gdc 13 dead space crafting destruction

7/30/2019 GDC 13 Dead Space Crafting Destruction

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Crafting DestructionThe Evolution of the Dead Space User Interfac

Dino IgnacioLead UI Designer, EA Visceral GamesTwitter: @dinoignacioEmail: [email protected]


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Crafting Success: A Deeper Look atCastlevilles Crafting System

Room 303 South Hall


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Crafting Destruction

The Evolution of the Dead Space User InterGeneral

Core Ideas

The Aesthetics

Specific The RIG

The Frontend

The Evolution

The BENCH

Q and A


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AT ITS CORE

Before I talk about the UI of DeadSpace, I will discuss its relation to thegame as a whole

Dead Space was conceived to be animmersive, story driven, science fictionexperience.

We wanted to create a game thatsuspended disbelief and maintainedhorror all throughout the game play

This larger mission helped craft thedecisions that informed the UI


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THE BACKSTORY

Dead Space was set in a dystopic and depletedfuture

Most of the first game transpires in derelict miningvessel called the Ishimura

Everyone is dead and the vessel is plagued byspace zombies

You play the role of an engineer sent on a repairmission


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THE APPROACH

Knowing our core and backstory; wedecided the UI needed to fully supportand integrate with the rest of thegame

We designed the Ishimura as acharacter that had to be believable inthe world we created

We looked at the UI as an extensionof the Ishimura

The Sci-Fi setting afforded us thelicense to use a very diegeticapproach to UI


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DIEGETIC

The element exists both for thecharacters in the fiction and for theaudience(or in our case the player)

Dietetic sound for example is when acharacter in a movie plays the radio inhis car and he hears the tune but it

continues on to the next scene as asoundtrack for the audience


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DIEGETIC BY DESIGN

Sci-Fi made it possible for us to dothis.

We were able to wrap typical gameconventions like loading screens andsave points into believable worldelements.

Examples: Door hologram exists as a real world

element for Isaac and doubles as a UIelement for the player

Loading Screens are integrated into tramand space taxi rides


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DIEGETIC IN IMPLEMENTATIOTo make UI that actually existed inthe game world we had to come upwith an innovative way of doing it.

Traditionally UI was built with 2Dtools like Flash

We needed our UI to live in the 3Dspace so we decided to use the game

engines particle system


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THE RULESOne of the cornerstones of gooddesign is to have a rule set

Isaac is always on the left side of thescreen, even when interacting withUI. (We are always in 3rd person)

Non-diegetic UI appears behind Isaac

All interactive UI must live around

1.5 meters above the ground planeWe set up a strict color language

Blue/White means interactive

Red means locked / not interactive at themoment

Orange/Amber means ambient


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THE LOOKAs much as it wasfuturistic, it was a depletedand broken future

This was not Star Trek;we are set in a derelictmining ship

The UI needed to feel

unpredictable and broken


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THE LOOKWe took inspiration fromflickering fluorescent lightsand dentist lamps

Static and scan lines alsoadded a distinct feel

We used skeuomorphs totrigger nostalgic emotions


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SKEUOMORPHSA derivative object that retainsornamental design cues to astructure that was necessary in theoriginal

May be deliberately employed tomake the new look comfortably oldand familiar

Examples: the handle on a bottleof maple syrup, the wood panelingon cars, hubcaps with spokes, thepaper texture on the iPhonesnotepad.


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THE RIGThis is the most

recognizable piece of UI inour game

It evolved out of thenecessity to keep theplayer immersed

We needed a way to

message your health level,your inventory, your ammocount and your maplocation without clutteringthe game space


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THE RIGThe RIG was an attempt

to package all theseessential gaming interfacesinto a collapsible construct

As many games left allthis information in a HUDformat that broke the 4th

wall, we attempted todisguise all these systemsinto diegesis


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THE HEALTH BARApart from the visor this maybe the most iconic part of the gam

Many iterations were made in its development


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THE HEALTH BARWe tried many designs

Some more elaborate thanothers

In the end simplicity was theway to go

The most understated lookended up being clearest and the

most iconic


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THE HEALTH BARIt evolved very little over the

three gamesall the tweaks to this systemhas been superficial

The first games health bar lookedlike a tube of light

The second one was turned into ahologram

And the one in DS3 has a littlemore vintage circuitry detail


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THE INVENTORYWe made many attempts

at this core systemWe had more elaborateattempts but in the endusability won


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THE INVENTORYWe have updated the

system quite a bit overthe course of thefranchise

The changingenvironment and gamerequirements directly

affected its evolution


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THE WEAPON SELECTORThe idea was to find a

quick way to switchweapons without needingto go to your inventory

The idea has stayedpretty simple and evolvedvery little

In DS3 we had to lessenthe number of weaponsyou can carry toaccommodate the moreelaborate and robustweapons you can make


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THE MAPThis is one of my favorite

systems from the firstDead Space

It was a very beautifulreinterpretation of theHUD map

Unfortunately it was

completely unusable


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THE LOCATORIn the last month of

production of the firstgame, we realized theMap was unsalvageableand we had to come upwith another way ofhelping the playertraverse the game

The Locator was born outof desperation we justneeded a way to point theplayer in the rightdirection


