If you recall, with my previous top down shooter project, Planet: Discovery, I was working on level generation. Of course, the level generation algorithm used then was a very simple tile-based solution. The former algorithm would create a starting point, then randomly choose from the four cardinal directions where to start adding tiles and so on and so forth. It was a very linear approach to level generation and definitely could be improved upon, which is what I did.

I started researching more roguelike-style procedural dungeon generation algorithm, but there wasn’t anything that I really liked, until I got to Rooms and Mazes, written by Bob Nystrom.

His solution was very simple, and I quote:

1. Place a bunch of random non-overlapping rooms.
2. Fill in the remaining solid regions with mazes.
3. Connect each of the mazes and rooms to their neighbors, with a chance to add some extra connections.
4. Remove all of the dead ends.

Bob Nystrom

Of course, this algorithm is very simple to understand, but when I tried to finally implement a solution in Unity, it didn’t turn out that well. The first major problem I encountered was in step 1: place a bunch of random non-overlapping rooms.

Sounds simple enough, right? Well, I couldn’t find a very simple and efficient solution to placing random rooms without them overlapping. I tried hard-coding in positions to make sure the generator didn’t generate rooms where rooms were already generated, but that gave it a “too perfect” look.

Eventually, I discarded storing the positions of each room, and to just generate random rooms in a certain radius based on the height and width of the dungeon. If the room overlapped, it would get destroyed.

Then it was just a matter of searching up some maze algorithms, and I used the growing tree algorithm. There’s a giant collection of algorithm’s here, which can be useful, depending on what you’re trying to do.

I ended up with something simple, as shown below. The next steps I have to take are to add props, different tiles, a beginning and end point to each floor of the dungeon, and finally spawns for enemies. But for now I’m going to tackle Enemy AI.

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Alright! So I haven’t posted in a long time, but I felt like it was time to give an update on what I have been doing.

Right now, I’ve been working on a new top down shooter project, and I am pretty much scrapping Planet: Discovery, but most of the elements and gameplay will be the same. Nothing is drastically changed from the base mechanics of the top down shooter game; I pretty much just gave it a new look and made everything a lot more efficient.

Some mechanics have changed, however, but I will release a full “dev diary” on this new project soon. In the meantime, check out this small sneakpeek at what I’ve been working on!

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