00:00www.mesmerism.info
00:30www.mesmerism.info
01:01www.mesmerism.info
01:01This is Anker 9, the best map ever.
01:04Yeah, this is Anker 9, right?
01:05So we named it Anker 9 and then after that I put a 9 up there.
01:09Bam.
01:10Yep.
01:11It's...
01:12One of 9 anchors.
01:1318 actually.
01:15You know, from day 1, this was actually a pretty favorite map among the guys that were just
01:19sort of play testing and so it hasn't changed layout-wise really all that much.
01:24A lot of times our maps will go through a lot of iteration and we'll rip a side off or
01:29we'll double the width of a gap or something like that because it's not working.
01:33And this one really has kind of stayed pretty consistent.
01:36Yeah, as far as the gameplay, the thing that's really nice about this map is it has the right balance
01:40between,
01:41okay, I'm not too far away from the action, but at the same time when I spawn in, I don't
01:45have 50 grenades in my face.
01:46Like it has just the right amount of pacing for a Slayer game.
01:49You can always get back into combat pretty quickly in this map.
01:53Yeah.
01:53That's nice.
01:53Or in my case, you can always die really quick.
01:56Your playing is bad.
01:59Did you find a bug?
02:00Your face is bad.
02:01Hey, I'm on your team, Nimrod.
02:03Oh, that's right.
02:04Oh.
02:05So the pit was pretty fun and we wanted to make a map in this DLC that actually captured a
02:13lot of what the pit captured,
02:14which we felt like was symmetrical team-based combat, lots of strategy out in the middle between the bases.
02:19Multi-level, the engagement distances are very similar. So this map actually kind of fills that niche in this DLC.
02:29And then Mike came on to start architecting this one out.
02:32We have a term for it. It's called decot napization.
02:35Yeah, I think people will either love this map or be totally enraged.
02:38Because there's so many ways to escape death. Even though it's really a tight map, I always wanted to make
02:45sure that there was an escape route because I'm often being chased.
02:49So to give myself a few more seconds to live, I'd make sure there's a little drop-down or a
02:54window to run through or maybe something to hop up on.
02:57Similar to use the bevel-tonus hallway, I see?
03:01Yeah, heavily. Bevel everywhere. Primary art direction.
03:08Oh, look at this cheater. Take that grenade.
03:10I know when we sat down to think about the DLC maps, I know this one particularly had a lot
03:16of potential because of the low grav outside.
03:21Well, yeah, you know, it's funny because recently we got Microsoft testing and they came back, gave us a bug
03:28that it was kind of too easy to die out here.
03:32I don't know. It seems perfect to me, the amount of danger out there.
03:37Well, it's a ninja ledge, right? I mean, you're finding a shortcut, but there's like a payoff and there's also
03:42a danger.
03:42So it's risk and reward, right? If you stay inside, it's safe. I mean, well, with the exception of getting
03:48shot, but the level's not going to fight you.
03:50But when you're on the outside, you have a shortcut, but the level could be actual danger.
03:55And it sounds awesome out there.
03:57Originally, I was hoping that this space station could be kind of a crippled, half-destroyed space station during the
04:04War of Reach.
04:05There'd be like all these crazy spaceships flying by that were like under attack.
04:10Killing freeway?
04:11Yeah.
04:12But I really liked the way it turned out. It just feels really clean and easy to navigate.
04:17Probably if there was all this damage and smoke and crazy movie stuff going on, I would be getting killed
04:24even more than I do now.
04:27I wouldn't know where I was.
04:28Well, you made this map, right? So that means you have to be the best at it, right?
04:33If that was the case.
04:35I guess it's pretty interesting as far as the art side of things.
04:38When we were building the map out, memory is always a concern with bitmaps.
04:42And doing one-to-one unwraps for the objects takes a lot of memory.
04:47So Milton, he did the missile carts here, and he also did the engine service module.
04:53He did it in such a way where it looks like it has a one-on-one custom unwrapped, but
04:57it's mostly tile textures.
04:58So he developed some really cool techniques of fabricating those objects.
05:03I mean, I've been in the game industry since 1996, and I've seen such huge changes for how we build
05:10environments or vehicles.
05:11And we are literally getting to the point right now where we could model whatever we want.
05:16So Kentai, if you have a second, could you please tell me what these are for?
05:23Don't tell him.
05:23That's why it's an adult game. These are airlocks in case something goes wrong.
05:29All these doors shut, and these stabilize the pressure in this room.
05:32I think a good term to describe what we do a lot of times is implied function.
05:37It looks like it does something, but there's only to a point where we can really hyperanalyze how it works.
05:43So even on top of this saber, see how we placed this catwalk here?
05:47Uh-huh.
05:47It has to really feel flat and easy to walk and navigate around.
05:51It doesn't really make sense, but gameplay design trumps visuals in some aspects.
05:57We just have to make it look good.
05:58It's got to look right and feel right.
06:00That's what she said.
06:03I hope you guys enjoyed watching. That was Anchor 9, and it comes out on November 30th.
06:08I'll see you in space, and watch your back.
06:11I'll see you in the next video.
