ALEX KLEBA LEVEL DESIGNER
FAT PRINCESS ADVENTURES
ARENA MODE & THIS MEANS WAR DLC
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The Arena Mode DLC added a new mode in which up to four players can fight endless waves of enemies on two new Arena maps. Within this mode, the players could continue to slay enemies in hopes of getting weapon drops to use in their own campaign, or continue fighting harder and harder enemies! With the addition of the second free DLC: This Means War mode was added giving players an even more difficult Arena map as well as an entire new campaign difficulty. This difficulty also added more customization for characters and an increase to all blood particle effects. Some even lands on the screen!
I personally worked two of the maps: Castle Arena and Temple Arena. I conceptualized and created three mini-games: Destroy the Wagon, Cakeball, and Find Sir Phil. And I scripted an iterating spawn script allowing for endless waves and rounds of enemies.
I encourage you to check out some gameplay of the Arena mode here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CdWM5ine9M
QUEEN'S PALACE
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On Queens Palace I designed the world to create a much more memorable experience for the players as they finished the game. During this part of the game, most of the combat has been outside, and for this level I felt I needed to bring the player in, and focus the fights more. By creating the jail cell maze I was able to have a great balance between melee as well as ranged combat. I utilized the long stretches for the ranged attackers and strategically placed traps. For the melee combatants I used breakable doors and small out-coves, making the process of navigating the maze more interesting. Each nook and cranny held an interesting object, whether it was an enemy, or just a simple breakable. I wanted to make sure that any path taken felt like the right path to the player. After the jail cell maze section of the level, there are also two different jumping puzzles I worked on. These were simplistic puzzles, yet added a really cool and interesting dynamic to the level.
SWAMP PASS
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Swamp Pass was my first level I redesigned the layout on and worked with artists to create an interesting, story driven map. Originally the level was too open, and players were getting lost while trying to find a specific goal. To counteract this I created a much more defined path at the beginning of the original open area. This caused new players to understand that they have entered a 'new zone' and know they must be getting closer to said end goal. I also added a new feature to the river running through the level, which caused players to be 'slimed' (slowed) when they would enter the water. It added a dynamic to the level that seperated itself from all other levels in the game. It also heavily influenced the type of combat the players would want to participate in, near or around the water.
After working on the layout, I worked heavily on the enemy composition, and created a new creature type. Originally we had 'rotten melons' that were the same as the inhabitants of Swamp Pass: The Melon Men, but had different textures and slightly different weaponry. While working with the creative director on the story of this level, I decided to go with a more zombie esque route for these Melons. I helped modify the new AI tree, and basic behaviours of this new creature type. The main quest beat in this level was the place these new enemies would be introduced, so working with an artist, I was able to compose a more "Night of the Living Dead" feel as these zombie melons would start attacking!
BLACK FOREST
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In Black Forest I worked solely on enemy composition, enemy encounters, and quests. In this map we introduced a new enemy type to the players. Theses enemies were the 'Fire Bow Gobblings' and the 'Flaming Berserkers'. When adding these enemies into encounters I strategically made sure to show the players the enemies' strengths and weaknesses. By adding them to a group of already defined enemies, the player is able to easily see, and comprehend the new enemy type. Once introduced, I used these new enemies to challenege the players combat thought process.
While working with quests, I utilized a custom toolset to arrange and modify existing quest files. By doing this I was able to access tagged quests within a powerful visual scripting tool to check and update the player's current quest state.
PATH TO BLACK FOREST
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During developement, this area changed allowing for a much wider open play area. To deal with this, I had to utilize the expected enemies the player should be seeing for their level and quest state. By the time the player would reach this area, we expected them to have at least two upgraded gear items; I added an extra layer of difficulty with these enemies. The compositions were made to be all new and something the player had not seen. This added the first layer, the second layer was adding in an already acknowledged hazard the player has seen: Gobbling Bombs. This hazard layer made for some interesting encounters, where the player is actually getting pushed into these hazard triggers if they are not careful.
This part of the game was more difficult that what most players were expecting but had a great falloff in difficulty as the players entered the next level.