Dread Factory
A first person retro shooter
Story Synopsis
You have been smugled into a massive weapons factory and now you need to make your way to the storage silos and initiate the self destruct sequence. Fight your way along the production line and don't get crushed in the machinery!
Goals
Focus on first person shooter design and composition
Project Details
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Made in Unreal Engine
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Spent 4 weeks of halftime
Playthrough with commentary
Level walkthrough
End of level
Start of level
Locked door
Key
Elevator
1: Player Start
The player starts the level in a tight shipping container that has just been smugled into the factory. The first thing the player notices when they step out is the enormous red eye of the evil AI of the factory looking down upon them, this is to give a sense of oppression and belittlement. The contrast between the cavernous chamber and tight container also builds on this feeling.
2: Smelter Chamber
The player arrives in a massive chamber where metal cubes are smelted down and needs to follow the flow of molten metal across a drawbridge. However the drawbridge is locked. Once the player turns around they will see the Overseer Station where the key is. The objectives are both lit up in blue, a color that contrasts nicely with the level to make the objectives clear.
3: Overseer Station
After climbing some stairs and riding an elevator the player arrives at a control room overlooking the entire chamber here they can unlock the drawbridge. After this they can jump down to the drawbridge and complete the level loop.
4: Assembly line
After the drawbridge the player is presented with an assembly line that uses the molten metal from the previous area to press and then cool missiles. The player needs to navigate across the assembly line and jump from the coolant sprayer onto a missile to ride the assembly line into the final area.
5: Weapons Depot
After riding across the chasm the player is at the end of the level, now they just need to press the button to detonate the stored missiles.
Design Techniques
Mood Lighting
Using color to set the mood was a part of my concept from the very start. Combining red yellow and black gives me a wide variety of shades that can still effectively contrast with one another while sticking to a theme.
Also note that there is nothing green in the level. This is because I wanted to create an utterly artificial environment and green as a color is so closely associated with nature. The use of dark colors in contrast with glowing lights also gives me annother tool of contrast to lead the player.
Leading by color
Because so much of the level is red, yellow, orange or black the few things done in other colors stand out a lot and can be used to lead the player. Here you can see the current objective of the player lit up in blue. Once the player gets to the drawbridge and realizes it's locked they will turn around and see that the Overseer Station is also lit up in blue and the player knows exactly where to go.
Desire Path
This section was designed from the need to have stairs in a believable space but that jumping is more fun that walking down stairs. As such the stairs feature two 180 degree turns and glowing lights to imply a line straight down, heavily implying the desire path that the players shold take.
Leading Lines
In addition to colors I also use a lot of leading lines to lead the players eyes to where they need to go. in this example all the lines flow toward the control room, the only place you can get the key to continue.
Reflections
The choice to make most of the level one big chamber was not the smartest. It means that the player can quite easily see almost all enemies in the level and shoot them before they can react, a pretty unfun experience of shooting fish in a barrel and a lot of cover had to be placed on some now quite ideal places.
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I would also have loved to make the level bigger as there are a lot of concepts within the factory setting that I have not yet explored. For example an extended section of riding a conveyor belt could have been a lot fun.
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A very notable part of any factory is the sounds and I wish I had the time to add more sounds to get a lot more of the factory feeling across. Audio could also have been used as a good contrast between the busier and calmer sections of the level.
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While I'm very grateful to Jonas and Rebecka for their meshes it would have been nice to make some custom alien factory worker meshes that fit the theme better.