Greetings, Martians!
I am happy to see you again, and it is with great enthusiasm that I present to you this Content Creator Pack that I created. For those who don’t know me, I’m Silva, and I started modding strategy and RPG games in 1997. After a very long break, when the excellent Surviving Mars (2018) was released, I resumed modding. I had very little knowledge of 3D and programming, but that didn’t discourage me from making a large number of mods that were very well received by the gaming community. Modding has allowed me to improve my 3D modeling and programming at lightning speed.
And today Paradox contacted me to create this Content Creator Pack, giving me the freedom to choose the theme, the features to be added, and any other content. My specialty as a modder is to create new buildings, so I chose this type of content for this Pack. You see, they are not just new building skins but entirely new buildings, with new gameplay features for some of them.
The design of this Pack was done in two phases: in the first one, I wrote the game design and created each asset to make a mod. The second one was handled by Abstraction Games for the integration of my work into the game as true DLC.
I decided to focus on simple but interesting gameplay elements for the players and to limit asset animations to ensure final quality. I chose to make exclusively 8 new buildings to place in the Domes, trying to be faithful to the graphic style of the game.
I was inspired by the requests of the players, but also by my own experience, to add to the mechanics of the game and bring novelty and fun. Big settlements pose a lot of problems when the population becomes very large and the current buildings are not adapted to accommodate so many people. For example, the kindergarten is too small, so I decided to make a bigger one as well as a big school that has the feature of being a Spire, plus an improvement to give the trait of Genius to a small percentage of students.
In the advanced settlements, the number of retiring settlers also becomes a housing problem as they take essential housing for workers. This situation can cause labor problems in some Domes. This is why I have integrated a new type of residence exclusively reserved for retirees. Health can also become a big problem when there is a large population; infirmaries are too small, and medical Spires are not a priority in the choices of players. To solve this problem, I included the design of a Martian Hospital that will be able to cope with the influx of many patients.
The smaller Domes, where the choice of buildings is important because of their reduced space, are often without security or health facilities. This is why I created the Medical Post and the Security Post occupying a single box but with smaller capacities.
Another interesting building is the TV Studio, which is a new workshop where your settlers will produce Reality Shows for the Earthlings. Each broadcast will increase your funds. Finally, I added “Smart Apartments,” a new residential building halfway between the “Apartments” and the “Smart Complex.”
Most of the buildings are unlockable by technologies and have upgrades.
To create all these assets, I used the same tools as for modding, namely: Blender for 3D modeling, Substance Painter for texturing, and the Mod Tools from Surviving Mars to add assets to the game.
After I wrote the game design of the Content Pack, it was validated by Paradox. I didn’t make any sketches or concept art to start the 3D modeling of the buildings. I had a very precise idea in my mind of the general design of my models.
Once the 3D was finished, I created the textures, respecting the graphic style of the game. Then again on Blender, I had to configure the scene for export to the game, i.e. configure the materials, the lights, and the collision boxes, as well as indicate the position of some decorative objects (benches, trees, etc.), the access paths to the building for the settlers and the door animations.
Once everything was set up correctly, I exported my asset so that it could be used by the game. I still have to create the templates and some programming to make the buildings playable for the players.
I would like to close by thanking Paradox for the trust they put in me to create this “Content Pack Creator.” It’s a great experience for a modder, and it’s an excellent approach by Paradox to want to promote modding for their games and reward the most active creators.
See you soon in the Surviving games!
Silva