RIDERS REPUBLIC
Jump into the Riders Republic massive multiplayer playground! Ski, snowboard, bike, or wingsuit across an open world sports paradise. Race in mass start events, develop your rider’s career, or kick back with friends and free roam the parks.
🕹️ I had the opportunity to fulfill two roles on this project, as both world designer (procedural terrain designer) and level designer (track + event designer)
Project Information
Credits10 people I worked close together with
- Renaud PersonWorld Directior
- Kevin CarpentierWorld Lead
- Yann FieuxWorld Designer
- Pierre RobinSenior Level Artist
- Arthur BelinLevel Artist
- Charly CarreletLevel Artist
- Lukas StratmannLevel Artist
- Matthieu SchlosserTech Level Designer
- Pawel KsiazekTech Level Designer
- Loic BourdrelTech Level Designer
Description
Riders Republic is my first AAA game I had the pleasure to contribute on. I received the opportunity to do a full production cycle on the game, from concepting to the launch the game. Doing world design, terrain creation, set dressing and level design.
Therefore it is close to my heart. It is a project that has kickstarted my career. I have learned so much from my peers and mentors at Ubisoft.
Responsibilities / My Contributions
World Designer
• Creation of the world / terrain, with use of hand-sculpted and procedural methods
• Creations of the Bryce region and other memorable locations like the Subway and the Wave
• Creating geological features through procedural methods
Fixing terrain artifacts
Level Designer
• Creator of events, from start to finish (+organizing playtests, + balancing) | created 10 tracks
• Creation of Initial placeholder assets (macro shape & collision)
• Set dressing, composition & time of day/lighting setup
• Collaboration with Environment, Tech & Houdini Artists.
▶️ I had the opportunity to work on the terrain as a trainee world designer. I helped out Yann and Renaud (World Designer and World Director) on creating the procedural rule sets for the world, using WorldMachine and Houdini. I had the opportunity to create the terrain of Bryce Canyon Region by myself, an area of 9km^2. Both Macro and Micro rules.
Besides that I did some other minor rules for Grand Teton, Sequoia, the Wave in Canyonlands and the Subway in Zion.
▶️ After my time as a world designer, I switched to level design, creating events and tracks for the game. I was mostly in charge for designing mountain bike tracks. As a new sport, it was a great opportunity and challenge to bring a complete new experience for the player.
I created a total of 10+ tracks and am the owner of the biggest and final event in the game called "Riders Ridge Invitational", an event & playground where the player uses all the sports.
My Levels
🕹️ The best way to show my work is to show other players play the content I worked on!
Credits to the players. Thank you for making my levels look cool!
The Invitational
Redbull District Ride
Santa Cruz Urban Ride
Diving Board
Beam Me Up
Understeer
Bangers and Crashers
The Swell
Liberty Cap
Ford Foot Out
Terrain Creation using Procedural Methods
▶️ We used real world height map data as our base and through procedural methods created the micro rules on top of the macro. With use of masks based on for example, height, slope and angle. We were able to distribute the rules for texture and placement for rocks and vegetation.
I used Houdini, Zbrush and WorldMachine to fix terrain artifacts. Over the time on the project, I developed a workflow method that allows us to easily edit the terrain and reimport it into the engine.
Switching from World Design to Level Design
▶️ My time as a world designer on Riders Republic was a great experience. I learned a lot about world design principles and the creation of terrain through procedural and hand sculpted methods from Yann Fieux and Renaud Person. The two people I consider my mentors.
With the teams trust I had the ownership of creating the terrain in Bryce Canyon and a few ground rules in the other regions. The base for The Wave, The Subway & the Crocodile landmark in Bryce (Which you can see in the world trailer) are part of the creations I had my hands at.
The terrain in Bryce was my most challenging task and also my first task as a world designer. Working on Bryce taught me about researching real life geology, recreating these complex terrain features using procedural methods and understanding how it impacts the gameplay. It took multiple iterations but in the end it became a region that I believe, many players will enjoy!
Growing as a Designer (from trainee, junior to intermediate)
▶️ After 6 months I transitions towards level design. It was my initial plan to join the team at Ubisoft Annecy as a level designer. Due to a request I started as a world designer, tasked with the creation of the terrain. Needless to say, I am very honored to have been able to get this opportunity to contribute to the project in two different roles, as a level designer and a world designer.
▶️ As a level designer I contributed to multiple tracks, mainly bike trails, note worthy: Derailed Zone Snow Trails, Fairy Journey, Diving board, Liberty, Redbull District Ride, Santa Cruz Urban Ride, but one of the tracks that I am very proud of is the "Riders Ridge Invitational", the event the player unlocks after collecting 750 stars. I was the level designer of this playground and event. With help of 3 level artists, Lukas Strattman, Arthur Belin and Charly Carrelet, we made an unique, one of a kind playground for all sports.
My tasks as a level designer included creating, iterating and documenting the trails, guiding the player through set dressing, modeling PH state assets and working together with the level artists and Houdini artists to make it all become a reality!
▶️ Getting close to the release of the game, I saw an opportunity to advance my career. I stumbled upon an opening for a level design role on Assassin's Creed VR. It was a franchise I always dreamed to be part of. Next to that it was going to be build on new tech as well. Tech that I believe to be the next big step in gaming.
In short, I had a meeting with the team. After a short interview and a design test + a meeting with my current lead and the lead in the other Ubisoft studio, I got the role.
Galary / Media / Content
