Creating the Level (Ideas)

For my level I want it to have many twists and turns, I also want it to feature steps as you follow the corridor you get lower and lower, I want this as I would like to convey the idea of descending into hell the further you get. As this is a prototype I won't be adding mechanisms for doors to appear behind you indicating how you can't go back the further into badness you get.

I started first by jotting down some rough ideas.

Here I am thinking about what I want to do within a couple of rooms. I want to put the player at some points in a 1st person view, such as, as a child you see yourself in a crib but you see the bars, and you feel trapped in a dark room. Also I had the idea of having the character walk through a corridor and hit a dark obstacle, then lights would come on and you realise you are in a cupboard and you see a lady walk in, this would symbolise the voyeurism the character has begun to engage in.

At the end of each corridor I want there to be a table with a flower pot on and when you get to the end of each corridor near some stairs I want the flower to be more dead as you get closer to the end of the level to show the decaying of the mind, this with the darkening corridors and the

This idea features going down underneath the top level, a bit beyond my skill level maybe ...

this one features a spiral effect, as if going down a plug hole, I'm not sure how I could make this work in maya though so maybe a practise another time.

I like this one the best so I think I'll take this one onto maya and see how it turns out!

This one looks good but too simple ...

I took the level design I liked the most and went into Maya. This is the final layout as mapped in Maya alongside a chart describing what will happen in each room. It looks similar to the idea I came up with in Photoshop but a lot more refined.