Welcome to The Official SnarkPit Interview Series of 2011. Here we're looking to interview individuals who have at least two years experience designing levels for games. We accepted entries from amateurs and professionals alike in an effort to enlighten the masses, especially those who are aspiring level designers or hobbyists. From new to old, there is something to be learned by all. People from around the world talk about what got them into level design, and what they do to push the limits and explore the possibilities. Level design has always been a collaborative effort spent conversing with others for critiques and opinions, and it is in this spirit that these interviews are presented to you.

This is Interview #5 out of the series as given by Mr. Soenke (Warby) Seidel.

Soenke (Warby) Seidel is a long-time mapper who has an aim to dazzle his players. Having worked in the industry for nine years running, Soenke has accomplished a great deal many projects, and worked with such developers as: IO-Interactive, Snapdragon and Windward Mark Interactive LLC. He currently is producing his own game: Pirates of New Horizons for his up and coming game development studio. Soenke frequents the Mapcore forums and continues to stay active amongst the community. We are grateful to have him speak to us today!

If you're interested in reaching Soenke, you may contact him through his personal e-mail: warby(AT)gmx.net
And, if you'd like to see more of his work, please visit his portfolio: www.warby.de


The Interview:
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1. SnarkPit: Could you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got involved with level design?

Soenke: Hi, my name is Soenke Seidel; in the modding community I'm known as "warby." I have been making maps for 12 years now pretty much since Half-Life 1 got released! I have been working commercially for 9 years.

2. SnarkPit: What games and game types do you map for?

Soenke: I used to make a lot of Counter-Strike maps and then switched to UT-2003/2004 because of the superior tools/engine so mostly multiplayer stuff but I have a bit of single player experience as well.

As far as what I like to play I am a Day of Defeat and Team Fortress 2 kind of guy! But those games became popular when I was already pretty much done with the Half-Life engine workflow.

I tried to get back into the groove with the Source engine and Unreal Engine 3 but the amount of time it takes to make a full custom map these days (easily 6 month +) you might as well spend that time on making an indie game and maybe make some money off of your efforts! That's actually a trend I see with the modding community: There will be less and less custom maps (or at least with custom content) and more and more people will start making their own little indie games instead and then make maps for those.

3. SnarkPit: If level design is currently a hobby for you, What do you plan to do, or continue doing with your experience and skills in the near future?

Soenke: It's both a job and a hobby, I pretty much do it 24 hours straight every day and cant get enough of it! (no life)


de_wanda - an original map for Counter-Strike Source

4. SnarkPit: Where do you look for inspiration or whom do you look to for ideas and in what mediums (books, movies, portfolios, etc.)?

Soenke: All those things! I am in general a pretty big movie buff and watch at least one new movie every day sometimes two if the time allows for it! but the real inspiration comes from other level designers and 3d artists on the internet; nothing helps me get motivated than a healthy blend of "anger and envy." Of all possible sources, I find looking at other peoples' art the most inspirational. So when you need to jump start yourself, just have a quick peak in the "what are you working on threads" of the various game modding boards like Mapcore, Polycount and yes, Snarkpit!

5. SnarkPit: What is the most important step or aspect in designing a level for you?

Soenke: Most people will probably say mocking up the rough layout with all orange or white dev-textures without any art. But I find choosing your motive/setting/theme way more important. It's a fundamental choice that will inform all other decisions that you make in your level creation process. If your level takes place in a Tunguska impact crater with burning forests all around, on board a WWII German submarine, on the Eiffel Tower or the rooftops of Tokyo, [your level] will have huge effect on what kind of layout and gameplay you will be building, what kind of art will be required and what kind of mood/atmosphere you will convey... Everything hinges on this decision! I think a lot of level-designers sell themselves short in this regard! Yeah, you might have just build the best warehouse ever or the most bad ass sewer or the prettiest back-ally, but we have all been there and done those kind of settings; don't make anyone "want to play that." I think these boring map locations come from us mimicking all those Hollywood b-movies where all the shoot-outs always happen in locations that are 1) cheap to rent to survive on the low budget 2) secluded so that the film crew is not disturbed by the public 3) dirty/run down so when they break something during filming its no big deal! But we don't have to deal with any of these real world limitations, we can have a map take place on top of the Statue of Liberty that costs us exactly as much to make as a boring warehouse map would! So yeah people go crazy with your locations!


dm_grand_diablo - An original map for Unreal Tournament 3

6. SnarkPit: Are there any special techniques you use in designing your levels?

Soenke: I have slowly but surely become a "framerate"-nerd; I think anything running at less than a steady 60 fps is unacceptable. So I jump through a lot of extra hoops to insure that what ever I build will perform to its maximum potential. I try to build as much as I can with one and the same material to keep the amount of drawcalls as low as possible, plan ahead with occlusion in mind, build my geometry in ways that will allow for the least amount of vertex splitting possible and provide the best triangle strip generation potential! I wrote a little rant on Polycount a couple of weeks ago about performance optimization best practices (they were kind enough to include it in their wiki):

Soenke's Rant on Optimization in Levels.

