How do you design building interior layouts?

[Skaruts]

The title may mislead a bit, so let me expand on what I mean exactly. I've had this problem for a long time.

 

When designing a building, I usually don't know exactly what to put inside it. For example, if I'm designing a police station, I know it takes interrogation rooms, a mess hall... office booths... cell blocks... and I'm already running out of ideas. It surely takes more stuff than that. I've been trying to design a museum and I'm having a bit of trouble deciding what to fit in it, besides the art galleries.

 

I met a guy once who's job was specifically to plan this sort of thing out for architects (I think), basically listing them what a functional building needs to have inside it, but I don't remember what the job was called.

 

Googling isn't helping me much, so far (I'm trying different search terms). How do you people do it when you aren't sure of what to make of a building?

Edited February 11, 2014 by Skaruts

[Obsttorte]

For large buildings I start compartmenteliazing it first.

 

So for a museum I would divide it into several wings, maybe some sort of administrational part. The basement I would divide into a storage part, an electrical/machine part etc...

 

Then you have connections like hallways and stairs, you need toilets, bureaus, little chambers to store stuff into, etc..

 

It can also be very positive if you don't have too much ideas. The more you put inside the more you have to map

 

You can try to make the building appear larger then it actually is by making the layout a bit mazelike (so not just straight hallways), adding differences in height, make direct accesses "unpassable" (locked door, much lights+guards, loud surface etc.), adding fake doors to inaccessable wings, adding outdoor areas in the center or on the sides (like a garden or similar).

 

In addition you don't have to build room-to-room. You can have spaces between them. It does not has to be realistic, it just has to appear so.

[RJFerret]

Good question, I'd love others' insights into this too.

 

For me, function, what needs to be done, where is it logical to do that? Who works there, where do they do their duties?

 

To embellish your police station, where do they eat? Where is that food prepared? Where is it stored? Where is it delivered? Where do they spend break time? How is that room heated? Where is it's fuel stored? Where is it delivered? Where do they sleep? Who cleans? Where is their supplies stored? Etc.

 

Bureaucracy is a horrible human invention for getting stuff done, but a wonderful invention for creating extra embellishments. You don't just need the functional space (museum gallery), but administration (where is the money handled), meeting rooms, office rooms, heating facilities, fuel facilities, storage facilities, research facilities, cleaning facilities, museums might have twice as much space dedicated to behind the scenes functions as gallery space!

 

You can also web search some functions and discover infrastructure. For example, many FMs feature a privy, nothing more than a bucket under a hole. But where does that get emptied out? It was used for gunpowder? OK, if stored for nitrate collection by petermen, where?

 

You can also peruse within DR for models and wonder, "where would I place that item?" It would go in a ___. Oh! The such-and-such needs space for that.

 

PS: After brain-storming this, I realized I use the old journalistic "who, what, where, when, why and how" thought process. For every individual who there's another bunch of "whose" supporting them, which leads to more "whats", and those give you more "wheres"!

[demagogue]

A similar way to think about RJF's questions is to imagine a full day for the people living or working in the building. Just go through the day hour by hour and think about what they might do, and that will give you a lot to work with.

 

The other source of fodder for me is what I think will add to the story or gameplay or pacing. If it's time for some challenge, I'd have something that needs some security. If it's time to reward a player for getting past a challenge, I'd have some eye-candy. Then you can go room by room and think about what kind of gameplay pacing you want to have for a player walking through it, and that will give you ideas about what the rooms should be like.

[Sotha]

You could look for building blueprints from the net:

http://medievalcastles.stormthecastle.com/images/castlefloorplanlarge.jpg

 

Then replace rooms to suit your need. For example, replace gardens into more prison-y areas. Add dungeons and torture chambers etc.

 

Visit old houses in real life. Visit houses in games. Pay attention how things are laid out. Replicate.

 

If you go modular, I could do it like I do nowadays:

1) Place modules into the void to form a floor plan. Edit them until it looks nice.

2) Then draw boxy brushes around the modules. Then press the "create room" button, and cut the walls into portals.

3) Monsterclip and add all the other mission stuff.

[Skaruts]

@RJ, indeed you nailed it there. I never attempted to "tell a story" through the environment, but I love when the environments do, and this will be my attempt at doing so. Or rather more like telling its history, maybe.

 

@Obsttorte & @Sotha, in this case I'm going for a semi-realistic space, because the museum (I'm still not sure if it's a museum, it's just the only thing that came to mind that can have many rare artifacts) is to be part of the city I'm building, in which some stuff wil happen after the big heist. I can still modulate it, but I need to maintain proportions. But I'm trying to avoid laying out an entire building and then realizing the building is only half done and then having to restructure everything. So I need to try to plan out at least the areas where the player can go, but I need to know what areas there are first. Even if I can write down a complete list, some areas may end up being just imaginary behind fake doors, but having a fake door with a plaque saying "storage" is more meaningful than a blank fake door.

 

Blueprints is a good idea. I had forgotten that such a thing existed... wtf... "hey brain, work?"

 

EDIT: wasn't there a specialized google search for blueprints, like the google patents? I could almost swear there was...

 

@demagogue, I like that thought process indeed. Gonna keep it in mind while building.

Edited February 11, 2014 by Skaruts