Hey Guys. Long term viewer, part time troll here I've loved this forum for a while, and have to say that there is a lot of very usefull information in these forums, not to mention the kindness of some of the members here in sharing said information. As mentioned in the title, I'm piecing together a new platform game. I say new, as it's the first attempt I've ever had with designing a game period (excluding mapping in UT2k4 and CSS). I've teamed up with a fellow TA member and we're hoping to release something in a month or so all being well. I have a huge number of questions, but this is the one which will be most important, in my opinion..... LEVEL DESIGN! There are so many different games out there but from what I can tell, the following image below pretty much covers the styles of level people go for: Red = Side Scroller Green = Upwards scroller, a la doodle jump Yellow = top down map style game/rpg Blue = What I'm thinking of...kind of Now, please let me know of further styles, as this all helps. My line of thought is a game that is either Green in style, but not infinite in height (likely to be 5-6 iphone screens (320*6 pixels)). The other option is something designed in the blue area, where you still go up, but also left and right. The phone will be held horizontally however, not vertically. What are your guys thoughts? Also, if I did utilise the blue are of a level design, could the gameplay character be larger, or should it stick to a 32x32 type size? Cheers P3z
Side scrollers normally use the red area, but there is no reason you can't make a taller play area if you have elevators or something to take you through the level. Don't imagine you'd want to leave it open and potentially have the player fall all the way back down to the beginning. What I normally do is pick a maximum map size (say 128x128) and then build an enclosed level within that space. That way you can make anything you want, tall, long, etc.
Cheers for the response RPG. When you say 128*128 - what parameter are you using? Obviously not pixels as that's less than the screen size? Would you go for something "a la" the green zone, or say the blue zone? My concern with the blue zone is that width is fine, but players will get lost/confused? Pez
I mean 128x128 tiles. Tile size could be 32 or 64 pixels. It all depends on what kind of game you're making. Most platformers move left/right and don't have much height.
