Game:

Valheim (2021)

Duration: 2:37

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38

Been a hot minute since I played Valheim. Well, definitely longer than when snapping QoL was added to the game lol

I've paid my dues with survival mode builds so I decided to try something different this time around with no build cost, no enemies/raids, but otherwise still adhering to load bearing limits, etc and placing everything vanilla in-game without using mods to position/rotate stuff.

I also decided to make as un-Valheim as possible a build in that I'd avoid the usual cliches I end up while building anything with the (rather limited, let's be real lol) build pieces in the game. Namely:

- Avoiding ramshackle-looking roofing or ones that change their incline

- Avoiding rafters/hammerbeams. I know it tends to be overdone simply because the build pieces lend themselves well to it, but after a certain point it detracts from other architectural elements when there's a ton of wood going all over the place high up in the build

- Using the 2m door as little as possible - it's an odd piece that really throws the game's scale into a weird spot, since no practical door is exactly the height of a person if there are options available

- Avoiding 1m stair run heights- either goes way more than that, or does 0.5m increments at a time. 1m stairs is in the same boat as 2m doors in that it throws scale perception all out of wack (you very rarely see differences of height IRL that are 1m)

- Avoiding completely circular towers. Yes I know I do this way too often lmao. Instead, rotation shenanigans are used to connect 90 angles or otherwise enhance the angular shapes in the build

- Using rotation and micronudging a ton to break up the blocky, 2m-grid look of the game

- Starting windows from 0.5m off the ground wherever possible.

- In general, trying to mask the 2m-grid nature of the game. A lot of the wooden constructions and windows deliberately are 1.5 or 2.5m (3 or 5 'planks') across to help with this effect. The top floors are displaced 0.5m in both directions vs the bottom floor. etc etc.

- Trying to keep a sensible sense of scale overall. The only thing that is far larger than it would be in real life is the fireplace, and that's largely because there aren't many options when the stone needed to build a convincing chimney is a chunky 1m across, lol

- Focusing on specific architectural configurations - in this case deliberately leaning towards jettying and half-floors

- Lighting for effect. I'm tired of building stuff that ends up lit by a massive orange patch (the campfire) that then reflects off a dozen metal surfaces everywhere. Tried to put lights in places that result in a more distributed, muted fantasy mood.

I'm pretty happy with the result. Might actually come back to this and add more buildings bit by bit till I have a small town square or my computer dies

Music: Nature Sequence (6th Layer) from Made in Abyss Season 2 - Kevin Penkin/KADOKAWA

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