BEST GAME ART ENVIRONMENT | SUBMISSIONS
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- rmagee
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- Robin Cai
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Hello there!
I have made a castle and erdtree scene inspired by the game Elden Ring as my submission to Best Game Art Environment. More details in the video!
Project File (unreal, hda, hip, reference, render results):
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1e529Gb2WmTTOjXDZfgu5I5jwpftQyCsV/view?usp=sharing [drive.google.com]
Unreal Engine version: 5.6
I have made a castle and erdtree scene inspired by the game Elden Ring as my submission to Best Game Art Environment. More details in the video!
Project File (unreal, hda, hip, reference, render results):
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1e529Gb2WmTTOjXDZfgu5I5jwpftQyCsV/view?usp=sharing [drive.google.com]
Unreal Engine version: 5.6
Edited by Robin Cai - 2025年7月8日 19:35:33
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- LyohaSh
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Friends, I am glad to present my work for the Challenge.
I tried to create a special asset for artists so that when creating an environment they could use this asset to generate beautiful rocks with a waterfall. The idea was that the asset would do all the main work to generate the environment. The artist, in turn, would create only the main forms, as he imagines the future composition. I also understand very well that many artists who work on the environment are not very familiar with effects, so I tried to remove this moment from the pipeline. The artist does not need to go to the effects artist and ask him to make waterfalls for his environment. Waterfalls are created automatically based on the artist's sketches. I also tried to make many settings available so that the artist could create countless variations to his taste. This applies to the settings of the asset itself and the settings of the UE materials that are used in the asset. For the presentation, I generated several examples of the environment and tried to demonstrate different types of waterfalls so that you get the maximum idea of what things can be done.
I hope you like my work and find many useful and interesting solutions for yourself.
All materials in one archive 21Gb (UE5.5, .hip, .hda, manual, renders, references):
SideFX_Challenge.zip [drive.google.com]
I tried to create a special asset for artists so that when creating an environment they could use this asset to generate beautiful rocks with a waterfall. The idea was that the asset would do all the main work to generate the environment. The artist, in turn, would create only the main forms, as he imagines the future composition. I also understand very well that many artists who work on the environment are not very familiar with effects, so I tried to remove this moment from the pipeline. The artist does not need to go to the effects artist and ask him to make waterfalls for his environment. Waterfalls are created automatically based on the artist's sketches. I also tried to make many settings available so that the artist could create countless variations to his taste. This applies to the settings of the asset itself and the settings of the UE materials that are used in the asset. For the presentation, I generated several examples of the environment and tried to demonstrate different types of waterfalls so that you get the maximum idea of what things can be done.
I hope you like my work and find many useful and interesting solutions for yourself.
All materials in one archive 21Gb (UE5.5, .hip, .hda, manual, renders, references):
SideFX_Challenge.zip [drive.google.com]
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- luk4m4
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Hi!
I'm happy to introduce you to my “NewByzance” project, as well as its pipeline developed for its “Undini” needs.
NewByzance is a smart procedural content generator, designed to create an entire “turnkey” environment with simple input primitives, combining the power of Houdini for intelligent scattering and Unreal's PCG for low-cost display.
Undini is a custom pipeline I've developed on the side, allowing me to bypass the Houdini Engine to have more control over the data I pass between Houdini and Unreal. It runs in background, and is driven from a Unreal widget. No need to keep going back and forth, and total control over the data communicated between the software.
Undini is open-source, and available here: https://github.com/luk4m4repo/luk4m4_Undini_framework [github.com]
For this project, my plan was clear: to have the most challenging procedural game enviro possible. To achieve this, I developed a whole range of tools on Houdini, from a simple UV wizard to a deck-generating multi-ray launcher. All in all, a whole lot of VEX. Handy for practicing!
All the wrangles have remained hard-coded in the Houdini project for lack of time to write an include file.
On Unreal, despite the reduced time available, I paid maximum attention to detail, keeping performance at the heart of my build. PCG limits drawcalls to a minimum and lets me customize my assets as needed in BPs. Very nice to use.
