Journal Entry 2

2.3.2023

2D Game Kit walkthrough tutorial - 4 hours

Outcome: Finished build in a .rar file

Notes:

Maybe I have confused that we should have built on top of the first build from the second homework, I've uploaded a new build for the second homework, and will probably merge the two in the upcoming weeks. The level itself is also not finished, as I have in mind a much more sprawling and obscure level design, but I've implemented everything from the walkthrough.

I'm more comfortable with Unity, the logic of its features and more and more intuitive and my imagination is already running wild. ^^

In terms of design, I wanted to utilize much bigger and confusing environments. 2D games often feel claustrophobic to me, despite their sprawling designs, because of how tight all the assets and platforms are placed. That's why the game starts with a big drop into the level, I want the place to feel big, as an underground long lost dungeon and not just platforms put together.
After the drop right to the left of the player they can find a locked door with no way how to open it yet. I think it adds a direction to the player, they know which way they need to *ultimately go*. The fact that the door is on the left is also important. I don't want the game to be bound by a general directionality (all axis of directions will be utilized, not just from left to right like some games are).
Upon going to the right, after missing a very simple obstacle they reach an edge and it was important for me that they don't see what's beyond it. If they wait there for a while, they'll see a platform rotating in a rectangular formation, if they drop down, they can notice another way that's right below them. From that point, there is 6 possible directions for the player, 2 of which are inaccessible as of now because the jump necessary for them to make is too big. They will either be getting a powerup with a higher jump or a box will be present on each of those platforms respectively, that once they get where they wanted to jump from the other side, they will function as a shortcut.
Only one path as of now is design, it runs below from where the player was coming and it eventually leads to the locked door they encountered earlier. On the path player encounters their first enemy. The switch for the door is far enough from it that the player doesn't see them on the screen at the same time. Either they reach the door first, they notice where they found themselves in and will look for a way how to open it, or they walk over the switch first, and the loud sound cue will indicate that somewhere something opened, and they can decide on exploring what it was finding the opened passageway.
If they from there continue further to the left there is a box right on the end of a cliff. They can either try to push it or jump over it. Under it, however, is an enemy that would get crushed by it. If the player falls off the unfinished level they are teleported back to the spawn as of now.

I have numerous interesting ideas I think on how to utilize both moving platforms and interactable boxes and teleports. The nodes and component mechanics are super intuitive and all the possible options are starting to reveal in my imagination. x) One idea I have now is to have moving platforms that are hidden under an uninteractible layer of ground sprites, so that so the player could have always used it as a shortcut only if they knew about it.