Some level designs using Little Big Planet's level editor. I apologize for the video quality, these were recorded in analog standard definition. You can play the levels in Little Big Planet by searching for the user "mariomguy."
March 28, 2014
Conquest Board Game: The Making
You can download a print and play version of the game here:
However, my favorite design of all of these was a triangular board game called "Conquest." The spaces were triangular, movement was determined by cards, and there were even special cards in this version for anyone who reached the center. The goal is to capture all 3 of your opponent's pieces. The game was inspired by Backgammon, where movement was determined by luck and strategy comes into how you choose to move. You can also move more than one piece at a time in Backgammon, a concept few other games replicated quite as well. This made the game easy to play and understand but with a very deep strategy, plus the chance factor to keep things interesting turn-by-turn. Other games like Chess, Checkers, Sorry, and Trouble rely either a bit too much on strategy or luck to win, and the turns are not as interesting. While they do what they do very well, there are moments where Chess is not surprising or interesting, and losing a game like Sorry always feels terrible.
The cards in Conquest may require moving one piece 2/3 spaces or split 2/3 spaces among multiple pieces. The moves are never very complex, but they change the game dramatically and players are surprised by every turn. In a very early prototype of the game, I had all my pieces right next to my friends. I thought it would be more difficult to take me out if I was right next to him, but then he drew a Split 3 and destroyed all my pieces in a single move! The balance of chance and strategy made this game one of the most fun to play.
In Ringling, I chose to make this game a reality by constant playtesting and fixing certain design issues. The board was changed to a diamond shape but kept the same triangular spaces, balancing the distance between all players. Certain cards were changed slightly, and it was here I thought of an interesting mechanic: play for your opponent's turn. The game was a huge hit amongst playtesters and the professor gave it very high remarks. Most other students wanted to make RPGs with complicated attack/defense systems, and few had enough time to design it well. A year later I spoke to the upcoming freshman about game design, stressing the importance of simplicity and allowing players to understand how to play the game as soon as possible, and offered suggestions on how to keep things simple but still interesting and fun.
March 18, 2014
Midterm Demo Reel
My Midterm Demo Reel at Ringling College of Art and Design for Junior year.
Some info about it:
The first section is a modular kit, demonstrating my use of modeling and scale to create a kit with pieces that lock within each other. A restaurant has plenty of shiny and expensive-looking surfaces, so it's a display of shaders with incredibly clean surfaces. The cloth and plates are my favorite works: the bands are generated procedurally, so they are incredibly sharp and require no separate texture. To help remove aliasing, the shader calculates falloff and world position distance from the camera to blur the edges. The plates use sphere masks to generate a perfectly clean circle, and the golden reflection is achieved by multiplying a simple 2D texture (in this case, the velvet texture from the chair) with a golden yellow, and using it as a basic 2D reflection. The end result is quite acceptable.
The second section is a model of an airtank demonstrating advanced vertex painting and material work. The bumpy effect of paint peeling off is achieved with tiling mixmaps and normal maps, and is featured on the main body paint and the rubber handle. The shader also performs if commands to reveal a middle layer through the middle value of the mixmap and is adjustable. The brass performs a simple fade to rust, and the dial oxidizes. As for the base materials, the specular on the paint changes color based on your viewing angle much like a real paint would. The brass contains different normals tiling over the UV sheet with very intense lighting effects. The entire model is only 1300 tris, demonstrating 4 different dynamic materials.
The third section is a coniferous forest biome. The rocks perform a Z-up calculation over the surface normal to blend between a soft snow that always sits on top and a rough rocky surface. The snow uses texture maps to sparkle. All of the trees have vertex displacement based off of the leaf card UV sheet for subtle wind effects. The falling snow particles are also lit and use simple 2D reflections to sparkle.
Some info about it:
The first section is a modular kit, demonstrating my use of modeling and scale to create a kit with pieces that lock within each other. A restaurant has plenty of shiny and expensive-looking surfaces, so it's a display of shaders with incredibly clean surfaces. The cloth and plates are my favorite works: the bands are generated procedurally, so they are incredibly sharp and require no separate texture. To help remove aliasing, the shader calculates falloff and world position distance from the camera to blur the edges. The plates use sphere masks to generate a perfectly clean circle, and the golden reflection is achieved by multiplying a simple 2D texture (in this case, the velvet texture from the chair) with a golden yellow, and using it as a basic 2D reflection. The end result is quite acceptable.
The second section is a model of an airtank demonstrating advanced vertex painting and material work. The bumpy effect of paint peeling off is achieved with tiling mixmaps and normal maps, and is featured on the main body paint and the rubber handle. The shader also performs if commands to reveal a middle layer through the middle value of the mixmap and is adjustable. The brass performs a simple fade to rust, and the dial oxidizes. As for the base materials, the specular on the paint changes color based on your viewing angle much like a real paint would. The brass contains different normals tiling over the UV sheet with very intense lighting effects. The entire model is only 1300 tris, demonstrating 4 different dynamic materials.
The third section is a coniferous forest biome. The rocks perform a Z-up calculation over the surface normal to blend between a soft snow that always sits on top and a rough rocky surface. The snow uses texture maps to sparkle. All of the trees have vertex displacement based off of the leaf card UV sheet for subtle wind effects. The falling snow particles are also lit and use simple 2D reflections to sparkle.
Welcome!
Welcome to my art process blog! This will be a relatively informal dumping grounds for my artistic endeavors, including but not limited to realtime shader work in UDK, 3D modeling in Maya and Z-Brush, Visual Effects, Kismet programming, Some work in Illustrator and Photoshop, and pencil sketches. I will also use this to provide tutorials for users of UDK and write essays about contemporary topics related to video games.
Please allow me to introduce myself: my name is Michael Fahel. I live in a small city called North Port, Florida (pretty far away from the bigger game companies, I know). I previously attended Ringling College of Art and Design for 2, 1/2 years majoring in Game Art and Design. My specialty (if it could be called one) is creating shaders using UDK's material editor. I believe most of what people consider to be "good graphics" comes from the use of high-quality surfacing and per-pixel lighting. When I'm not playing or making games, I love walking, bicycling, swimming, writing fiction and expository essays, and I have a lot of fun making art in a variety of mediums.
If you wish to contact me for work, please send me an email at michaelf66@hotmail.com.
Please allow me to introduce myself: my name is Michael Fahel. I live in a small city called North Port, Florida (pretty far away from the bigger game companies, I know). I previously attended Ringling College of Art and Design for 2, 1/2 years majoring in Game Art and Design. My specialty (if it could be called one) is creating shaders using UDK's material editor. I believe most of what people consider to be "good graphics" comes from the use of high-quality surfacing and per-pixel lighting. When I'm not playing or making games, I love walking, bicycling, swimming, writing fiction and expository essays, and I have a lot of fun making art in a variety of mediums.
If you wish to contact me for work, please send me an email at michaelf66@hotmail.com.
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