In the end, I did my best to be efficient but keep to my original intention, which was to have something technically interesting, innovative and pretty all in one, despite a full-time job as TD Houdini during the day, and the fact that I had to move in the middle of the competition (which messed up my schedule quite a bit). I learned a lot, didn't sleep much, but had a lot of fun!
I hope you'll find something in this project that interests you as much as it did me.
Don't hesitate to contact me on Linkedin if you have any questions, I'll be happy to answer them!
Here [drive.google.com] is the GDrive containing all the source files, .hip, UE ZIP, renders, and walkthrough videos.
Procedurally yours,
Luka Croisez Ventura
I'm happy to introduce you to my “NewByzance” project, as well as its pipeline developed for its “Undini” needs.
NewByzance is a smart procedural content generator, designed to create an entire “turnkey” environment with simple input primitives, combining the power of Houdini for intelligent scattering and Unreal's PCG for low-cost display.
Undini is a custom pipeline I've developed on the side, allowing me to bypass the Houdini Engine to have more control over the data I pass between Houdini and Unreal. It runs in background, and is driven from a Unreal widget. No need to keep going back and forth, and total control over the data communicated between the software.
Undini is open-source, and available here: https://github.com/luk4m4repo/luk4m4_Undini_framework [github.com]
For this project, my plan was clear: to have the most challenging procedural game enviro possible. To achieve this, I developed a whole range of tools on Houdini, from a simple UV wizard to a deck-generating multi-ray launcher. All in all, a whole lot of VEX. Handy for practicing!
All the wrangles have remained hard-coded in the Houdini project for lack of time to write an include file.
On Unreal, despite the reduced time available, I paid maximum attention to detail, keeping performance at the heart of my build. PCG limits drawcalls to a minimum and lets me customize my assets as needed in BPs. Very nice to use.
In the end, I did my best to be efficient but keep to my original intention, which was to have something technically interesting, innovative and pretty all in one, despite a full-time job as TD Houdini during the day, and the fact that I had to move in the middle of the competition (which messed up my schedule quite a bit). I learned a lot, didn't sleep much, but had a lot of fun!
I hope you'll find something in this project that interests you as much as it did me.
Don't hesitate to contact me on Linkedin if you have any questions, I'll be happy to answer them!
Here [drive.google.com] is the GDrive containing all the source files, .hip, UE ZIP, renders, and walkthrough videos.
Procedurally yours,
Luka Croisez Ventura
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- ShootingBLIND
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Hello,
My name is Mike Perzel, I am happy to present my submission for the Game Environment Challenge. My main goal for this project was to work on building a toolset for Unreal Engine, streamlining the environment creation process. I have built a handful of tools including a Greeble Generator, a Cavity Scatter tool, and a Building Generator. Some of the challenges came through optimizing, troubleshooting and problem solving my tools and workflows.
Thank you SideFX and Staff for the challenge, it was a lot of fun.
Here is a link to all of the files for the project including my videos:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1zjWXN6ZA5kve91rq7RsbL4lkXpBKMWdp?usp=sharing [drive.google.com]
https://youtu.be/Tks5JfzOBg0 [youtu.be]
My name is Mike Perzel, I am happy to present my submission for the Game Environment Challenge. My main goal for this project was to work on building a toolset for Unreal Engine, streamlining the environment creation process. I have built a handful of tools including a Greeble Generator, a Cavity Scatter tool, and a Building Generator. Some of the challenges came through optimizing, troubleshooting and problem solving my tools and workflows.
Thank you SideFX and Staff for the challenge, it was a lot of fun.
Here is a link to all of the files for the project including my videos:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1zjWXN6ZA5kve91rq7RsbL4lkXpBKMWdp?usp=sharing [drive.google.com]
https://youtu.be/Tks5JfzOBg0 [youtu.be]
Edited by ShootingBLIND - 2025年7月13日 10:49:09
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- parrtizan
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Hey, my name is Daniel and this is my project Druids Forest. I took the idea to create a location in the style of the World of Warcraft, classic ruins of the old civilization in a sunny autumn forest. It was the first time I did the whole process of creating the project without leaving Houdini and it was quite an interesting experience! Below you can see what I got and my process of creating the project.
