Welcome
Hello, and welcome to Hit-the-Apex.com. This site serves as something of a “living” portfolio for me, a place where I can collect and highlight some of my design-oriented articles, theory pieces and level concepts. The newest content should appear directly below this post, or you can use the category navigation links either above or to the right to bring up a specific type of content. You’ll also find contact information, including email and LinkedIn resume links, in the right-hand navigation area as well.
- Chris Roper
The Fault
The Fault is a gameplay demo that I put together to highlight my working knowledge in a number of different disciplines with a strong focus on design. With the exception of a few 3D meshes (see the creation notes below for full details), I created practically everything that you’ll see in this short demo. If you like what you see then be sure to check out the behind-the-scenes creation notes below (you may need to click Read More below the video). Enjoy.
Level Concept: Aftermath
Here’s an image from the latest environment that I’ve worked on. It was created with UDK using standard assets in somewhere around 5 hours. Don’t forget to click the image for a larger version.
Level Concept: Aztec
These level concepts are a quick “sketch” of an area that could potentially be built out into a fully playable environment, akin to a highly-detailed piece of concept art.
This one was probably about 6 hours of work, excluding the final lighting process, and was built using the July 2011 release of the Unreal Development Kit (UDK). Click the image for a larger version.
All foliage assets come included with UDK. The blocks were built in Blender specifically for this project.
MP Maps
I recently compiled a rough list of what players consider to be some of the best multiplayer maps ever created in an attempt to look for patterns, “rules”, common themes or anything else that might stand out as the secret ingredient to creating a great skirmish environment. I had originally thought that, if anything, I might see commonalities in things like the number of entry points into a room or their general flow (circular, linear or otherwise), but as soon as you ignore sub-genres and just look at any great shooter map in general, most of the similarities immediately fly out the window. When you step back and look at maps like Q3DM17, de_dust, Blood Gulch and Strike at Karkand and are forced to ignore structural comparisons, the core thing that makes these maps great stands out: predictability.
That is, all of the really great maps excel at making the player always feel like they’re in control of the situation, whether they are or not. Read more…
Level Concept: Lost City
These level concepts are a quick “sketch” of an area that could potentially be built out into a fully playable environment, akin to a highly-detailed piece of concept art.
Here’s a quick level concept that I created in 4 or 5 hours with the Sandbox Editor 3 for Crysis 2. Be sure to click the “Read More…” link to view a couple more images.
Length
Game length is a fairly interesting facet of design as it’s one of the most complained about but least praised aspects of many games, by both critics and consumers alike. How many times have you heard someone say that the length of a game is great? It happens, but it’s rare. Maybe it’s one of those things that you don’t appreciate until it’s wrong.
Interestingly, we hear people complain that games are too short all the time. Read more…
