A Few Thoughts on Level Design

[BlueZero4]

I posted somewhere on the forums a few months back and mentioned having discussions about level design. I remember a few people said they'd be interested in something like that, and there's probably a few more who agreed but didn't speak up. In hopes that a few people who read this will benefit from it, I'm posting this topic.

If you have a comment on anything below, or if you have a thought that you find interesting, I'd love to hear it. I don't normally check the MB these days, but I'll be checking here for this topic specifically daily for at least a week, possibly more if this topic picks up. Usually my topics garner a few thoughtful posts and die a quiet death. We'll see if this topic shares that fate.
Forgive my typos, please.

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Anything that is created, is created for a purpose. Though I use the passive tense, the act of creation implies a creator. Without any purpose, there would be no reason to go through with the act of creation. A table is made to hold things above the ground, whether for eating or for working. For those of you who are God-fearing men, you know that God's creation of you imforms how you live. (Though I'd rather not this turn into a creationism topic, please. I bring the matter up to frame my discourse below.)

For the level designer, the first question he must answer to himself is, "For what end do I build?" The construction "For what" takes the place of the word "why", which you'll recognize from the Spanish phrase "Por qué?" The word "why", because it is so short and simple, often carries several meanings, depending on the information which gives it context, the speaker, and the mind of the listener. It is important to visualize that your map has an end goal. To simply ask yourself, "Why am I mapping?", you might end up with an answer like "I found SRB2 in middle school, picked it up, spent some time with it, and I really enjoy it." That is not the end goal of my mapping; instead, it is a story of my life events which led me to mapping. Clarity of thought is important in most forms of discourse, and mistaking one question for another can give you months of confusion.

The end goal of my own mapping, initially, was not very noble. I recall wanting to have a great level pack to rival such mods as the Mystic Realm. At that age, I didn't know what pride was, but that was a prideful thought. Later, when I made Nuclear Sunset, my mindset was "I have this image in my mind. I want to make it a real place, where I can really go." It's still one of my weakpoints, because if I turn away from my original design, I feel that I've lost some essential essence of my creation, as if it's not mine any more and it no longer carries my original message. I had a huge creative block while I was working on FFZ2, and I think I can attribute that to having a wrong end goal. My summer still lasts a few more weeks, so while I still have some free time, I consider SRB2 mapping. "I have the time," I tell myself. But I can't answer that with an end goal worthy of the effort, so I don't map.

For every mapper, their end goal is different. I have already hinted at this above: My end goal is to make something pretty. I look at the map as I'm working, and I add more visual elements than gameplay elements. I enjoy seeing a place become created my eyes, and I love seeing it develop from an empty room or landscape into an immersive place. I enjoy sharing my maps with other people, so they may be immersed as well. The common word I've heard people use for my maps is "atmospheric," and it's likely they mean the same thing I do when I say "immersive."

But most people don't share my end goal. Most people aren't going to go from SRB2 into architecture like I'm doing.

Mystic, with his Mystic Realm, set out to create a seven zone level pack to create a full suite of content to take the place of the inconsistent base game. I recall Kuja (a mapper who I don't think frequents these parts any more) was fascinated with gameplay and gimmicks. Penopat, from what I've heard, seeks to capture beauty. I've played many maps, but most mappers don't make their end goals clear in their maps. I can't for the life of me tell you what KOTE builds for, nor Blade. But if you've played any of Kuja's maps, or any of Peno's, you can see their aspirations through their maps. Their intentions come through clearly.

It's perfectly fine that everyone has a different purpose to each map. A mapper will only put what he loves into his map, and everyone loves something different. For me, my snare is that I sometimes hate a map because the mapper has imbued it with his loves, not mine. I am often too focused on seeking out those qualities I idealize, and so I ignore and push away the qualities I don't want, even though they're there. The problem with that behavior is that it places my own expectations at the center and blinds myself to what's really there, which is sometimes a really good map. And often, such maps that do excel in the areas I seek rarely meet my expectations.

So then, what do we say? SRB2 must not be a game that has one best map, or one best way of mapping. Rather, SRB2 must be a platform for mapping that supports many end goals. SRB2, as a game, does limit the scope of the end goals which one may pick. You probably remember hearing something like "Ports don't work in SRB2. The gameplay's too different." But rather than begin with the game's contraints, I suggest we begin with a statement about people:

Every map should engage the player.

I feel silly saying that, because it feels like a given. We commonly consider SRB2 a videogame, and we commonly consider video games to be forms of entertainment, and all forms of entertainment must be engaging. This mindset optimizes for fun, though, and I don't think it sees SRB2 very clearly.

SRB2 can be a videogame, built for entertainment. It doesn't have to be, though. Level design is such a huge thing that you can shape the game to be anything you want. With level design, you're basically shaping a place for other people to experience it. You don't have to give your players a "This is a videogame" experience if you don't want to. You only need to engage your player so they'll see the things you love about your own map. And, probably, you're going to be engaging them by presenting those things that you love. Let me explain.

