The Midland Ranch Heist kicks off the “Texas Heat” campaign in which the heisters find themselves meeting a new contact, Gemma McShay who has a job for them in the lone star state. She enlists the gang for two main reasons, to steal some intelligence on whos been interfering with her gun smuggling business and to steal some prototype weapons that are being constructed on the repurposed ranch. The level can be completed in both stealth and loud and features unique level specific mechanics/features that I designed as part of the gameplay experience.

 

As with recent heist releases this level can be completed in both stealth and loud gameplay approaches. The heist features multiple options of approach at various points throughout to give the player an exciting new experience and encourage replayability.

 

I was the solo level designer responsible for taking this level from paper concept to release, focusing on my personal aspect on finding the fun of payday 2 gameplay. The development of this level had several challenges which had to be dealt with and is probably the hardest level I have worked on in my career so far. This included some changes to the fundamental workflow to help new level designers working on PD2 going forward. All of this together made it extra satisfying that the players have responded extremely positive towards the DLC, giving it a review score between 86%-90%.

 

• Created level documentation - top down layout for the level, gathered reference, generated asset lists, VO documents, gameplay objectives that fit the narrative brief

• Created design documentation alongside game design for new mechanics (turret)

• Blocking out parts of the level in editor (proprietary version of the Diesel engine)

• Prototyped new gameplay (weapon crafting and countermeasures)

• Created and implemented gameplay assets - gameplay interactions, AI, SFX, VFX

• Prototyped and created new gameplay using existing tools and features

• Visual Node Scripting and Lua scripting to orchestrate gameplay

• Adding dynamic and replayable elements within the level to enhance replayability

• Bug fixing

• Feedback and part of the discussion in re-working some of the heist pipeline for future development going forward.

 

Some elements I am particularly proud of designing/implementing for this heist are:

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• Player choice for objective order - The level can be completed clockwise or counter clockwise, changing which order the player completes the objectives in. Players are encouraged to take the right path however more experienced and adventurous players can take the left path to change the objective order and create a more replayable experience.

• Mountable Turret (Loud) - A static turret developed for this level that players can mount and use to shoot enemies. The turret can be disassembled and reassembled at different points indicated by a monopod and ammo stored at each location to create a visual language for where it can be used. Also created to match the narrative theme for a weapons workshop.

• Golf Cart - A new vehicle developed specifically for this heist. Created as a tool for players to more easily transport loot from the weapons workshop areas to the dock where it can be secured.

• Weapon manufacturing - Inspired by a previous popular gameplay feature on the level “Cook Off” in which players are instructed by the contractor to cook and secure meth. This gameplay fitted perfectly with the narrative of weapons manufacturing in addition to co-op gameplay of searching for the required parts. This involves the players searching and gathering weapon parts, putting them on a workshop bench and when all three parts are together they can be turned into a fully assembled weapon that can be secured.

• Countermeasures (Stealth) - As the loud gameplay had new features I wanted to add something to the stealth experience to keep players on edge and add tension to their experience. A previous idea I came up with was using an existing mechanic called “point of no return” in a new unique way. Usually this mechanic works as a countdown until the level outright ends on a failed screen, used in both stealth and loud gameplay. As this is a stealth only mechanic instead of having it work in the classic method I instead set the level loud so it didn't outright end the players experience, but still added tension and pressure. I typically used it to make more boring “time lock” elements more interesting, when triggered the player needs to go to a different location while remaining undetected and deal with a simple situation within the given time. Examples of this are opening a locked door and a short interaction, some being chance based to amp up the tension some more.

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