Houdini 20.5.613 Unreal 5.4.4
Unreal project, houdini projects and HDAs: Your text to link here... [drive.google.com]
Houdini 20.5.613 Unreal 5.4.4
Unreal project, houdini projects and HDAs: Your text to link here... [drive.google.com]
Edited by parrtizan - 2025年7月14日 03:32:24
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- SoloLera
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Hi! That`s my Skywoods project. Since I`m submitting the idea for 2 different categories, the explanation will be splitted into 2 forum branches to respect the rules. Hope I`ll manage to follow the general line though
Part 1.
Like I mentioned, the architectural style of the city is inspired by modernist and brutalist architecture. To me it represents a huge forgotten dream about the robotic and cosmic future. These unique enormous massive buildings scattered all around the world feel like living reminders about how creative, huge and sometimes illogical a man can be.
The idea was starting from a forest environment but adding floating constructions on trees to use all available space and playing with gravity.
Created simple valley relief. Why else is the city abandoned? And to cheat with visuals from high points ofc.
Scattered trees, and something looking like ground foliage.
Constructed changeable HDA modules for very basic visual and function variety. Honestly, mostly to re-explore the idea of modularity in architecture. 3D itself is a great sandbox for architects and the procedural approach turns it into an amusement park. We can actually endlessly spawn these “nests” using vertical scatter with a touch of magic and it`s fun.
From cinematics the scene looks brutal and promising at the same time (at least to me). Props and a good story about exploring the city through the passes, collecting some details and building some miracle machine in the central module would work I think.
Cinematic:
https://youtu.be/iSvs20pDCek [youtu.be]
Files:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1iO8bgbwC5BTmwQFjpGuw0welFDmtlU1l?usp=sharing [drive.google.com]
Part 1.
Like I mentioned, the architectural style of the city is inspired by modernist and brutalist architecture. To me it represents a huge forgotten dream about the robotic and cosmic future. These unique enormous massive buildings scattered all around the world feel like living reminders about how creative, huge and sometimes illogical a man can be.
The idea was starting from a forest environment but adding floating constructions on trees to use all available space and playing with gravity.
Created simple valley relief. Why else is the city abandoned? And to cheat with visuals from high points ofc.
Scattered trees, and something looking like ground foliage.Constructed changeable HDA modules for very basic visual and function variety. Honestly, mostly to re-explore the idea of modularity in architecture. 3D itself is a great sandbox for architects and the procedural approach turns it into an amusement park. We can actually endlessly spawn these “nests” using vertical scatter with a touch of magic and it`s fun.
From cinematics the scene looks brutal and promising at the same time (at least to me). Props and a good story about exploring the city through the passes, collecting some details and building some miracle machine in the central module would work I think.
Cinematic:
https://youtu.be/iSvs20pDCek [youtu.be]
Files:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1iO8bgbwC5BTmwQFjpGuw0welFDmtlU1l?usp=sharing [drive.google.com]
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- NicTanghe
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Here's My entry to the Lost Cities of the elderwood
Welcome to the lost Telmple of elderwood.
Adrift on one of the moons of eldat.
Share is working again
share:https://tinyurl.com/elderwoooo [tinyurl.com]
Welcome to the lost Telmple of elderwood.
Adrift on one of the moons of eldat.
Share is working again
share:https://tinyurl.com/elderwoooo [tinyurl.com]
Edited by NicTanghe - 2025年7月14日 18:09:33
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- sarnett21
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Hi! Here is my Elderwood project. It is a Viking village inspired by Rohan from Lord of the Rings and the Golden Hall from Beowulf. Please be sure to watch the whole explanation video for details regarding my inspiration and process.
Here is the google drive link with all of the materials (images, cinematic, explanation video, and scene files):
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1RXTcLaDpjBMpHr8I312HcMLCMbA7wIqO?usp=sharing [drive.google.com]
(the audio on the explanation video is a little quiet, so I recommend turning up the volume)
Thank you!
Here is the google drive link with all of the materials (images, cinematic, explanation video, and scene files):
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1RXTcLaDpjBMpHr8I312HcMLCMbA7wIqO?usp=sharing [drive.google.com]
(the audio on the explanation video is a little quiet, so I recommend turning up the volume)
Thank you!