For example, I'm not planning on putting any rings in my next level. Nor enemies. Nor hurtwater, and the deathpits are probably just going to be teleports instead. I even want to turn off the HUD, too. I don't think the level needs any of it. I'm hesitant because I know that most people expect to have rings in their levels, so they'll reject my level because they're not expecting it. I know my FFZ2 release didn't have any enemies, but that was just because I forgot to add them in later (which is, TBH, how I think about them).

Partly, this is because I'm the kind of person who likes to strip things down to their essential parts and do different things with them than usual. I see SRB2 as two parts: the player and the world. I understand that these two parts must interact with each other, and as level designers we orchestrate the world to determine the interactions.

When I say that we "engage the player", the interaction is really what I mean by that. Your mind probably goes to somewhere like the old CEZ2 switches, or how the Gears of War developers said that the player uses their gun to interact with the world. I'm guessing that you're thinking about the idea of interactions too narrowly (though I might be wrong, for some of you). You're probably thinking about situations where the player makes an action which causes an effect in the level. You throw the switch, the door opens.

I'd like you to consider the reverse. Interactions are not initiated by the player, but by the world. If you step on a switch, and the switch opens the door, who was responsible for that.

"But BZ4! I was the one who jumped on top of the switch. I did the jumping, and the door responded to me. Aren't I the one who initiated the action?"

You'd think that. But the level designer caused the switch to be there. And you only thought to jump on the switch because it was already there. Consider the switch to be an invitation, which the player responds to. The jumping-on-the-switch is not the initiation, but the response. For those of you Calvinists in the audience, this should sound familiar.

Now let's broaden the idea of interaction. Consider your average series of platforms above deathpit. You're envisioning something the player is supposed to jump across, right? From one platform to another. A mere jump isn't a very big interaction. It doesn't cause the level itself to change, but the level is definitely causing the player to jump. Even a hallway would cause a player to walk through it. If you're thinking about interactions as things initiated by the level, there's interactions everywhere.

I'm now going to say something that you might not like. The aesthetics of a level also interact with the player. It's harder to argue for this, because the player can't really respond through Sonic to the lighting or the odd decorations hanging from the ceiling. (When we play SRB2, we use Sonic to interact with the world. An intuitive statement, but worth pointing out.) You can't measure the aesthetics by what you cause Sonic to do. Aesthetics don't cause player actions the way a crawla will. So my argument for this is going to be pretty lame:

Take GFZ1. Play it. Open it up in DB, delete all the flowers, and play it again.

Big change, right? I'm pretty sure the flowers aren't ever used for a visual gameplay cue, so you're not changing any of the elements that influence Sonic. But it wasn't as great as it was the first time. My argument is basically this: If you have two different results, and you've isolated the change which caused the difference in results, then the change you made to the level caused the difference in experience.

I had it explained to me like this: "When we say A caused B, what we mean is that, if A had not have happened, then B would not have happened."

Therefore, I believe that a level can engage the player primarily visually, and the level will work perfectly fine with minimal gameplay. I think that a player who's engaged in the scenery won't mind not having much to jump on. All of you probably saw that one coming from a mile away, because you know I make pretty maps without much gameplay.

But on the other hand, I'm also going to say the opposite. If you've got a level focused on gameplay, don't do a whole lot aesthetically. Make the visuals clean, make 'em clear, and make 'em elegant. But don't distract from the gimmicks. Be sure to use visual clues for your gimmicks. Grass edges help to denote platform edges, and SSN once mentioned that a different texture on the floor from the wall helps your level read clearly. That's about all the aesthetics you need.

So here's why I don't like rings. They serve three purposes in the game:

• If you have at least one, taking damage won't kill you.
• If you grab 100, you get an extra life.
• If you have them at the end of the level, you get a score bonus, which might give you another life.

Now, here's what enemies do:

• They attack the player, to make them lose their rings and possibly die.
• If the player destroys the enemies, he won't be able to lose his rings from them.

These two elements only exist because they dialogue with each other. Take out the enemies, and you don't need rings! Take out the deathpit's ability to make the player gameover, and you don't need the extra lives. There's an entire system of gameplay that you're putting into your level that you're not even thinking about. I certainly don't want a ready-made system of gameplay in my levels. You might, but you should know what's going on when you scatter in the crawlas and the rings onto your level geometry that might not need it.

But if you don't have the rings or the enemies in, you've still got to replace 'em with other interactions. I feel like I can't take the enemies out of my old levels, just because I didn't build them to stand without the two.

The point here is that you can hand pick the interactions you want in your level. You're allowed to pick interactions that nobody's seen before (and if you can do it well, I'd encourage you), and you're allowed to reject interactions that are practically standard. I like thinking about visual design as being of the same currency of gameplay, so that you can pick one and leave the other out for a reason. I'd even suggest you keep your gameplay focused, using a coherent set of gimmicks and strip down the unneccessary gameplay.

