Project Resurgence: Blog 3

Progress from 10/10 - 10/22

I have been very busy the past couple of weeks making large adjustments to Level 2: The Cathedral of the Dark Arts. After the playtest there we were asked to identify five issues from the feedback we received on our level.

Here is a look at our current annotated map:

Our notes on the level can be found here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bFdOpjmpJXC15mxf_b074lzNldNCLDrBvzBKBcwM2G8/edit?usp=sharing 

First off, we ran into an issue of players not moving their camera within the level. This resulted in players having a harder time traversing throughout the level. To fix this issue my partner and I had to go and readjust our level. We drastically reduced the harsh angles within the level and have more gradual turns, requiring the players to move their camera less.

Players also disliked the large groupings of pillars throughout the level. To fix this reworked the areas with pillars and used pillars more sparingly to make the level feel less repetitive.

Also, players every now and again would get lost within the level, usually within fighting areas because they would get turned around. This was partly due to it only being a block out and how things looked very similar. We are currently adding in assets to help landmark specific areas, so players are less likely to get lost. Some players also disliked the amount of platforming within the level and felt that it would disrupt flow at times. So we removed some platforming areas and tried to avoid putting level mechanics too close to walls that may disrupt the flow.

A lot of the past week has been adjusting the level and putting in assets that we got from modeling for our level. Putting in the walls and other assets in the level was very time consuming and I spent most of my time getting those in place. We are still waiting for a couple assets such as floors and a ceiling to make our level feel more complete. 

I also had to go through and place invisible walls around the frame of my level because the collider on the model isn't enough to stop the player from running through it. We have been running into issues with the player going through colliders in many instances, due to the speed of the character.

We also implemented battle areas from programming. This should significantly help with players getting lost within fighting areas because the battle area will lock people in that area, then after the player has defeated all the enemies they can continue through the rest of the level. 

The level isn't perfect and needs some touch-up but I've put a lot of hard work and many hours into the level the past couple weeks to get it to where it is. I'll soon be getting playtest feedback on the level and will be making improvements on the feedback.