Liliana.
Azmi-Galoczi
Level theory
At the beginning of Martyn's lesson, our task was to choose an existing game and change its theme. Our group came up with a driving game called Driver San Francisco (Ubisoft, 2011). We added the themes action and sci-fi and mechanics of teleportation. This would affect the players’ experience by adding additional fun features to the game, especially in a sci-fi environment. This would be a drastic change from the original, as it increases the players' gaming experience in a positive route.
The evolution of sonic games were a mixture of improvement. Of course, it started as pixels and platformer. As more games evolved, more characters were added and games changed into various types of genres: cars, platformer, fighter games, 3D third-person, puzzle, joystick, sports and more. As I watched the evolution of sonic games, even though they improved story, character and graphics, they even made a nostalgic game of platformer and classic pixel style in 2010. However, as more Sonic games were developed over generations, additional mechanics were applied. For example, Sonic Unleashed (Sonic Team, 2008), the game adds Sonic to become a werehog (think werewolf) by Eggman’s newly created machine. So by night, Sonic transforms into a Werehog to defeat nightly enemies of Dark Gaia. But Sonic as a Werehog, the players cannot play as classic sonic (super speed), instead, they must fight with punches, slashes, and all kinds of Werehog abilities. This is a very new mechanic from the original Sonic games, since they’re always about being speedy and racing to the end.
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Overall, I noticed that SEGA made a mixture of game styles over the years to bring nostalgia. But also, from the YouTube video we watched about the main genius features of environment design, of Sonic Adventures 2: City Escape (SEGA, 2001). The video explained about the developers’ smart idea of freedom for the players. Simply, players are free to explore within the map the developers made, so even though there are borders where players can’t leap over, players can still discover the nooks and crannies of the map and get rewarded with extra collectables or a tutorial of how to whistle, for example. However, the developers designed the map fit for anyone - for the explorers, the learners, or for the get-on-with-it type of players. This method of level design expands the audience within the targeted age range because it’s almost as if anyone would be willing to play this game because it suits their trait.
This method continued in the Sonic Unleashed game and some other Sonic games.
Sonic game evolution: (SEGA, 1991-present):
ZoomZike (2019) ‘City Escape is Peak Sonic Game Design’ YouTube. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mlz-K3tRVxQ&t=458s [Accessed 14 September 2019].
Andrew Lewis (2019) ‘Evolution of Sonic Games 1991-2019’ YouTube. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkCufD6Dz9Q&t=2s [Accessed 12 September 2019].
When it’s the players’ first time playing apex legends, they’re obliged to go through the tutorial before going serious into a match. This is very good because this helps the players learn the pointers of the game, features such as environment, rules, types of weapons and the abilities of a character. They learn by being introduced to the movement controls by having the game show a checklist of controls on the side of the players’ screen. Once they completed the checklist, they follow BloodHound (character who teaches players the tutorial) down the hill. BloodHound then introduces the players the mechanics of looting: opening a Supply Bin, swapping items and using them. They are then pinged to a location where they learn Lifeline’s abilities, such as the tactical abilities and the ultimate abilities.
Apex Legends is a hero-based game, before starting a game, you choose one of the legends, out of the nine, to play as. However, the tutorial only allows you to play as one, Lifeline, which is one of the downfalls, but overall, it’s good that the players are obliged to play through tutorial before competing in the games, otherwise they would rage quit because they don’t know how to play.
Apex legends tutorial: (Respawn Entertainment, 2019):
Ammo - When a player loses ammo, they’d have to run away, before getting eaten alive, and find more to continue to go against enemies. But the more the players find, the more rewarding because it feels as if they have a satisfying abundance of ammo to use against, feeling unstoppable and empowered.
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Keys - In some games, gateways to an area require keys in order to proceed or find a secret passage/room. However, when a player defeats something, for example, and the object drops a key, it’s rewarding to have received that key because they can now successfully proceed to the next stage, or proceed to an area with extra features for the players to explore.
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Weapon upgrade - This personally, is my top favourite rewards in games. The satisfying ability to become stronger and successfully continue against stronger enemies, feeling empowered. But in order to achieve this, players must keep working by defeating enemies to gain more exp, or working through quests. To get something, you must work for it.
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Awkward item placement - Items, such as higher loot, tend to trick players by being in an awkward position that gets players the desire to find a way to reach the loot. Either a secret passageway, using powerups for a higher leap, grappling, explore for a parkour route, or explore items to build upwards towards it. At the end, it’s always rewarding, making the players feel satisfied.
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Hidden alcove - Hidden alcoves would tend to look suspicious. A suspicious texture on the wall, a suspicious looking hole in the wall, a book suspiciously sticking out to be pushed back in place to reveal a secret passageway, or even a painting waiting to be walked through to find a room of fabulous loot. Suspicious textures are endless. But when they catch a player’s eye, it is rewarding to find the solution of a puzzle or find that extra glorious loot.
Rewards:
New Super Mario Bros. (Nintendo, 2006) is a good example as it consists of:
- Awkward item placements
- Hidden alcoves and keys
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The layout of certain levels, with this list, for example, hidden alcoves, doesn’t normally show a suspicious texture of a wall/floor until the player falls/walks through it, stumbling upon a room of coins or passageway to a secret world or shortcut. Sometimes there are textures to make the players suspicious, therefore this makes them deter from completing the level - by stopping and looking closely at what they think may be a hidden alcove. With awkward item placements, if the players want what they found above their heads, floating, they will explore a route up to their reward, which slows them down from completing the level. But this also comes to challenges, the challenge of parkouring through to the reward. Sometimes, in Mario, it’s hard to “wahoo” your way through tiny mushrooms or flying coopers to finally reach the last red coin. This also comes to pace: when running through a red ring, the audio changes to an intense countdown until when the player is running out of time, the countdown becomes more intense, increasing the players’ pace to make sure they collect as much red coins as possible.
Whereas with the hidden alcoves, the pace is much slower because the players are exploring their newly discovered area, but if they take too long, they must proceed with their level because in Mario, the players’ time ticks…
With keys, players are obliged to explore for the key to proceed to the next area of the level. That would consist of killing boo ghosts or running back and forth across the area to look for the key. This pace is slow, unless the player is being chased by boos.
In a platformer game, like this, the layout for hidden alcoves would consist of pit looking as if they’re pits of doom, until players accidentally fall through them, and whilst falling, they find a platform to land on quickly to receive a reward/find a passageway to a shortcut, for example, but even this would be an example of an awkward item placement. In conclusion of the level layouts, there are plenty of platforms to run and jump on - this gives players a way to explore as they venture through to the end of the level.
Reference
Nintendo (2006) New Super Mario Bros. [Computer game]. Nintendo UK.
Sonic Team (2008) Sonic Unleashed [Computer game]. SEGA.
Respawn Entertainment (2019) Apex Legends [Computer game]. Available from: https://www.ea.com/en-gb/games/apex-legends [Downloaded 28 March 2019].
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Ubisoft (2011) Driver San Francisco [Computer game]. Available from: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B005OKTOF8/?th=1 [Not downloaded but site accessed on 12 September 2019].
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Fandom (2004) City Escape [Online]. Available from: https://sonic.fandom.com/wiki/City_Escape [Accessed 12 September 2019].