Leveling Standards

Level design is a very complicated process. Making a good level is a mixture of three principles.

1. Structure (design and layout)
2. Visuals (atmosphere and interaction)
3. Gameplay (flow and intuition)

This article is very accurate and applies well even for Darkest Hour: http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/DanTaylor/20130929/196791/Ten_Principles_of_Good_Level_Design_Part_1.php

Much of what is discussed and expected of you as a leveler comes from different sources and is based off of theories/opinions. So you have to respect multiple points of view and accept that you may be told conflicting things. For example, players will expect certain things, historians will expect another thing, and others will be focused on perhaps something specific. Darkest Hour level's attempt to find a middle ground between history and fun. That is one of the biggest challenges we face.

Structure

Design and layout refer to the general arrangement of landmarks within the level, at least it starts off with that. Our standards are very lax on this principle, because we craft real places to imaginative areas. That said, this stage is very important. No one truly knows why some designs work as well as they do while others fail, mainly because there are many other aspects to consider. So this is one of those, we don't have standards to guide you on designing the layout for your level, and can only offer that you should take care in doing so.

What we can have standards on is playable area size, but again this varies depending on how many players the level expects to have playing it. The largest level size we want to see from now on is Bridgehead size (2km x 2km) or less.

more to come...