Creating the World of The Walking Dead: Empires

World Design Philosophy

For the Walking Dead: Empires, I created an open world made up of 81 playable zones. These zones needed to provide players with opportunities to build bases with friends, gather resources, and fight hordes of walkers.  With players also moving their base to more advanced zones as they progress, we also needed these zones to provide an engaging play space for players at all stages of the game.

To meet these goals, I designed the game world with the following parameters:

1. The game world's 81 zones are assigned rarities, creating a gradient of challenge starting at the edges of the map and moving inwards

2. As rarity increases, zones gradually change in composition, from forests and sparce roads to neighborhoods and towns. 

3. Higher rarity zones should still have an abundance of open or clearable space for players to build their bases on.

4. Zones have a variety of interconnecting elements, such as railroad tracks, streams, and roads. These help with player navigation, and make the world more believable.

5. Resources, loot, and enemy spawns are influenced by a zone's rarity, giving players a sense of variety and progression as they explore and build in new zones.

Zones

Common Zones

Common Zone Composition: 100% Wilderness Tiles (16/16)

Uncommon Zones

Uncommon Zone Composition: 50% Wilderness Tiles (8/16), 50% Rural Tiles (8/16)

Rare Zones

Rare Zone Composition: 43.75% Wilderness Tiles (7/16), 43.75% Rural Tiles (7/16), 12.5% Suburban Tiles (2/16)

Epic Zones

Epic Zone Composition: 37.5% Wilderness Tiles (6/16), 37.5% Rural Tiles (6/16), 12.5% Suburban Tiles (2/16), 12.5% Urban Tiles (2/16)

Legendary Zones

Legendary Zone Composition: 37.5% Wilderness Tiles (6/16), 37.5% Rural Tiles (6/16), 12.5% Suburban Tiles (2/16), 12.5% Urban Tiles (2/16)

Ancient Zones

Ancient Zone Composition: 37.5% Wilderness Tiles (6/16), 37.5% Rural Tiles (6/16), 12.5% Suburban Tiles (2/16), 12.5% Urban Tiles (2/16)