D-Day Enhanced Trailer

D-Day Enhanced Logo

I joined the studio during the release of the original Honor and Duty: D-Day (PS4, PS VR), so the logo for that game was not created by me. However, I designed the logo for the "Enhanced" version, as seen below on the right. It was essential to keep the logo simple so it would work across various media, something that wasn't possible with the old logo. I aimed to retain some of the identity of the old logo by incorporating the iconic star and circle.

Map Design & Creation

I am a big fan of multiplayer shooters and have probably played 90% of all Battlefield and Call of Duty games. It has always been fascinating to see how the maps for those games are made, and to understand the design decisions behind various elements.

When I started working part-time for Strange Games Studios, my initial task was to create maps for the original D-Day game. Despite having a limited set of assets, I was able to create a fan-favorite map called "The Castle," known for its intense close-combat battles.

Eventually, we developed an enhanced version of D-Day. For this iteration, I aimed to bring more detail to the original maps and create brand new maps that would elevate the game to the next level. These maps can be seen below.

Atlantikwall

The Atlantikwall map is based on the Atlantikwall megastructure on the coastline of western Europe. It is a medium sized map with narrow trenches, underground bunkers and tunnels and some open areas with nature.

Derailed

The Derailed map is a large scale map that has three main areas. The hill with bunkers, the derailed train and the lumberyard. When there is a small amount of players, the maps will be smaller. In that case only the derailed train area for version A or the hill with bunkers for version B is playable.

Kasbah Village

At one point there was the plan to release themed maps every new season. The maps would be bundled with character and weapon skins that fit the theme of the season. Kasbah Village is one of the maps included to be part of that season.

Kasbah Village is one of my favorite maps that I've created. There is a small village in the centre of the map that is created/better suited for infantry battles, while the rest of the map works especially well for vehicles.

Oasis Airfield

Oasis airfield was scheduled to release in the desert themed season. This map is located in the North African desert. The map has various points of interest, for example the hangars, oasis, radio tower and so on. There are tunnels running underneath the airstrip, this allows infantry to advance safely.

Stadium

With players being very positive about the test map (Shoot House), we decided to add another map like this one, but for a bit more players. the end result was the stadium map. It never released like a couple of other maps that were made.

Desert Fox

Another map planned to be part of the Desert themed season is the Desert Fox map. A map that was available in the Beta. It was the first large scale map with more vehicles available. The map was simple to keep the render performance optimal. 

Shoot House

As mentioned before, Shoot House was just a test map where we would try various new game elements and tweaks. Players liked it so much that we decided to keep it in the game.

Weapon Skins

I created over 36 different weapon skin tiles for D-Day Enhanced. The tiles were created in a way so that they are tileable. That means that the left side merges with the right side of the image and the upper with the lower side. This way we were able to quickly create a lot of skins for the many weapons we have in the game. Of course we had to tweak the tiling size/amount, so that the skin would be applied in a nice way. Below are some examples of the tile textures I created.

Store Assets

Every game that you put in a store will need marketing assets. Below you can see the assets for the PlayStation Store. Every now and then we updated the images. There are many reasons to do this, for example to show something that was included in an update.

New version

For the new version I created a composition with many of the new assets we created.

Old version

For the old version we used an image we created with MidJourney as a base. A lot of work had to be done to that AI image to make it usable.

Marketing Images

What's the best way to convince people to get a more premium edition over a standard edition of the game? It's by showing the actual content in some way. Below you can see the images I had to (quickly) create for social media.

Player Banners

In the game, players are able to personalize their player banner. This banner can be unlocked with the tokens they earn. The banners we created, started with the creation of AI images by MidJourney. I had to clean those images up in Photoshop, where I placed them in a pre-set frame. Here below you can see some examples. 

DLC Store Assets

All the weapon skins we included in DLC packs had to have an image before it could be displayed in the store. We had individual skin DLC, bundles of skins, and an ultimate bundle with everything included. Because there are a lot of skins, I've only included a couple of examples here below.

All the DLC had to be placed into the PlayStation Store. I had to do this in the PlayStation Concepts area (of PlayStation Partners). This was the first time we were doing DLC at this scale, so we learned a lot from it. Sometimes we couldn't figure out how something needed to be implemented into the system, that's why I created an overview so we could explain our questions more easily.

Icons

For this game, I created many icons, including those for the various classes. Over time, I worked to make the simplified icons more appealing. Although some alternative icons were designed, they were ultimately not used for the classes. The supply stations, however, have very simple icons to make them easily recognizable and distinguishable from a distance.

Singleplayer Concepts

After the initial release, we introduced several modes that can be played solo or in co-op. One of these modes is a linear mission mode where players start at point A and need to reach point B, encountering and eliminating numerous AI-controlled soldiers along the way.

The missions are set on existing maps. Before establishing the boundaries within the map, I created several concepts.

Included in the slides below is a concept for a King of the Hill mode. In this mode, two teams battle for control of a small area on the map, with the zone changing to a new location every two minutes.

Social Media

When a game launches, goes on sale, or when doing a giveaway, we create an image for it to post on social media. Here are some examples.

Battle Royale

Sometimes there are just too many ideas, and not all of them make it into the game. One such idea was a Battle Royale mode. The PS4 version had a very basic Battle Royale mode, so we explored the possibility of introducing an enhanced version in the new game. Some of those map concepts are shown below.

One idea was to combine the existing multiplayer maps into a single island, but that would have been a lot of work. Instead, I focused on creating entirely new concepts.

UI Design

I designed many UI elements for this game, but unfortunately, they weren't always implemented as intended. Some elements were redesigned shortly before or after release due to the game's evolving content. One example is the battle pass screen, where players can view their unlocks. The current screen is a very simple placeholder, and the actual replacement was never used.

Pop-ups

Another thing I created are the replacements for the UI pop-ups. For example when you are on a killstreak, or when you captured a flag. Some examples can be seen below.

Map

Even though this map is not really part of the UI, it did serve as a background for it. On this map I tried to put a lot of details to make it look like a realistic map that could've been used during WW2.

Medals

The medals are pop-ups for when you've done something memorable on the battlefield. This could be getting a certain amount of kills, a kill with a bayonet or something else. The medals were created with the use of MidJourney, but the ribbons were made by me.

Unlock System

We wanted to put an unlock system in the game to keep players engaged for a longer time. I came up with a lot of concepts for that system. Some mock-ups look really simple, it doesn't resemble how it looks in the game.