Now we are going to talk about Game Environment Software, which game environment artists commonly use to create stunning game Levels whether it be indoors inside buildings or outdoors in nature.
We will talk about the most commonly used pieces of software that big studios and professional artists use to achieve the level of detail, complexity, and realism we see in modern games.
Types of Game Environment Software
There are a lot of programs you can use to get this job done, so please don’t take it personally if we don’t mention your favorite software because I am pretty sure it is awesome too.
We are going to split these types of software into 6 categories based on what they are mainly used for.
1- Concept Art
For the most part, concept art is done using photoshop, which is a great tool to create stunning environments, it has all the tools that a 2D artist needs. It has been around forever, artists trust it because it gets their job done, it makes game studios and clients satisfied.
Concept art is not a requirement for an environment artist but it a great way to contribute to the vision you are creating, also it helps you understand and better communicate with concept artists when they hand you their concept to work from.
Furthermore, it is a very valuable discipline to be familiar with. You will learn about color, value, composition, and design. At some point, you may want to create your own concept designs to work from.
2- Modeling
An environment artist must have the necessary knowledge of modeling game props and game environments alike.
There are so many Standard 3D modeling packages that can help you model everything you need, but there are few that stand out and they are considered industry standards because game studios use them a lot.
These are 3Ds Max and Maya, also indie game developers and indie game studios use Blender for the most part because it is amazing also it is free. These Modeling packages have a lot of tools that can make the process
of modeling fast and efficient.
You can do Retopology using modeling software which allows you to rework the polygon flow of your model. Topology flow is very important when creating characters or objects with deformation and for animation.
You can model with topology flow in mind from the start using your 3d modeling software, but you can also use an additional application to help you with topology later on during your project. One of the best applications out there that can help with retopology is Topogun.
Also, You can do Uv unwrapping using these programs which is a very important process for backing and creating the maps that an environment artist needs for creating textures.
3- Sculpting
Sculpting is a necessary process for creating intricate details for high poly models which usually require millions of polygons.
For the most part sculpting is used to create organic models, hard surface models, and environment architectural details sometimes.
For this job, there is no software that can stand against Zbrush which is the king of digital sculpting.
Basically all game studios and most professional artists that use sculpting depend on it to get their job done.
There are some alternative programs you can use which are way more affordable than ZBrush.
Among these are Autodesk Mudbox, Sculptris,3D Coat and Blender which also has sculpting tools.
4- Texturing
Texturing is a very important part of an environment artist’s job. the software that are used today are not the same software that were used just 10 years ago.
This process used to be done in photoshop as a primary tool for texturing in game development in general, but today we have more options.
Game environment artists use Substance Painter & Substance Designer to create textures for their models. We also have Quixel suite which is a combination of 3D tools that can be used in integration with photoshop to create textures for 3d models.
Mari is also a 3D painting tool that can support textures up to 32k by 32k pixels and thousands of textures per model across different channels. It is amazing for creating intricate texturing details, with high-resolution maps.
5- Terrain Generation
One of the best Game Environment Software for doing this job is “World machine”, it is being used by a lot of environment artists.
Terrain generation software helps you create realistic 3D terrains.it is a powerful and flexible Game Environment Software, it combines procedural terrain creation, simulations of nature, and interactive editing to produce realistic-looking terrain quickly and easily.
You can build and export high-resolution heightfields, textures, and meshes for your game or rendering software.
6- Game Engines
An environment artist definitely needs a game engine to take his assets into to see how it is going to look in the game.
There are a lot of game engines out there, the most used are unreal engine unity, CryEngine, and a lot more…. Those game engines are all great and available for everyone.
All you need to do is to download them. There are also a lot of online tutorials and documentation that will help you to understand how to get your art in-game.
A game engine does a lot of things from rendering in real-time, collision detection using a physics engine, animation, artificial intelligence (AI), and sound just to name a few.
I hope this was useful and helped you know about the Game Environment Software that an environment artist uses in order to create game environments.
