LOCKEZ'S PROFILE

author=El_WaKa
Edit: Well, at least I can give it some use because I was wondering... There's a Misao for "Most Promising Demo", and I want to review and nominate a game for that. But the rules of the event only mention completed games? So... that review won't count?

That review and nomination is definitely appreciated, and the review will still earn you makerscore like normal. But this event is focused on reviewing completed games from this year, so it won't count for the event.

Sounds like your life is supremely fucked up and you should probably figure out what you're running from so hard.

A few long straight walls are okay. They're certainly better than the zig-zag walls you get when you try to make curves or diagonals with the RTP graphics. My #1 recommendation would be to find different cave graphics that actually have curved corners instead of perfect right angles, and preferably also diagonal and curved walls.

Using just one ground tile everywhere, combined with no changes in height and almost no doodads, also doesn't look great.

Also, this should be obvious, but you need to erase the shadows along the edges of the walls. There's no light source to cast those shadows like that. This is indoors. I assume those are only there because you forgot the engine made them automatically.

I think this is a pretty good list. I think if you want to make the game more interesting than the small set of choices in Darken's list suggests, you're going to have to do so by combining these structures together and looping them back around on each other to create a more complex map. Or, you're going to have to start making the player choose their path in a more interesting and interactive way than just walking in a different direction.

I do think it's worth counting a unique case where the player has to not only select the right path, but also first discover that it exists. This isn't really a different structure than anything Darken mentioned, but it's another way to differentiate the exploration in two different games that might otherwise seem to use the same option out of Darken's list.



In the original Legend of Zelda, you have to bomb every wall and burn every bush in the entire game. A few bombable walls have moblins inside who make you pay the door repair fee for blowing up their house. Most others have a reward which might be either optional or mandatory. Some things are not hidden, though the non-hidden things are never traps. This is probably the most common structure for hidden paths - having all three types, while also making some mandatory paths be non-hidden.

In a typical section of Super Metroid, there are likely to be a bunch of hidden spots you can find, each by a slightly different method. There's also one mandatory path which is not hidden. The mandatory path often has obstacles that take some time to figure out, but its mere existence is never invisible like the optional rewards are. For example, to complete a mandatory path, you might enter a room have to use your grappling hook in a new way you've never used it before, but to find an optional item you might have to shoot a random tile that looks identical to 800 other tiles in the same room. There are no traps in Super Metroid.

La Mulana is an exercise in frustration for many players - it's a game where every single thing in the game is hidden. Unlike Super Metroid or Legend of Zelda, there's no systematic way to discover these hidden paths - each one is different, often requiring the player to solve what amounts to an invisible puzzle, like "stand in this unmarked spot for 3 minutes" or "fall onto this unmarked tile from as high as possible." And none of these puzzles have even their presence conveyed to the player in an obvious way - in 100% of cases, it's possible to go through a room without even realizing there's something to find. The game conveys what to do via subtle clues that the player must notice and then also interpret, such as "there was a thump sound and it came from the right speaker, so maybe something happened in a room further right" or "this statue's eyes opened, so I should check the room 19 screens back where there was another matching statue."

The Tomb of Horrors is a classic Dungeons & Dragons adventure. A typical room in the Tomb of Horrors has a lot of details, one obvious exit which is (almost) always a trap, and a lot of hidden traps which are punishments for interacting with the wrong detail or doing so in the wrong way. The game uses riddles to try to convey what to do, but interpreting the riddles is difficult. The riddles often only make sense in retrospect (and sometimes not even then). For example, the riddle "If you find the false you find the true" is supposed to convey that when players find a hidden door leading to a dead end with a trap, they can search the dead end (after being impaled with spikes) to find a second hidden door which actually leads to mandatory progress.

Notably, in all of the above games except for Super Metroid, it's possible (in fact, it's very likely) for players to get stuck and simply be unable to complete the game without a walkthrough. I think that is frustrating to a large majority of players, and is why very few games put mandatory objectives behind hidden paths. Modern Metroid and Zelda games heavily de-emphasize even optional hidden paths, having only the occasional bombable wall or hidden grotto that isn't clearly marked. I think it's not a coincidence that Super Metroid is a game people love, Legend of Zelda is a game people tolerate because of its sequels, and the other two games I listed are strongly hated by most players. Most people really do not like hidden mandatory paths. La Mulana has a small niche audience that enjoys it, though. So maybe there are enough people who do like them for an indie developer to capitalize on the fact that AAA games are ignoring that audience.