Part 5
With many of the game mechanics settled, now we are focusing on level design. The game will start out with a tutorial level telling player about the controls of the game. Once they exit the tutorial, they will go into a crossroads room. From here, there will be 3 branching paths. For progression through the game, we were deciding to either go for a branching path, which is a game which has optional routes which you can take to get additional items or rewards with another path that progresses the level and story, or a linear game where everything is in one line and more mechanics or levels are given out as you progress through the levels. Both have their pros and cons. Branching games give players more choices which may engage them more but backtracking may turn them away from it. Linear games are good for players who dislike backtracking but players who want more choice may find it confining. Overall, we decided to go for a branching game. We want to have branching paths to allow the user to choose how to play the game. Users can go for each extra item or challenge themselves and try to finish with only the starting item. This is in hopes of introducing replay ability to the game so that the player will have reason to come back and try different things with the game. If we are able to create more levels at a future date, we will be able to use this to create an extensive experience for the player. On the paths, we will also put indicators that symbolize the contents of each room, but the players will not know what they mean. We did this so that later on the player can learn for themselves what each indicator symbolizes and choose how to play the game accordingly. Two paths will lead to optional helping items like another gun or a health pack while the last one progresses the game. Once the player finishes the room that progresses the game, they will have another crossroads with similar branching paths. Now the game progressing room will lead to a boss which upon defeating it will finish the game. For the guns, we decided to have some obstacles like laser traps or dart traps blocking the way of the player from getting the gun. The laser traps had laser coming out in a cross pattern while rotating while the dart traps would shoot darts that dealt damage as well as slowing the player while taking some damage over time. The two puzzles both involve getting the timing right to get past them but we felt we could use them both to design different types of puzzles. We decided to put a puzzle to make the gameplay vary from the usual combat of the other rooms. We also wanted to make the player feel like they earned the weapon. For the actual design of the puzzle, we also tried to make it so that the player would be able to see the obstacle coming and not have something appear from off screen. This is because we wanted the players to not feel like the obstacle was unfair. Another thing we tried to avoid while creating the puzzle was sections where the player would get hit no matter what. I believe that players should have their skill at the game matter so having unavoidable damage from a puzzle was something I tried to avoid. For example, I designed the dart trap room and while I placed the traps around, I realized that there was certain sections where I found that players would get caught between traps and get sandwiched. From there, I learnt that I should try avoid unfair situations while designing the puzzles. As for the combat rooms, they were laid out in a way that there was an initial burst of enemies and “dens” which periodically spawned enemies the longer you stay in the room. At first, we were afraid that players could not clear the enemies fast enough and would get bogged down by the constantly spawning enemies. However, I felt that putting spawners was a good way to make players moving quickly and efficiently through the room and try to progress. Additional effects added included sound effects for walking, firing the gun in its different modes, as well as background music for the boss fights. Ryan was the one who mainly found them and we decided to add them to create a better atmosphere and set a tone for the game. We also wanted to give the game an extra ‘oomph’ feeling which is why we added certain sound effects. Notably, I want to highlight that we didn’t put any overworld music as we wanted to convey a feeling of loneliness and being trapped on a desolate planet. Other things we missed out for the final game was sound effects for reloading, trying to shoot an empty clip and start menu music. Conclusion Overall, I feel that designing my first video game was a good experience. However, I do feel that I would have like to design more interesting mechanics so I hope that in the future I will be able to think of some cool gameplay mechanics that will be able to catch other people’s attention
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August 2018
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