HomeLAN - What are some of your favorite aspects of Devastation in terms of its level design?
Torbjorn "Tobbe" Ahlen - This is a question that could take me months to answer. There is so much going on with the levels I will be short and say it’s the level of realism and the variety of the locations. We got layout concepts and textures from real places that the maps represent. For example, early on in the project one of our 2D Artists went to Taipei and shot hundreds of reference pics for me to work off, as well as gigs of raw texture source. This made such a difference when you see our Taiwan maps. They look like the real thing. We did the same for Tokyo, and San Francisco where a lot of Devastation’s action takes place.

The details that go into the maps after I am done with them are also very cool. Let me give you a good example: there’s a Chinese take-out restaurant in the San Francisco Chinatown level. Behind the restaurant, you will find a small area that looks like it’s where the employees go to take coffee breaks, and so there are chairs, and coffee cups and a magazine. If you keep looking you might find some empty Chinese food containers and soda cans in the gutter. In my opinion, details like this may at first seem quite unnecessary for a shooter, but the fact that someone went the extra step to add them is nice, and that most are kickable or throwable is even more fun.