HorrorTexturesShowcase

If you're like me you probably find 3D modelling to be extremely tedious. If you enjoy coding games and making fun or interesting game mechanics either by inventing them or figuring out the logic of how to code them for yourself without following tutorials and that's what you enjoy about making games then an aversion to 3D modelling can set you back in terms of the aesthetic design aspects of making games.

Using only basic shapes like cubes and some left over shapes from a previous project (half cone and dumpster shape for the flashlight and it's on/off switch) I made this showcase to prove you don't need 3D modelling to make a great looking game. You just make the textures in some image editing program by making a collage of photos you can source online then you use a photoshop style image editing program to make corresponding normal maps, occlusion maps, and height maps.

In order to make the various types of maps you might need to change or invert the colors and things of the various parts of each image to make sure they work the way you want them to. The height/occlusion maps are reasonably intuitive they just need to be black and white images and you can keep any raised parts in a separate layer in the image editing program and make sure they're lighter than the surrounding areas (lowered parts are probably already dark like gaps between floorboards etc). The normal maps might be a little more finicky but you can just mess around with the contrast and making things lighter or darker so they stand out from each other as distinct shapes to make sure it turns out the way you want.

I got really bored of this project and just want to be done with it so it's not particularly polished and I couldn't find a quick and dirty way to make volumetric light for the flashlight in URP without buying an asset which I don't want to ever do for any reason. This isn't the best looking demo but you can imagine how good it would look if it had volumetric light and dust swimming in the beam. You could probably make a game that looks as good as a triple A title from the past however many years if you added those and other element like embellishments and things on the walls also I just left the ends of the walls how they automatically are with the whole texture crammed into the small space which obviously you would not do if you were serious about making it look good. 

I do not even have a 3D modelling program installed on any device I own beyond MS paint 3D so you can really see just what you can do using only basic shapes and the various texture maps. I really think this is something people would want to be aware of as they become interested in indie game development because 3D modelling really is painfully tedious to people who don't have a taste for it but that shouldn't mean they can only make low poly crude voxel looking games.

Note: The ripped carpet in the second hallway looked really cool originally then i tried to add the pattern from the carpet in the first hallway and it ruined it and I didn't notice until after I'd already uploaded this so if it looks bad that's why. If you did the same effect you could probably make it look really great because the first version was.