Buried Voices is a 3D puzzle platformer game currently under development in Unity. I am the environment artist on a team of five people, and I am responsible for modeling and texturing the majority of the architectural components as well as furniture and other props. In this game about historical negationism and revisionism, play as Khura, a half-Avanqi, half-Feorlen woman in search of the true history of her people as she explores the mysterious Feorlen library.
You can learn more and download the development build at the Buried Voices website. Buried Voices received the WPI IMGD Audience Choice Award.
Concept Art
Architecture
The game takes place in a former cultural site of the Avanqi people, which has since been converted to a library by the Feorlen people. To make level design and gameplay implementation easier for the team, I constructed the environment in a modular fashion, with individual, tileable architectural components that can be moved, duplicated, and adjusted as needed. All of the different components are displayed below. The target polycount for each asset ranges from 500-1,000 polygons.
The site is carved inside of a mountain, so I wanted the architectural components of the level to have a certain balance between rough, natural stone, and more refined tilework and polished stone which has been laid on top of the base rock in the mountains. The architecture has a buildup of dirt and grime from years of neglect under Feorlen control.
These stone tablets, called "Living Stone", are used for platforming. Khura uses her Reminiscing and Farcasting abilities to "grow" the broken stone pieces from the walls of the library into a full stone platform so she can move through the library.
The full and broken versions of the living stone share the same UVs so they have identical textures. This allows for the broken version to seamlessly transition to the full version in game.
Interactable objects
This Feorlen "Silencing Field Generator" blocks the player's ability to use Reminiscence. It features heavy steel patterned with Feorlen designs.
There are three Feorlen "Keys" which Khura must obtain to access the mysterious locked fourth room of the Library.
Furniture AND Props
The Avanqi lamps for this environment were inspired by Moroccan-style hanging lamps. I used warm-toned metals and glass to contrast against the cooler blue tones of the overall environment. The unique geometric cutout designs were achieved using opacity maps, and I gave the glass centers emissive maps to help the lamps appear lit from within. These lamps were given additional lighting in Unity with point lights.
Bookshelves feature prominently in the library. Given the sheer quantity of bookshelves needed in the environment, I paid extra attention in the optimization of these models. The books are achieved via a texture with normal mapping instead of 3D book models to cut down on geometry. Each bookshelf is in the 500-600 poly range. I modeled and textured three different styles off bookshelves to keep the environment visually different and varied. These bookshelves feature Feorlen wooden carvings and metal engravings.
Most of the furniture in the environment was brought by the Feorlen people who took over the site and converted it into a library. These pieces, often made of wood, iron, and marble brought by the Feorlen, contrast with the blue and orange colors and geometric details of the Avanqi lamps and architecture.
A large number of books and scrolls were needed to fill the space. I modeled a single book mesh, and then retextured it multiple times to give the appearance of many different books in the library.
