5 Crysis Wars in game screenshots:
(please click on all images to view them fullscreen, the thumbnails don't do them justice)
This first image outlines the nature of the valley and the bridge. Obviously, I chose not to take the literal idea of a "valley", and opted to do an urban valley created by two juxtaposing cityscapes. The city on the right represents the persona of Jonathon Ives. It's a structured city that remains the same, yet adds slight changes as you progress further back into it. I did this to represent my (extremely biased) view of the Apple products Ives is responsible for developing. Gaga's city, on the left, explodes with different shapes and sizes of building. The textures I used are all different, crazy patterns, unlike Ives' side, where they are all more or less, uniform building designs and textures.
Ives' side of the bridge represents technology, and the power that comes with it. While it might not look like much from the outside, it houses something terribly powerful on the inside. As you walk across it, the increasingly large gaps in the rings brings light in from outside, and gives you an increasing view of your surroundings.
The staircase at the beginning of the bridge leads inside. An empty antichamber leads to sliding double doors, behind which is housed a teleporter. This is the elevator for Ives' side of the building, and is the epitome of his power in this scheme. It represents the absolute power that can come with technology. My table can be seen in the 4th quarter of this image. I chose to do a very understated table. This both works with and juxtaposes the idea of power. I wanted it to be simple so that it would reflect the idea that power is only powerful when you don't need to use it. Therefore my table is small and understated in this huge environment. It is a simple curving table, dominated by it surroundings, but holding a lot of power as it is the meeting place for these two powers.
Gaga's side of the bridge takes on a much more natural approach. Inspiration for this came from her abstract use of costumes, such as the meat dress. The beginning of the bridge is a large collection of blue crystals that have erupted from the ground. They represent the dominating force of power that nature can be, even in the domain of man.
The bridge for Gaga shoots out of the ground to meet the travellers as they approach. The elevator for this side is more of a horizontal escalator, as it moves across the water as you take a leap of faith down to it. I coloured most of the bridge white, with the two important crystals, being the end one and the elevator, coloured blue. This draws the attention of anyone crossing so they know which way they should be moving.
Video walkthrough: This is a short video walkthrough showing the different paths throughout the level. I had the HUD turned off during the filming of this, so if you download the level from the link at the end of this post, I scripted some text to pop up with instructions at certain key locations. That will not appear in this video. Textures: 36 textures representing movement:
Linear
Rotational
Scalar
Accelerating
Explosive
Mechanical
18 Sketched perspectives: 9 one point perspectives:
9 two point perspectives:
News article mashup:
Oprah
Lady Gaga
Jonathon Ive
Often overlooked, he has been called the man behind the curtain. Recentlygaining leverage asa mentorto many. His controversial approach to life, over the top stylesandeccentric attitudehave earned what some call a golden ticket through life. Aproven track record has in effect, become synonymous with innovation and industry leading product development. This power and influence is seen to surely teach the people how to be themselves, reach for their goals, and not allow others to break down their dreams.I for one could not imagine anyone elseto show us what’s new and exciting. For many, his work and words have allowed them to seek out and have their lifeswish granted.
With the linear textures, I was trying to make ones that would tesselate and become textures for my cityscape buildings. So they might not look great as 6x6 images, but applied as textures I think they look pretty good.
As far as my bridge goes, very little work has gone into that so far, because of issues with the cryengine, but that's fixed now thanks to Russell, so I should be getting that all done soon.
I have however figured out exactly what I want to do with it all though. For Jonathon Ives' side of my bridge, I want it to be very futuristic and panelled. Somewhat like a spaceship. It'll be all white, with black joins, and the panels will be moving parts that make up the bridge. This mimics his work for apple, which produced some very techinical things, way ahead of it's time. The white panelling also reflects the trademark white image of apple products.
Something like this stuff:
Lady Gaga is my other client, and for her side I want to make something reminiscent of Superman's Fortress of Solitude. That might sound kind of stupid but there are reasons behind it. Firstly, this image is pretty much what I'm basing it off.
I think this sort of imagery works well for her, in a really abstract way. It reflects the explosiveness of her career and popularity, as well as the environmentally friendly image she has (Re: meat dress). It dominates the surroundings, and carries a power that can't be ignored, even if you want to (yes, that was a musical taste quip). Anyway, back to the bridge stuff. Her her side, I want to rig the different crystal spikes to rise up out of the water as the player moves closer to them, so it creates a walkway as you walk across the void. Everything will be semi-transperant, so the light will play a big part in this section of the bridge. Shining through everything and casting shadows.
My draft environment can be seen in the post below this one.
For my valley, I wanted to get away from the preconscribed notion of a natural valley, and found a post on the discussion boards about using a cityscape as a type of "urban" valley. I loved this idea, and decided to use this for the basis of my experiment three landscape. Therefore my bridge will span across a void, most likely a river, between two opposing sides of a skyscraping city.
Valley draft insandbox 2:
News article mashup:
Oprah
Lady Gaga
Jonathon Ive
Often overlooked, he has been called the man behind the curtain. Recentlygaining leverage asa mentorto many. His controversial approach to life, over the top stylesandeccentric attitudehave earned what some call a golden ticket through life. Aproven track record has in effect, become synonymous with innovation and industry leading product development. This power and influence is seen to surely teach the people how to be themselves, reach for their goals, and not allow others to break down their dreams.I for one could not imagine anyone elseto show us what’s new and exciting. For many, his work and words have allowed them to seek out and have their lifeswish granted.
Final Crysis Wars Model:
Electroliquid Aggregation:
"If communication with crazy people can heal them, in that interaction we might take on some of their craziness."
For the areas that weren't textured with custome images, I chose to keep the rest a white colour to give the structure a very sterile feel, as if it were a doctor's office or a science lab. It remains bare so the occupants are able to bare themselves. (I actually made it a very light grey, but cryengine doesn't pick that out very much)
Here we can see Freud's workspace. The space uses the idea of communication to derive it's shape. This area has multiple transitions between zones. The lowest box is submerged in the water, giving access to the pool area. A hole in the ground links this space with that of the submerged world, while the steps to the side lead to the higher areas. The highest accessible area in Freud's workspace leads to the base of the spiral staircase, which allows this space to communicate with the one above.
The spiral stair leads upward to Newton's workspace. Wherever you are in structure, the constant sight and sound of the waterfall reinforces Newton's law that "what goes up must come down".
Newton's workspace contains two distinct levels. The higher of the two, where the spiral ends, has a perfect vantage point onto the balcony of the level below where he could test his rules of physics regarding gravity.
The textures I used are placed so they reflect the electroliquid aggregation. They are used in a light to dark order, but with dark at the top, which seems to contradict Newton's ideas on gravity, where the heavier should be falling. This creates a chaos, or craziness, that the structure resolves through its communicating areas.
This video demonstrates a walkthrough of the structure. It's unfortunately in a very low quality. Initially the videos were in high definition, but needed to be joined, and the only way I could do that was with freeware I found, which dramatically lowered the quality.
