The Outer Worlds 2 - Laplace's Garden

Laplace's Garden is the Headquarters of the Order of The Ascendant. This is a major faction in the game. This POI features 10 quests - OA Faction Questline, and Side Quests.

This POI is on the planet Cloister, and is accessible in that region. This is a Settlement, and it shows how the OA functions as a society.

This POI went through many iterations. The main goal was to get the person to the main building where they could start/conduct the Faction Quests. This screenshot is from the entrance of one iteration.

This is the same blockout as above. The goal was to offer a direct path to the Main Building, while showing the optional gameplay elsewhere in the POI. I didn't like how the player had to go so far out of there way for optional content, so I iterated.

This was the next iteration. The player enters from where the image was taken.
Yellow - main building
green - commerce space
blue - exploration, RPG gameplay
brown - exploration, Quest area

This was again another iteration. The player in this version was brought right past vendors, with a straight path to the main building. This made it fun and easy to restock or prepare items for gameplay when coming or going from here.

The new design funneled the player past things, so opening up sightlines to other areas was essential. This screenshot shows how we placed visible routes around to incentivize exploration.

Showing how people lived here was important, so in this iteration I had apartments. These got cut to make room for more important quest gameplay elements, and the residential aspect became an implied visual element (shown below)

This is the final result. The player has leading lines to the main goal, as well as a clear, path to get there. The shops on the left/right are immediately visible as well, offering that distraction/optional gameplay.

Walking past the Cafe, the player has a clear sightline to the barista within. This NPC also has a quest associated with them in this POI.

There's a clear sightline to the shopkeeper as well when the player walks by. It was important to me to convey gameplay possibilities as clearly as possible in this POI. I wanted the player to be drawn to exploration here.

The cafe was a place the player would return to for a quest, so I put in some effort to build up the space more than a saloon-like would usually be. I filled the space with Crowd NPCs and some ambience to help with worldbuilding and immersion.

The second floor has a vending machine, and some more ambience. Showing the daily lives of OA citizens was important to me - I wanted this to show the society.

The quest for the barista brings the player to this facility, where they will discover that the OA is drugging the water supply.

The interior features some RPG gameplay opportunities, and some lore to dive into.

On the same side of the POI sits a Lab. This is purely a worldbuilding structure. Inside the player can see scientists going about their work. Showing, not just telling, how the faction functions was important to me.

There is a Doctor, a courtyard, and a park. These feature more gameplay, RPG opportunities, and some minor reactive elements. The tree in the center is also a Weenie for the POI, it can be seen from anywhere - including the Main Building

This courtyard has two RPG gameplay opportunities. The player can repair lights using Engineering, or help out a student in a class with Explosives research.

This screenshot shows students being lectured. This serves two purposes
1 - RPG gameplay opportunity (help a student cheat on an exam)
2 - shows the impact of the OA leaders taking over the Lecture Hall (main building)

The park has an RPG opportunity for the player to fix the fountains. The lit up section draws the player toward the gameplay opportunity for this.

Allowing the players RPG choices to have a positive and visual impact on the space was implemented by me to add a subtle feeling of connection to the space for the player.
top - initial fountain, broken, no waterfall
bottom - fixed fountain, waterfalls

The main building itself. This lobby brings the player to different quest areas in the building. It's open and large for the potential combat in this space

To the left of the entrance, there's a lecture hall that has been repurposed into a Meeting Room for other Faction's delegates

On the ground floor, straight past tghe stairs are where the other Faction's representatives are housed. These rooms show repurposing as well.

Past the patio, or past the Representatives chambers, also on the ground floor is the War Room. This is where the OA Faction meets for their war efforts. This room is revisited for the Faction Questline.

To the right, there is a patio with views to the rest of the POI. A major Faction Quest NPC is placed here.

At the top of the stairs is the entrance to the Faction Leader's Sensory Deprivation Chamber room. This is where the player is introduced to the Faction Leader

This POI turns int a combat space during one of the games' quests. The Auntie's Choice Faction has assaulted the Order Headquarters, and the player fights with them to kill the OA Leader.

I set-dressed the area with corpses and blood to show the recent, and brutal active combat.

I also added new cover objects for the combat - both the player and NPCs can use these during the fight, but they're not present during the default state of the POI.

At the end, the player gets to fight a beefed-up variant of the Faction Leader in the main lobby of the main building.