UEFN CAPTURE THE FLAG LEVEL
PROJECT FOCUS: LEVEL DESIGN
SOFTWARE: UNREAL ENGINE FOR FORTNITE
Magical Turf War is the name of a map I made in UEFN for a Capture the Flag game. For this level, I wanted to make a map inspired by the Moving Stairwells in Harry Potter. This was my first time designing for a Capture-the-Flag type, multiplayer shooter game, and I had almost zero experience with even playing this kind of game prior.
To make the level, I had to first familiarize myself with Fortnite by playing it, then learn the rules for a capture-the-flag game by conducting research on other games. What I ended up with was a cool looking level that sort of worked, but due to how open and huge it was, wasn't as effective a level as I had hoped it would be. Still, I learned a lot from making it, and was able to use learnings from this level's development to make a better CTF map later on (Minesite Mayhem).
FINAL PRODUCT
This level was developed over the course of around four months. I followed the entire level design process, from doing research on capture-the-flag levels, to creating a level design document, grayboxing, creating the level, playtesting, iterating, etc. By the end of development, I had learned a lot about the process of making a multiplayer shooter map, and how to improve my level designing process. I also used learnings from my previous Fortnite level design experience to improve this time's process and end result; the main changes being to focus less on the art of the level, and creating clearer paths for players rather than an open arena. At least for a capture-the-flag type level.
MY WORK
MAP
Click the image to view in higher resolution!
FINAL LEVEL SCREENSHOTS
This is a slideshow showing the Red Team's half of the map, since it's the side that had modular art assets added in to replace graybox.
This is a slideshow showing the Red Team's half of the map, since it's the side that had modular art assets added in to replace graybox.
GRAYBOX MAPS
These slides show the polished graybox, and then the original graybox on the last two slides.
These slides show the polished graybox, and then the original graybox on the last two slides.
PLANNING STAGE
Early diagram for the level. Here I was experimenting with floor levels, but I didn't add any cover because I didn't understand the importance until playtesting.
Paths of play bubble diagram.
TAKEAWAYS
Magical Turf War was the first Fortnite Level I ever designed. I had never used UEFN as a level design too before this, and I had only worked on making platformer levels before this. Another thing to note was that I started with very little knowledge and experience on Fortnite, Capture the Flag games, and shooter games in general. By working on this project, I was able to expand my knowledge about games to include this genre, and gain a better understanding of what makes a Capture the Flag game level good.
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Playtesting also helped a lot, as every time I made some progress we were forced to have some classmates play our level and give us some feedback. It helped me get a little more used to showing off my work, and helped me learn from their perspectives what needed improvement in my level. The main things seemed to be reducing how much space there was in the map, to make paths more focused, plus adding cover in the right areas, and in more areas, to ensure that players would get a chance to breathe and hide during fights. I ended up redoing my entire map design and starting from scratch. While it didn't give me a perfect result, it's still an okay map to play on, and the important thing is what I learned from making
