So I've been thinking about what genre of Post™️ I should do, and decided I'd like to do a retrospective/breakdown of my experience doing level design for Void Sols this past year! Void Sols is a top down minimalist soulslike, so a lot of this will focus on encounter design and exploration. - ThreadSky

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nshooter.bsky.social • 95 days ago

So I've been thinking about what genre of Post™️ I should do, and decided I'd like to do a retrospective/breakdown of my experience doing level design for Void Sols this past year! Void Sols is a top down minimalist soulslike, so a lot of this will focus on encounter design and exploration.

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nshooter.bsky.social•95 days ago

Void Sols started from a prototype @kiniperson.bsky.social made back in 2022, consisting a rough early version of what turned into the Prison level and the Warden fight from the final version of the game.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2EMuX2dehV4

nshooter.bsky.social•95 days ago

From there, it kinda went viral and got coverage from some awesome folks within the souls community, to the point where Modern Wolf (our eventual publisher) reached out to Kartik about a potential deal. From there, things really got rolling, and I quit my job at Rockstar to assist with level design.

nshooter.bsky.social•95 days ago

I was hired back in February of 2024, and between then and launch made these biomes in this order:

1. The Mountains.
2. The Cultist Compound
3. The Mines
4. The Factory/Swamp
5. The Apex

(Kartik made the Prison, the Forest, and the Supermax prison, though we assisted each other back and forth)

nshooter.bsky.social•95 days ago

So my loose plan for the next however-long-it-takes-to-get-through-this is to go through the levels I worked on in order, and share some behind the scenes info on our design process, emergent problems, accidental successes, and all the funny little things that happened along the way.

nshooter.bsky.social•95 days ago

Today was just an introduction, but going forward I'm gonna try to post little tidbits every Saturday and Wednesday (potentially more often if I'm feeling up to it). I'll also try to daisy chain this all together in a way that allows people to read it in order. Thanks for listening!

nshooter.bsky.social•94 days ago

Next thread:
https://bsky.app/profile/nshooter.bsky.social/post/3lbpuiavlzc2a

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