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- timelessjang
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- Joined: 10月 2020
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Hi everyone! I'm Jamie. This is my stylized ruins scene for the Houdini Game Art Challenge 2025 – Environment category.
After I submitted my Procedural Ruin Wall Tool for the Tools category, I kept working and built a full scene using tools I made in Houdini. This is my first time making a full environment with my own tools, and I really enjoyed learning how powerful and fast procedural workflows can be for environment art.
The style is inspired by The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom. I wanted to make a quiet and magical place, like a hidden corner in an old world.
I made the ruins wall, trees, flowers, and campfire tools myself, and also created a stylized foliage decal in COPS. If you want to know more about how I made the ruin wall, you can check my entry in the Tools category.
I'm very happy to join this challenge with so many talented artists.
Thanks for reading, and good luck to everyone!
download the source files here [drive.google.com]
After I submitted my Procedural Ruin Wall Tool for the Tools category, I kept working and built a full scene using tools I made in Houdini. This is my first time making a full environment with my own tools, and I really enjoyed learning how powerful and fast procedural workflows can be for environment art.
The style is inspired by The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom. I wanted to make a quiet and magical place, like a hidden corner in an old world.
I made the ruins wall, trees, flowers, and campfire tools myself, and also created a stylized foliage decal in COPS. If you want to know more about how I made the ruin wall, you can check my entry in the Tools category.
I'm very happy to join this challenge with so many talented artists.
Thanks for reading, and good luck to everyone!
download the source files here [drive.google.com]
Edited by timelessjang - 2025年7月14日 21:53:35
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- geetee2323
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"Failure's just practice for winning, darling." — Dorothy Parker 1893-1967
So many things left to do but I did purposefully setout to aim for something unhinged and grandiose to reflect the lore of my Elderwood and its deep-time Von Neumann construction, all guided by the warped bot of CivAlpha.
Its been a satisfying dive into local lore, history and nature while trying out many new aspects of Houdini, some crucial things I couldn't get to work but I've brazenly ploughed on with my new setup so apologies if it runs like a donkey on a more typical machine, just glad to have taken part at this point and look forward to going through some of the files submitted.
all the best to yeas all,
Slainte
(Houdini Files)
https://www.idrive.com/idrive/sh/sh?k=u7z6a7x4c3 [www.idrive.com]
(Unreal Files)
https://www.idrive.com/idrive/sh/sh?k=i0c0i7n8m6 [www.idrive.com]
p.s the music is just me noodling
So many things left to do but I did purposefully setout to aim for something unhinged and grandiose to reflect the lore of my Elderwood and its deep-time Von Neumann construction, all guided by the warped bot of CivAlpha.
Its been a satisfying dive into local lore, history and nature while trying out many new aspects of Houdini, some crucial things I couldn't get to work but I've brazenly ploughed on with my new setup so apologies if it runs like a donkey on a more typical machine, just glad to have taken part at this point and look forward to going through some of the files submitted.
all the best to yeas all,
Slainte
(Houdini Files)
https://www.idrive.com/idrive/sh/sh?k=u7z6a7x4c3 [www.idrive.com]
(Unreal Files)
https://www.idrive.com/idrive/sh/sh?k=i0c0i7n8m6 [www.idrive.com]
p.s the music is just me noodling
Gareth J.R. McFarlane
Occupation:hmm...Houdini is kinda keeping me occupied of late, in good fashion :)
Location:Not far from where Ned Stark beheaded that fellow(we were not consulted)
Occupation:hmm...Houdini is kinda keeping me occupied of late, in good fashion :)
Location:Not far from where Ned Stark beheaded that fellow(we were not consulted)
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- dbaciu
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Ok guys, so here it is, Project Yggdrasil, the tree of life.
Like I've said in the WIP section, I wanted to do an "insect city" of sorts, being inspired
by the pictures I've taken in the local parks as references for the project.
Being an enormous tree (and level) I've put it into an off-road setting (it is much easier to drive around
)
Try to climb to the top! (although the bridges that should have make it possible are not there, unfortunately,
but still, it makes for an excellent off-road adventure)
I did not have the time to put all the stuff that I've wanted inside, it is more like the path to the "city".
