The Design of Jade Gate

Disclaimer:

Most of the projects that I will be doing are for a game that I am developing on my own code named Project Ninjio. In short, the game is a story action driven role playing game (common referred to as an action RPG). It features 2 uniquely styled areas, one in which the cities are built to flow along with nature, and the other where the cites are hyper futuristic. The game is set in a futuristic China, where after a large war, the country is split into the two settings described above. The game is built in the Unity 3D game engine.

The Design of Jade Gate

Introduction

Ninjio's story primarily takes place in two settings. One is a city that has pushed to develop their future alongside nature while the other, the primary setting in Ninjio, chose to develop their future without nature. Although these two contrasts are not a primary part of Ninjio's story, I felt that they had the opportunity to be an interesting, and very extreme, contrast to each other. The city where the main portion of the game takes place is called Jade Gate, or 玉門 in Chinese. I think that Ninjio may finally be at the point where I need to create some portions of Jade Gate for use in testing game play features.

Jade Gate's design and influence

I find it interesting how Jade Gate was the first one out of the two settings where I knew exactly how I wanted it to look. I wanted the city to be the "City of the Future" where it's leader wanted as much innovation as possible, however this resulted a city where nature was destroyed and many human ethics were violated as well. This kind of city, where innovation was heavily encouraged, resulted in me thinking back to a few YouTube videos about Walt Disney's EPCOT project that I have watched recently.

Wait, the Epcot in Walt Disney World in Florida?

Walt Disney and his Experimental Prototype for a Community of Tomorrow

Well, no. In short, without going through too many details, Walt Disney before he died had come up with an Experimental Prototype for a Community of Tomorrow (EPCOT for short). This community was built to be able to survive, thrive, and show off what the future of cities can be. At the heart of this project, there was a gigantic city that was planned to be built using the finest technology that the  1970's could offer, including a labyrinth of transportation options like monorails and an integrated roadway design for the city never thought of before then. This concept of EPCOT city faded away with the passage of Walt Disney himself, however the idea of bring the best technology and innovation to a single place was eventually incorporated into the EPCOT theme park built in the Walt Disney World Resort in Florida. I would like to make the main city where the story in Ninjio takes place to be heavily influenced by Walt Disney's idea for a "Community of Tomorrow" as I feel that Jade Gate's constant strive to innovate would fit well with the original drawings that the Walt Disney Company did for EPCOT city.

The model on display in Walt Disney World
of EPCOT City

So, what does a city of the future look like?

The road layout of EPCOT City,
note the circular nature of the city

A cross section of the city of tomorrow, look at those transit options!

This is a very difficult question, however when I look at the concept art for EPCOT city, I see many things that I like. One such thing is how the city is highly planned, with higher density buildings like apartments and high rise office towers situated in the center of the city and lower density buildings like single family homes and larger office complexes located on the edge of the city limits. Another thing that I found in the plans for EPCOT city was how much the transportation infrastructure is planned. In the drawings for EPCOT city, there are many modes of transportation ranging from roadways built onto of each other to various light rail systems (monorails, electric trains etc) that weave throughout the city. There are many other things that I find interesting inside of the concept art for EPCOT city, however I will spare all of you from my annoyingly long list. These are just some of the things that I want to incorporate in Jade Gate's layout and design.

This week's work log:

Monday December 4th: Finalized Sketch of Kuai Long

Tuesday December 5th: Did the body for Kuai Long

Wednesday December 6th: Finalized the rig for Kuai Long

Thursday December 7th: Textured Kuai Long

Friday December 8th: Did some eye textures for Kuai Long, restructured the project file structure and naming scheme…. yeah

The sun sets on Walt Disney's EPCOT

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