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THE LOCATORIt turned out to be one of

the most loved features ofthe game

We have expanded onthis system over thecourse of the franchise

With Isaac getting more

mobile we had toredesign the system towork better in Zero-G


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THE FRONTENDThe game was designed to be

one solid seamless experienceWe have deviated a little bit inthe sequels with trombonecameras and whip shots butbasically Dead Space plays withno cuts from the beginning to

endThe Frontend was designed tobe the start of your experience

We used it as an portal to leadyou into the game


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THE DEAD SPACE 1 FRONTENWe had a very elaborate plan for the first games frontend

It involved seeing holographic menus in organic matter with imagespeople turning into necromorphs with bones and muscles twisting an


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THE DEAD SPACE 1 FRONTENIt proved to be to expensive as we didnt have the

animation and the modeling budget to create highresolution muscles and bones that late in production

So we decided to improvise

I asked my producer to give me $500

I bought a butchered lamb for us to video anddissect


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THE DEAD SPACE 2 FRONTENThe game centered

around information aboutthe Marker that was lockedin Isaacs brain

We built the UI in supportof this and helped tell thestory

We added a metagamewhere the further youprogress in the gamethese fragments of rockcoalesced into a Markerinside Isaacs brain


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THE DEAD SPACE 3 FRONTENThis has been visually the most ambitious one weve done

We left the confines of the abstract and place our UI in an environm


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THE DEAD SPACE 3 FRONTENThe frontend occurs in a

lab where slabs of ancreature are frozen inblocks of ice

And much like thesecond game we revealmore or the creature asyou progress through the

game


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10 SECOND KITTY BREAK


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10 SECOND KITTY BREAKLook at this cat



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10 SECOND KITTY BREAKJust look at it



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10 SECOND KITTY BREAKLook.

THE EVOLUTION OF THE LOO


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THE EVOLUTION OF THE LOOStory has always been the core of the game

We wanted the UI to truly be integrated tothe story

This being the case, we always made sure ithad a personality and an arc

We gave it life by making sure it reflectedthe environment it resided in

We also gave it progression and a sense ofgrowth



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THE EVOLUTION OF THE LOOThe UI of first DeadSpace was (as mentionedearlier) a mirror of thestate of the Ishimura

It was broken anderratic


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THE EVOLUTION OF THE LOOIn Dead Space 2 the UImirrored the vastness ofthe Titan Sprawl

The UI was a little moreadvanced and sleeker toreflect the moreadvanced environment


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Dead Space 3 is set on a planet with artifacts from 200 years into the

We designed the UI to be retro futuristic

Where we had floating light based holograms in the first 2 games Dfeatured glass based holograms that lived within confined frames


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THE BENCH


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We always wanted to show Isaac as anintelligent and resourceful individual that

had to overcome his challenges with hiswit

All his original weapons were modifiedconstruction tools

The original BENCH allowed the player toadd circuits along upgrade trees to tweak

and modify his weaponsAs much we loved this feature wealways knew we wanted to do more with it

In Dead Space 3 we decided to doubledown and redesign the feature


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DESIGNING BENCH 2.0


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The challenge was to make a robustweapon crafting system that was

deep enough for the core player butwas simple enough for the averagegamer

We had seen some very intuitivecrafting systems on PC games butwe knew the metaphor would nottranslate very well to the console

We needed to create a system thatplayed well with a controller

BENCH 2.0 CONCEPTS


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The original concept used a moreanalog metaphor

All the weapon parts were littleboxes that slid across a conveyorbehind glass

The hope was to make the craftingprocess feel more real and less UI

We got really far with this version.

It was pretty but admittedly notvery user friendly


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BENCH 2.0 PROBLEMSThe multiple screens


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The multiple screensmade sense in older Dead

Space UI as it helpedground our UI in the world

This did not work on thenew BENCH with the sheeramount of information wehad to put on screen

BENCH 2.0 PROBLEMS


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In the past Isaac never left our screen at any timeHe was always in view. We never did a full UI screen

The new BENCH as we had a lot more detail to show

The Dev team kept using the debug way of building a gun rather thBENCH (this was a clear sign we were doing it wrong)


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BENCH 2.1 2.3 2.5 3The final iteration is a lot more


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streamlined and easy to use

It implements a very intuitive use ofthe analog stick

It allows you to build a gun in 3clicks

The system is still very Dead Spacedespite the deviations from the norm


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BENCH LESSONS LEARNEDWe had to accept that having an easy to

i t iti i t f i lti t l


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use intuitive interface is ultimately moreimportant than keeping our aestheticconventions

FINAL THOUGHTSDead space has been an amazing project to be part of


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The world allowed for some amazing innovations

I personally feel that our contributions will resonate into the next gI feel very fortunate to have been part of it

The sheer talent on this franchise is staggering

Thank you for coming along for the ride

THANK YOUSChuck Beaver Jeremie Benhamo


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Jason LeongJohn GeraciLeo Lee

Richard Carrillo

Tracy EspeletaAndy Wright

Christy Yen

Matt GalliaMichael Ye

Bill Fowle

Ford H

Megan Berr

QUESTIONS AND COMMENTS


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Din

Twitter: @d

Email: dignacio

gdc 13 dead space crafting destruction

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