you are in the right place!

First a little about myself:

My name is Ian Owen, and I am currently the Lead Level Designer for Planewalker Studios and I work under the title of "indie" game developer. Even though I am the lead level designer I am still a student at The University of Texas at Dallas, and I don't plan on doing indie game development as my career. I am planning on making my way to the AAA sector of video game design. In this blog I will talk about some of the things that allowed me to get where I am today and how I plan on moving forward in the career, some of the things that you will see in this blog post are:

• Networking (via LinkedIn and in person meetings)
• Portfolio (How to)
• Resume (What they are really looking for)
• Cover Letter (To really stand out)
• Do's and Don'ts of Interviewing

A new blog post will be made about every 10 days. If you would like for me to elaborate on a specific topic, please let me know as soon as possible!