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Curiosity Development Report #4
The fourth Curiosity Development Report, a weekly report of what we've done, what has gone well and what has gone completely wrong during the development of our next game.
3 Min Read
ALL SET AND READY TO GO
Goooooood evening everyone! Welcome to the fourth Curiosity Development Report. This will probably be the shortest one yet as this week was spent fleshing out little details and making sure we have a game plan ready for next month's work and therefore there isn't really much to explain. So lets get this done then we can all go home and have a nice Sunday roast, unless you already are at home in which case you can just have your Sunday roast.
OUT ON THE OPEN WORLD
One of the major final changes we made to the level design is to scrap the idea of seamed together levels and instead go for a more open world feel. The new layout for each world will consist of a hub area where players can relax, interact with NPCs, purchase items and check their progress. Surrounding the hub will be several areas which would originally have been the separate levels, players can choose which order they complete these levels apart from any required tutorial levels which will be first and the boss levels which will be last. The aim of this is to make the player feel like they are exploring an actual world rather than progressing through individual levels.
This level design will also aid us in creating a sense of wonder when player's find new areas, discover secret bosses and unlock new items. We want player's to feel a huge sense of accomplishment when they defeat a world, to feel like all that learning and exploration was worth it and this style of level design feels like the most effective way to create that.
TOLD YOU IT WAS SHORT
Well I did tell you it was short, the level design wasn't the only thing we did, there was plenty of other little bits we tampered with but they're so little that they wouldn't really be able to fill their own section so I'll just list a few of them off the top of my head:
Player's will be able to buy standard armour sets from vendors in the hubs or collect the required items to build rarer ones which contain stat boosts
We refined the upgrade system so that each upgrade falls under one of three categories; player, items and misc. Player's still earn upgrades by completing challenges rather than collecting ability points and choosing which upgrade to pick.
Enemies and puzzles will follow the player skills that a platformer typically requires; Timing and pattern recognition.
The majority of puzzles won't be too complex in order to keep the player moving through the world.
A couple of recurring hub NPCs were created including a gambler who the player can play gambling mini games with in an attempt to win more coins and a time trial man who will challenge the player to collect all gold time trial trophies. Both NPCs have side quests that will lead to the player unlocking special items and armour sets.
NEXT MONTH
Next month we will be working on prototyping the different rules and mechanics and making any necessary tweaks as well as creating the first draft of the story and level design. It's full steam ahead from here on out!
Keep on gaming,
Shaun Quaintance.
RECAP
- Spent this week working on final tweaks to the concept doc
- Prototyping different rules and mechanics next month
- Also creating first draft of the story next month
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