Level design is classed as a technical job and a visual art job. Its high level of detail and art directory is often overlooked by the player, but in actuality, the technical side of level design is probably the most important and vital section in the development process. The time and planning that is put into mapping out a path for players, choosing obstacles, and in some cases, puzzle solving activities, is just as much as actual game production and asset creation.
Visual, spatial elements, interactivity, dynamic behaviours, navigation and playability are all warranted in this job, these elements of the game level need to come together nicely in order to have a good level experience.
The first thing that must be pointed out about this job is that spatial elements are indeed, needed to enable characters to travel in the space of the level, the skills required to add the spatial elements to the levels is in its self a technical thing to do, although it involves visual skills in other areas of spatial elements.
Interactivity is another none visual side of level design that doesn’t involve visual skills, in this area of level design is very heavily based around the technical abilities of the artists, using the computer software in such advanced ways as to allow characters to bring a sense of involvement and stimulus to the players.
Dynamic behaviours includes both technical and visual skills. The technical skills shine when using the computer to assign the properties to assets such as; gravity, breakable etc... The process of research uses visual skills in observation of real world physics, as its no use being able to apply these properties to the objects if they don’t know how the assests react to certain situations within a real life scenario
Navigation and playability are the two which uses mostly the visual skills of an artist, these parts of level design are perhaps the most important ones in the sense of the visual skills as the environments need interesting objects in the scene to interact with, also, they need a good layout to keep the player occupied and interested throughout the created level. These parts of the level can’t simply just be thought up and thrown in. they require visual research to create each of the interesting sections of the environment, and require multiple test play throughs, with an engine, to gauge: what kind of space is required in order to allow the size of the character to pass through, The height of a character to make sure that a certain jump or dodge can be effective whilst in gameplay, etc...(Mentioned prior) to be able to sort these issues out, a development team needs time before the art direction within a level is even considered in engine.
It can be argued that level design is a high-end functional activity without the inclusion of any 3d art at this stage in production. Texturing, Models of assets, Sounds and cinematic plays are all over shadowed if the base of all these elements is flawed, either in playability or consistency throughout the level. This is why it is extremely important that the initial level creation includes extended research and testing of all these vital sections of pre-art inclusion.
In terms of a final, completed level, the evidence is clear to a player when poor planning and research has occurred in the initial development of level design.