A LOT of stuff should have been in there, and it will be.
I hope you'll like it.
On the technical side, it is a "game in a hda" sort of thing, with minimal controls.
Only the seed and the number of tree roots are exposed.
It contains the full vex tree generator, I should make it as an entry for the tool section
Here is the link to all the files
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1cFj-GRurP-aJ1K6nQCjlXXnm3mjQ_xHW?usp=sharing [drive.google.com]
Here is the video
https://vimeo.com/1101331916?p=0s [vimeo.com]
Here are the images
Like I've said in the WIP section, I wanted to do an "insect city" of sorts, being inspired
by the pictures I've taken in the local parks as references for the project.
Being an enormous tree (and level) I've put it into an off-road setting (it is much easier to drive around
)Try to climb to the top! (although the bridges that should have make it possible are not there, unfortunately,
but still, it makes for an excellent off-road adventure)
I did not have the time to put all the stuff that I've wanted inside, it is more like the path to the "city".
A LOT of stuff should have been in there, and it will be.
I hope you'll like it.
On the technical side, it is a "game in a hda" sort of thing, with minimal controls.
Only the seed and the number of tree roots are exposed.
It contains the full vex tree generator, I should make it as an entry for the tool section
Here is the link to all the files
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1cFj-GRurP-aJ1K6nQCjlXXnm3mjQ_xHW?usp=sharing [drive.google.com]
Here is the video
https://vimeo.com/1101331916?p=0s [vimeo.com]
Here are the images
Edited by dbaciu - 2025年7月14日 17:22:36
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- Elise Illy
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Hi (again maybe). So sorry, but I have some issues uploading on the forum, so just in case I sent a second post which is a lot shorter this time in hopes for not missing the deadline. Cheers!
Elizabeth
All my files: Your text to link here... [drive.google.com]
Elizabeth
All my files: Your text to link here... [drive.google.com]
Edited by Elise Illy - 2025年7月15日 06:34:11
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- teacupsandtime
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Hi all, this is my submission to the Game Art Challenge 2025 for Best Realtime Environment!
I imagined the Lost City of Elderwood to be a barren citadel-island, surrounded by mountains filled with treacherous paths. The energy orbs keep the city alive for those worthy to discover it yet again.
All of the assets where made in Houdini and manually imported into Unreal. I created an HDA to build ruins from scratch, allowing artists to carefully control the level of destruction from the exposed parameters. With several layers of resolution visualisation, I tried to remove iteration time so that the final, high-resolution mesh could be done only at the end of the iterative process.
Good job to everyone!
Cinematic Video:
Google drive project files here [drive.google.com] .
I imagined the Lost City of Elderwood to be a barren citadel-island, surrounded by mountains filled with treacherous paths. The energy orbs keep the city alive for those worthy to discover it yet again.
All of the assets where made in Houdini and manually imported into Unreal. I created an HDA to build ruins from scratch, allowing artists to carefully control the level of destruction from the exposed parameters. With several layers of resolution visualisation, I tried to remove iteration time so that the final, high-resolution mesh could be done only at the end of the iterative process.
Good job to everyone!
Cinematic Video:
Google drive project files here [drive.google.com] .
Edited by teacupsandtime - 2025年7月14日 23:36:48
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- jemovfx
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Hello everyone!
I had quite a lot of trouble figuring this one out! I made a bunch of procedural scattering tools in Houdini to fill up my scene. I used very basic RBD to mimic that nature has taken over this road and now there's a cute little hut living under a tree. I created my own procedurally generated assets, scattering tools and to be quite honest went a bit too wild with the Unreal foliage tool. It was very fun! I wanted the feeling of walking around in a forest surrounded by the colors of nature. There's a lot of things I wish I could improve, but figuring out procedural trees (kind of) was quite satisfying!
https://vimeo.com/1101410978?share=copy [vimeo.com]
My drive with all the files
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1IeJMZ1W_fGS-0blokiWC6FYVW1DKfZaa?usp=drive_link [drive.google.com]
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