1. 1.

   the overall floor plan / shape / structure of a playable level; "the layout was so confusing I didn't know where to go"
2. 2.

   a layout drawing used in design planning, usually an overview drawing of the level from a top-down perspective; "have you finished drawing the layout? we need to prototype the level soon"

• ​Flow is how it feels to move around the level. Players can move quickly and smoothly, or the flow can feel abrupt and disjointed, etc. This sense of mobility should match with experience goals, or else the level might feel confusing, awkward, incoherent, or broken.
• ​Balance is the real and perceived fairness of the player's options, usually in combat. Where can the player go, what territory can the player control? A balanced level helps players trust the layout and thus more invested in the game outcome.
• ​Encounters are gameplay sequences with NPCs that test the player's skills, usually in combat. The player must improvise a strategy to confront a challenge. Note that implementing encounters in-game usually involves some scripting.
• ​Typology is about the use of design patterns to better understand how a layout fundamentally functions. Using this shared design vocabulary helps you study other levels, convey ideas, and collaborate on teams.

• START BIG. Use the entire page. Start with the big main shapes and gradually work down to smaller features like doors and windows. Work in passes over the entire drawing. Don't try to draw at 100% detail from the very beginning.
• 90/90. Rectangles, boxes, and grids are much easier to build than odd angles or curved walls. Generally ~90%+ of your corners should be 90 degrees and aligned to the grid. You'll thank yourself when you blockout.
• USE 2+ LINE THICKNESSES. Use different line weights to mark different types of walls and areas. If you're using a pen or pencil, don't apply so much pressure, and grip the pen a few centimeters above the nib.
• THE PEN IS MIGHTIER THAN THE MOUSE. For quick layout drawings, use a pencil, pen, or drawing tablet. If drawing with a mouse, keep the layout drawing as simple as possible, and avoid fine-tuning lines or tweaking exact shapes -- precision doesn't matter here.
• WE'RE NOT ARCHITECTS. Detailed architectural drawings are pretty, but at this phase of level design, just draw the bare minimum needed to express the bounds of the space and the player experience. Like in the 4-step image below, maybe stop at step 2 or 3.

• ​Flow. Draw or mark the critical path, either with a line or a set of arrows. If the critical path is non-linear or complicated, then at least mark the player's start position and exits. For multiplayer maps, lightly shade or highlight team spawn areas and the primary circulation.
• Areas. Label major areas, landmarks, and intended setpieces. What are its major segments or chunks? For competitive multiplayer maps, start thinking about the possible "callouts", short labels that players use to quickly refer to different parts of the map.
• Game Objects. Mark important objectives, NPCs, enemies, items, powerups, pickups, traps, etc. that are vital for understanding the player experience. But omit secondary objects that aren't important or aren't on the critical path, to avoid cluttering your drawing with too much stuff. A busy confusing layout drawing is a useless layout drawing.

• ​Research: heavily inspired by Alcatraz State Penitentiary in San Francisco, California
• ​Typology: ground-level arenas flanked with narrow catwalks and prison cells, frequently gated
• ​Encounters: designed block-by-block, room-by-room, each section offers a central conceit that adds a new twist to the Antlion vs. Combine encounter space throughout the whole chapter

"My process is about iteration, which sometimes means stepping back to planning stages. [...] Sometimes I spend an hour iterating on an area and it clicks. Other times I spend that same hour, and eh, maybe best to set it aside and try something else. [...] How do I tell? There's a gut feeling from experience building similar levels in the past. There are also a bunch of heuristics and patterns to check against. Does the player know the goal? Can they anticipate a solution and plan for it?"

In this particular scenario the trick was that the player could go through the lasers and trigger an alarm but he could also:

• Disable the lasers when the guard was patrolling away from them and then go into the red zone and silently take the AI down.
• Use the Camera attached to the walls to scout the location by traveling from camera angle to camera angle. At this point in the game this is an already well established way of scouting interior locations.
• Use the drone to explore the hallway and incapacitate guards.

The corridor beyond also has a bunch of strategically placed junction boxes that can be hacked to incapacitate to incapacitate two guards at the same time.

• ​Flow: one central lane with side paths, 5 control points total with dynamic spawn rooms
• ​Balance: symmetrical map, all 9 classes must be viable, attack / defense viable at each CP
• ​Typology: beaded necklace, a long coiled corridor dotted with arenas for each CP

"After the initial design discussions, maps were sketched out by the design group, and then built by the level designers. Once the initial version was complete, regular playtesting began. Many changes were made throughout the playtesting cycle, often resulting in drastic changes to original plans for the map. [...] [Warpath] was the first TF map in which teams respawned in different locations based upon which control zones their team controlled, and this led to a long test cycle where respawn points were moved many times." -- Robin Walker, from "Half-Life 2: Raising The Bar", pg. 48 (emphasis ours)

1. 1.

   Have a basic plan, define desired experience goals and pacing.
2. 2.

   Sketch and label partis, simple thumbnail sketches of core shapes.
3. 3.

   Arrange the space with bubble diagrams, sketches that emphasize overall proportion and relation.
4. 4.

   Draw a floor plan, a top-down drawing with walls and floors.

   • Start with big simple shapes, omit details. Use multiple line weights and shade floor areas.
   • For rooms with multiple floors, draw an isometric view, with attention to the floor planes.
   • For important or complex set piece rooms, maybe sketch a perspective view and label it.
5. 5.

   Markup the plan with player flow and gameplay notes. Help others imagine the experience, especially if you are collaborating with others.

   • Name and label areas. Think of each chunk of the level as its own parti.

• Make sure you've read about flow, balance, encounters, and typology.
• Continue to the Blockout phase.

• ​"Warowl and FMPone - Mapping for Fun" by 3kliksphilip