A new video from the Ship of Heroes team shows off how the team creates mission maps.
The video, embedded below, shows off how the devs can create a mission map or dungeon for purposes of an instance. They noted that special iconic locations and buildings are hand-crafted environmental art, but more straightforward missions are produced in larger quantities.
Maps are constructed in an semi-automated fashion, with the initial map generation that allows the team to focus their technical artists on polishing and lighting. The video highlights James Smith, a developer on the team who runs the team that creates the instanced missions.
The team have created their own library of literally thousands of environmental art assets, in addition to their proprietary tools. Once they have a map they do like, the work still isn’t complete. It can take months to add props, polish the lighting just right and test for bugs.
You can take a look at the full video below. If you want to read the blog post, you can check it out here.