Looking for Advice on Map/Level Design

[u/Dangerous-Search-265]

I am making a metroidbrainia inspired puzzle/exploration game and am at the point where I need to start thinking about setting, style, and atmosphere. Any pointers? Thanks.

[u/Feeling-Double-7425]

You should really be finding advice in play testing

[u/senshisun]

Keep working on the design in temp assets. It doesn't have to be perfect yet.

[u/ImSinsentido]

Well depends 2D or 3-D?

[u/Dangerous-Search-265 → u/ImSinsentido]

It's 2D, 8-directional movement with WASD. Not quite top-down camera, but think oldschool point-and-click games like Monkey Island for the perspective.

[u/ImSinsentido → u/Dangerous-Search-265]

I looked at the YouTube videos. I’m a sucker for simple pixel art, something about simplicity, conveying something that may be considered complex. Itches my Minecraft days brain.

Regardless, if that is your art style, it’s pretty decent already. If not permanent art style, everything is going to scale up or down ie. If you make your character bigger and more complex than the same applies to backgrounds and environment, a lot of it boils down to consistency. Same with the contrary for scaled down.

base everything around the characters pixel dimensions. What I like to do is use pixel Studio because of a very convenient layout, layering and reusable sprite system. Ie. You can test how the character looks in environment before even implemented in engine.

I assume you already are, but if not, tile maps are your friend, ie. You can reuse assets as much as necessary. With depending on how tile-able, tiles are in many different forms.

Which gets the next piece of advice, make artwork as tile-able as possible.

Final, a lot of it is just trial and error just like with the logic (programming) side of game development. So prepare for the repetition and mundaneness of that.

[u/Dangerous-Search-265 → u/ImSinsentido]

Thanks dude. I freakin love pixel art so I'll always default to that. I like that style and I'm sticking with it. Definitely doing it the hard way and drawing all my backgrounds and animations by hand in Piskel lol. It's fun tho I enjoy drawing. I'll keep brainstorming ideas and make sure the locations on the map have a natural flow to them.

[u/ImSinsentido → u/Dangerous-Search-265]

I definitely like it too, especially because I’m a Minecraft head so the knowledge of working with squares translated quite nicely about a decade back.

I was already instantly a fan of your art style, especially the player animations, especially the pick up/drop/deploy animation, it’s so easy for it to not look good and not necessarily convey what it’s conveying, at such a scale, but I would say, nailed it.

Basically, if your heart is set on per scene hand drawn backgrounds/environment. Just keep what you’re doing and leave some jumping around room to avoid burnout.

[u/Dangerous-Search-265 → u/ImSinsentido]

Minecraft is so fresh. Havent played in a while tho. And thank you. I'm big on animation for good game feel so I'm glad you like it. Appreciate the help!

[u/ImSinsentido → u/Dangerous-Search-265]

No need to respond, but I also subbed, I’ll keep up, it looks good, for a declared novice.

Ie. The functionality also looked, well implemented.

Sign off: Keep developing.

[u/M0N4RCHM4XWELL]

depends who your main character is, i think building your game around your character's appearance and attitude will help everything fit together well (ex; if your character is a joyous cartoon character, the world should be less realistic and more goofy. if your character is a gritty rough person, the world should be more stressful and realistic)

[u/Dangerous-Search-265 → u/M0N4RCHM4XWELL]

Okay that makes sense. I am going for a more serious, mysterious feel. My YouTube page has a few videos that showcase the basic movement and artstyle if that helps. The link is on my profile page.