Hell is Us is now out and we hope you are enjoying the game! On our end, we're going to keep unveiling the work and minds of some of the creators behind the game in our Creator Spotlight series of articles.
Today, we chat with Alexandre Zenga, Lead Level Designer on Hell is Us!
Can you tell us about your journey as a video game developer and how you came to be working on Hell is Us as lead level designer?
From my younger years playing the old classics as a kid all the way up to the big blockbusters we see today, I’ve always been captivated and amazed by video games. Back in the day, like many young boys of my age, I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and video games were my passion and my refuge.
As a young adult in the mid 2000’s, I learned about a newly created school right here in my hometown of Montréal, that was specialized with video game specific programs called Campus Ubisoft at the time (now Campus ADN). That was my calling! I applied to their Level Design class and got selected.
After a few years of experience in the industry, I joined Funcom in 2010 where I met Bruno Parenteau (Game Director) a fellow Gameplay Designer then, and we quickly became friends. After the release of The Secret World and the unfortunate fate of Funcom Montréal, Bruno joined his long-time friend Yves Bordeleau (CEO) at his new studio which became Rogue Factor. In 2013, during the early stage of development of Mordheim: City of the Damned, Yves and Bruno quickly realized they needed a Level Designer on the team, and they recruited me.
Fast forward over the years, we shipped Mordheim: City of the Damned, Necromunda: Underhive Wars and Jonathan Jacques-Belletête (Creative Director) joined us. After the team grew up in size and strength, I was offered the opportunity, and the honor, to become the Lead Level Designer on Hell is Us.
Considering the player-plattering philosophy of Hell is Us (no quest markers, no map, etc), how do you find the balance between letting the player figure things out by himself and not being too obtuse and thus frustrate the player?
That was a real challenge! While we wanted to give enough information to the player, we didn’t want it to be too “on the nose” either, it wouldn’t have felt natural. We had to adjust the dosage depending on what type of content we were working on, especially the main storyline. We were very meticulous with our landmarks placement and made sure they were visible enough. We don’t want you to feel lost, but we also want you to have those “Eureka!” moments that feels great when you figure something out.
Some secrets are hidden in plain sight, while others are so deeply hidden, you may only discover them in a subsequent playthrough. It was very fun to implement. We even had our own internal difficulty scale for those secrets, it went like this: easy, medium, hard and “must go on Reddit”. We hope you have as much fun uncovering them as we had designing them. Good luck!
Hell is Us features both open zones and dungeons. What were the specific challenges that you faced in designing these types of locations?
Both had to feel different but still needed to follow the design principles and core pillars of Hell is Us. Generally speaking, open zones have more freedom of exploration while dungeons are a little more linear. We wanted to keep some of that “open zone freedom” in our dungeon designs and add some linearity in our open zone designs, all while keeping the principle of player-plattering. So, you might have a different experience from your friends who are playing the game because you made different choices, or you completed parts of the game in a different order.
Rogue Factor’s previous projects were tactical role-playing games; what is the biggest challenge in transitioning to a 3rd person action-adventure game?
In Hell is Us, our map designs are a lot more oriented on exploration, immersion and experience rather than on tactics, vantage and choke points. While balanced and tactical maps are fun to design, it was a breath of fresh air after several years on a different genre. When we first transitioned from Necromunda, everything we made was way too large in scale and vastly open because we were used to the environments of that universe. Additionally, Hell is Us’ controls are very different and with the combat system being focused on melee, so we had to completely review how we built maps.
Where do you look for inspiration? Video games, other media, real-world locations?
Honestly, all of the above and then some... We look for inspiration everywhere we can! Some areas of the game are heavily inspired from cult video game moments while other areas are based on real-world locations, but nothing hits the spot as much as seeing the work of our own artists. When I see a new concept art or the work of our environment artists, it really triggers something special!
What kind of a gamer are you? Is there a game you always go back to?
I'm a hardcore gamer and a huge fan of RPG, MMORPG, Action RPG, Hack & Slash, Roguelikes and Incremental Games. I will always be a min-maxer, I absolutely thrive on pushing the limits of power in games. There are a couple games that will always have a special place in my heart: EverQuest, which I have incredibly fond memories of, and Path of Exile is the game that keeps bringing me back for more regularly. Shout out to my friends on The Tower, you guys are amazing!
In your whole career, what are you most proud of?
The team and the studio we built at Rogue Factor, without a doubt. I know this sounds cliché, but it’s true. When I first joined, we were just a dozen of devs with a lot of ambition. We grew together over the years, aged together, developed unparalleled comraderies and relationships, increased our expertise and recruited incredible talents on the team. This is what makes Rogue Factor so special for me today and I’m incredibly proud of our achievements.