Stria
Open world experience
Introduction
In this project, I wanted to create an open world with a focus on player navigation, discoverability, and findability in a fantasy setting.
​I focused on creating multiple points of interest and designing the layout of the world using a node-based system, so one location would naturally lead into another.
Details
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Developed over 5 weeks half time
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Unreal Engine 5
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World Design
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Template used Jakub W AGLS
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Trees from craftpix
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Other mehes/materials by me
World background
The body of a dead god has been lying in the land of Stria for millennia. Believed to be a statue created by the gods, everyone worshipped it as their creator.
But this was no statue and suddenly, it began to decompose. The rotting flesh and blood
started to corrupt the land.
Some tribes extracted the decaying blood from the body, using it in rituals and even drinking it,
gaining enhanced powers.
Will you save the land or let it rot away?
Points of Interest
Cultist Ritual Island
Hand of God
Gods Heart
Temple of Cleansing
Leaking leg
Lonely Island
Corrupted Temple
Bandit Camp
Big Bandit Base
"Every point of interest serves a purpose in the world either it connects to the story or serves as a gameplay space, offering the player different types of engagement such as puzzles or combat."
Biomes
The Corruption
The Crimson forest
The Beach
I created three distinctly different biomes in the world to prevent the player from experiencing visual fatigue while exploring.
This also helps signal to the player that they’re entering a new zone, which may present new threats and challenges.
Navigation
Main path
Side path
From my own experience and people I've talked with, we like to
explore alot in the beginning of a new game and later on focus on the story.
With this in mind I designed the first part of the the world with more discoverabilty and in the second part of the world with more findabillity.
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Enviromental storytelling
Dead bodies
In this video I've used dead NPCs to give the player a hint on what might be coming when
traversing down this path.
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The spears indicates it was humanoids that killed them and not a wild animal. So the player can prepare for a humanoid encounter.
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Further down the path the players finds a bandit camp filled with enemies.
Non hostile architecture
I've used generic fences to lead the player to non hostile and friendly encounters.
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A spiked fence signals for danger and its will likely lead you into a hostile enviroment with evil bandits.
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A fence does not signal for danger compared to a huge spiked fence that the bandits use in their base.
Player Agency
To promote player agency I deliberatly designed the landscape around my point of interest so it would have multiple enterences to enhance the experience and give different players with different playstyles multiple choices on how to enter an area.​​
Big Bandit Base
The Bandit Base can be accesed from 3 different directions. North, west and east.
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Each path offers different type of
advantages and dissadvantages. This allowes players with
different playstyles to play they way they are
most comfortable with.
1. Most action straight on. Can funnel the enemies into the enterence to fight them one on one in the tight space.
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2. Fastest way to the boss. Using the the secret exit as an entrence playing the combat space in reverse.
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3. Starting from a vantage point. Coming in from behind you have the oppertunity to take out the guards in the tower without anyone seeing you.
Cultist Ritual Island
I designed Cultist Island so the main path would lead to the heavily guarded bridge at the front.
But I also added an optional path at the back of the island that can be partially spotted from the main path.
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To make the optional path more interesting to use, I hid part of it under water so it looks like a dead end, but it will reward players who walk all the way down the ledge and discover the path under the water.
1. Optional path looks promesing with such a intimidating and heavely guarded main path.
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2. Optional path looks like dead end with the path hidden under the water.
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3. Hidden path is reveled by going all the way down the side of the cliff, rewarding the couriosity for players that took a closer look.
Day and Night cycle
I love when a games day and night cycle has a big impact on the gameplay. So when I designed the world I made sure that some Landmarks and Points of Interests would have impact on the day and night cycle or be impacted by the day and night cycle.
Lonely Island
impacted by night
During the day the player has
no way to reach the Island and
will hopefully spark couriosity.
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When its night the water is pulled out into the ocean by the tide wich allows the player to walk on the new formed paths
over to the Island.
The night
impacted by lighhouse
During the night the world will become very dark and navigation can be troublesome if
you are not prepared for the darkness.
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By adding a lighthouse at the starting town it serves as a great landmark during the day and even greater landmark during the night when you might have trouble finding back to town.
This project originates back to and old assignemt we had in our Advanced Level Design course.
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By continuing on this old
assignment I could save some time,
focus on its weaknesses and improve on its foundation that I already had created.
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From a generic medival forest to a fantasy corrupted land with a dying god at its focus, Im quite happy with the result.
