Finally my Unity level Crescent Moon is complete.
My first concept idea for my Unity map was going to be a post apocolyptic wasteland filled with only scavengers and raiders roming the wastes. There were going to be some civilized towns. But this idea was scraped early luckily before anything too seriously was created. I started with my basic outline of my map which contained dirt and sand. The map was later changed and I was thinking of more of a fantasy based game. I added different textures on my map such as grass, rocks, white sand and another sand texture. I decided to do an animal game but you are also an animal, also including clans in the game. What other better animal than wolf packs. So I chose to do a wolf game but you are a lone wolf who belongs to no one’s clan.
My story was only a rough idea of just setting up a beginning for a story. I did not think of an ending for the game. For the terrain I just used the terrain toolkit to create small hills and giant cliffs then put textures on the ground. The map consists of the middle area which is just a dessert with no life forms around. Then around the dessert are three regions which contain a clan of wolves in each of them.
When I created my skybox it kept screwing up every time I reopened the Unity file. But after we used the new Unity 3 the skybox stopped deleting itself. After I had my map layout set up I added props with the terrain toolkit. But eventually decided to remove the props as there were too many and I wanted to create my own scenery with my own props.
So I began creating models in 3ds max. I started modelling a wolf first but it did not turn out very well, I decided to google how to model animals and found a dog model tutorial which I followed then morphed it into a wolf instead of a dog. The UWV unwrap was easily done for the dog, though I did get a little help with the neck. I then animated the wolf to give it an idle pose in my Unity level. I then created other organic and manmade props in my level. They were also easily textured using UVW unwrap.
The last touch ups I did with my map were lighting effects. Since my skybox is an overcast picture I decided not to add a sun light to cover the whole map but instead I added a light effect around the light forces giving them a colourful illumination when you approached them. I also quickly made the map smaller since it takes a while to travel from one side of the map to the other.
Changes I would have made to the game would most likely created more of an environment in the clan regions and more of a better atmosphere in the dessert. I would have possibly added more wolves with different textures and animations. The environments could have been improved on especially with the particle effects. I also would have changed the regions of the wolf clans to be more unique for each of the areas. Possibly added a inside/cave landscape. One of the regions was originally planned to be created as a cave but was not able to do so as I did not know how I would approach this idea. Caves got a little strange and changed the map making other parts disfigured. The last thing I would have added would most likely be more life forms for props or for the game. But I did not get that far with ideas.
The last part of the reflection has been updated on the Resubmit post.
