What I did:
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Owned entire level
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Worked with two other level designers to form a cohesive experience through merged areas
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Blueprint writing and asset integration​
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Software: UE5, Blueprints, PureRef​​​
Initial Idea
​This level takes place in an alternate version of Jackson Square in New Orleans. I decided to recreate an existing location for this level; it made sense to take a real-world location and make it for Fallout, but also provided an opportunity to dive into architecture.
Project Goals
​My goals for this project were many:
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1. Create a new environment that could be in the Fallout franchise
2. Recreate a real-world location in the specific post-apocalyptic setting of Fallout
3. Learn how to work with other Level Designers on a project made for a bigger whole without the oversight or help from leadership or other disciplines
4. Go through a professional pipeline with intent to pass off to another (hypothetical) team
5. Create a foundation from which I can use the Fallout Creation Kit to 'mod' the level directly into Fallout 4
6. Learn the balance between visual realism, efficient level design, and game-feel
7. Learn more about architecture and its uses in Level Design
Notes
While the Church and the Square in the center of the area were not my responsibility, the Church is self-contained and the Square was never finished, so I will be making my own version of the Square to connect the Pontalba Buildings and Cafe Du Monde together to make a cohesive playspace, along with any other minor areas.
Pontalba Buildings
Initial Blockout
This area ​is much more focused on combat and exploration than the Cafe, and takes up the majority of the playspace in this level. In the real world, these twin buildings face each other on opposite sides of Jackson Square. Built around 1850 and used as shops and apartments today, I knew I could use them to my advantage and keep them relatively the same while adjusting as needed. However...
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Finding information on the Pontalba Buildings proved extremely challenging. My intentions were thrown out the third-story window when I couldn't find reliable information on the interiors of the buildings, and resorted to the Bethesda approach to real-world locations: close enough counts in horseshoes and hand-grenades — and nuclear bombs are just big grenades.
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References
I started by giving myself and the other two Level Designers a solid foundation by using real-world measurements of the greater Jackson Square area and blocking out the areas to be worked on using simple primitives.
Around this point in making this area of the level, I decided to optimize what I had made in UE modeling mode. I learned both how to optimize after-the-fact, but also what I did and didn't need to focus on while making the models.
Cafe Du Monde
Initial Blockout
​I started with the idea and a rough sketch of the area, choosing to focus on player pathing, exploration, and storytelling over combat. This area is intended to be a sort of non-combat area.
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Finding exact dimensions of the building and everything within proved impossible, so I used a mix of Google Earth, Google Maps, and lots of internet sleuthing to find the information I needed.
Lessons Learned and Going Forward
I unfortunately paused construction of the Cafe area and began working on the Pontalba Buildings due to time constraints, wanting to make combat areas, and my inefficiency while making the Cafe area. ​
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​Lessons Learned:
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More efficient research strategies
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More efficient translation of real-world objects to in-engine ones
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Also, things usually shouldn't be 1-1 due to different metrics like player scale and speed​
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In real life, most people walk around...but in game, you generally move as fast as possible
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More efficient Unreal Engine modeling practices
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