7. SnarkPit: What three pieces of advice would you have for an aspiring level designer?

Soenke:
-Learn a 3D app like Max/Maya more and more level-design work in game dev studios gets shifted towards them; knowing your way around at least one 3D package is crucial!
-Make something that "wows" people! This is an entertainment business, the products are supposed to wow the customers and you need to show your employer that you can provide that mind blowing "wow" content that will enrich the product and increase its commercial value.
-Many people will tell you the easiest way to get into the game industry is to specialize! Find one thing you like the most and become the fucking BEST in the world at doing that specific thing! And although I do agree with this, I would highly urge to keep a multi-disciplined mindset. As a level designer, you will not just build layouts and script gameplay, you will also have to deal with the environment artists, texture artists, lighting artists, the programmers for level specific features, QA people who will be testing your stuff your game-designers and other superiors that you will have to report to! Being able to communicate frictionless with all these different people in these vastly different fields of expertise is key! All these guys talk a completely different language and have sometimes diametrically opposed views about how something should be done. Knowing the ins and outs of all those fields can be a great plus to your career! As a level-designer on a big game, you will kind of fill a mini-producer role really! So yeah, specialize but never stop learning stuff about the other fields too to stay in the loop!

8. SnarkPit: What other hobbies or careers do you work/study in and do you think they compliment your level design knowledge and or skills?

Soenke: Like I said I am a big movie nut and I would love to try my hand at doing matte paintings and some simple special effects for movies; a fellow IO-Interactive level-designer Michael "Zacker" Schmidt recommended this awesome book to me: "The DV-rebels Guide" which has all sorts of cheap home-brew special effects recipes. It's really itching under my finger nails to try some of them!

9. SnarkPit: What should a beginning level designer focus on the most in attempting to develop their skills?

Soenke: Make sure you finish stuff! That I think is the biggest hurdle to over come. How it usually goes is people start stuff all enthusiastically and than quickly drop it when they realize how difficult it is... -And yes, game-development is extremely hard and complex! I take great pride in practically releasing everything I make!

10. SnarkPit: What's the most valuable lesson you've learned about level design?

Soenke: Never ignore the other disciplines! You have to juggle a lot of stuff in your mind at all times! Often when building a mock-up with orange/white-dev textures, I get completely absorbed in game-play/layout matters and completely disregard that stuff that wont occlude well (bad for performance) or has a huge object or building blocking the sun making the entire play area too dark to see (bad for looks and gameplay), or I make oddly shaped buildings that fit my game-play vision but never translates into a somewhat decent-looking or believable building (bad for visuals). Every time you push a cube around you should ask yourself how will this affect the path-finding of the stairs? How will this affect the lighting? How will this affect the performance? How will this affect the collision? Am I gonna get stuck on this? Can I still take proper cover behind that once it has been moved? Never to switch into a pure gameplay mode or pure graphics mode was the most valuable lesson I learned. As a level-designer, you gotta be able to do some crazy mind juggling!


Pirates of New Horizons - An original game by Soenke.

11. SnarkPit: How important is optimization to you in designing a level, and how much of your time would you say you commit to it out of the entire level design process?

Soenke: Its becoming more and more I'd say I am approaching 50% (but it's on my mind all the time). I started doing it for other teammates work as well! I guess this is my specialization niche I found for myself

12. SnarkPit: What are some of your "level design philosophies?"

Soenke:
-Quick iterations time/lots of iteration is king! (that is why anything pre-calculated is bad !)
-When working in a team, only suggest stuff that you are willing to implement yourself!
-If you don't implement it right now it wont be in the game!
-If it doesn't wow people, don't waste your time on it!
-People like to express themselves, so allow for many different play styles to all have a good time!
-Work clean... Seriously, this is important!
-And of course: frame-rate trumps all!

13. SnarkPit: Is there a particular level or custom map from any game that stands out as an excellent example of craftsmanship? Why?

Soenke: It's not exactly a custom map but dod_avalanche to me is like the holy-grail of multiplayer layouts. I can (and have) played that map eight hours straight without it getting boring!

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We completely appreciate Soenke for responding to our interview and eagerly await his new games company and their future developments! Thank you Soenke!


If you're interested in giving an interview and feel that you qualify, feel free to check out our questions and criteria for submitting an entry here. We'd love to hear what you have to say!