And you pick those interactions carefully, because you're mapping with a goal in mind. Your level's going to have a certain kind of experience for those who play it. And you're only picking the interactions which help you do that, right?

tl;dr
Now, I'm doing a lot of analysis here, but I just want you to think for yourself. There's a lot of standard advice floating around this community, and not all of it's useful. Sometimes advice is useful in some situations, but not others. Just do what feels right, and if it doesn't, learn to see it so you can stop doing it.

 

[Boinciel]

It should be noted that rings also have another purpose, one far more critical to level design. Trails of rings create lines that the player tends to align themselves with, thus guiding the player. Ring arrows are an ugly evolution of this idea. Players grab them because they are conditioned to grab them, and try to grab as many as they can on their way to the exit. A single ring is worthless, but longer chains are more valuable to the player's subconscious. In cases where level geometry is limited, the rings pick up the slack.

This is one of the major difficulties I faced when designing Sonic's Schoolhouse. The texture set I was using had to be used in very specific ways to prevent it from looking completely hideous, but I also couldn't use Rings to guide the player from one area to the next seamlessly. As a result, the level felt incredibly unbalanced both as an experience and as a gameplay challenge.

Maybe things will be better next time...

 

[BlueZero4]

That's a good point. How much clarity of design do you think would be lost without any rings?

 

[Boinciel]

I don't think rings are at all necessary for guidance if the sector work is strong enough, but mechanical texture sets have real problems with this due to their inherent square nature. However, in order to guide the player sometimes it may be necessary to compromise the original vision for an area and change the angles for the player to be able to take the path of least resistance. It all depends on whether the vision the designer has for the area is malleable (such as a vague rocky platforming section) or absolute.

But it should be said that rings are also a one-way lead. The player picks them up and they are no longer there to guide the way. In a way, they are exchanged for knowledge of the area and the correct route. Players subconsciously know when they've been through an area by whether the rings have been collected or not.

 

[CoatRack]

To answer your question on why I make levels BlueZero4 is this:

I have these ideas in my head that I want to be able to interact with, and share. A key point in them is the detail, seeing as that is what I spend the most time with. My earlier levels was more detail based and had less gameplay/platforming, since at the time I had been told by someone that platforming was a bad thing (Platforming in a platfromer, who would have ever guessed!). I have started to spend more time with gameplay elements, and while I am at it I try new themes and ideas. Said ideas sometimes fall on their faces, but that's what makes experiments fun!

I like to think of levels as pieces of art, everyone has their own style, some make gimmick filled levels, others make scenic levels, or a mix of several types. When you think about it, if we only had people who wanted to make gimmick-fest it would get stale fast. Which is why I personally have a bit of a soft spot for levels that look nice but don't have the best of gameplay.


Also, on the subject of ways to guide the player. I sometimes use scenery-based "arrows", like in Eggmansion I put in some lighter-colored parts to help the player on their way. Or Chemical Facility with it's generic "RED ARROW" texture, not that I was a fan of it I was just in a crunch for time.

But if let's say you had a jungle themed level, you could have a custom vine texture made with a stick that is a arrow. That way it would fit in with the theme and still serve as a guide.

 

[BlueZero4]

What's your working definition of art? I call art the category of any (creative?) work which is meant to inspire emotion. I've also heard art called anything which shows a great display of skill in workmanship, though it's not my favorite definition.

I'm interested in how indicating direction without using specifically arrows. I agree that arrows which are integrated into the level's theme work better than those which are not, but I'm waiting to give a solution until I can think of a specific example to share. I am actually interested in giving my levels clarity of navigation rather than simply direction. I'd like to make my doors known as doors, my paths known as paths, and each connection point seen clearly. I suspect that the teask will require unique solutions for each situation, though I have not tried my hand at it yet.

 

[MascaraSnake]

As somebody who plays levels but doesn't make them, all I ask is to be entertained. I couldn't care less about how you achieve it or what your intentions are, I just want something I can enjoy. So to answer your question "for what?": So people can enjoy it. That should be your first and foremost intention. It doesn't matter at all what Coat and Blade map for, what matters is that the end results are usually enjoyable. It seems like you look at level design primarily as an outlet for artistic expression. Fine by me, but you have to realize it's a minority view.

Your levels have nothing to do with how platforming levels are normally designed, and SRB2 is a platforming game. It's perfectly fine that you do something else - SRB2 isn't customizable for nothing - but all the advice and expectations in this community are geared towards a certain standard. Let me quote Mystic's review of FFZ2:

Forever Forest Zone, Act 2 by BlueZero4 - 7/10
I really don't know how to judge this. It's not really a Sonic level as much as a little world to explore. It's nicely done, with atmospheric music and visuals. I almost feel like this would play better with no rings or HUD. However, it's not really a Sonic stage. I quite enjoyed the level, but it would be better served in a mod designed for exploration with exploration-based goals, not a level design contest for Sonic levels.

I think this says it all. Your levels fall outside of the norm. It makes no sense to compare them to other maps or to justify what you do under the rules that apply to normal maps. The standard advice that floats around this community is indeed very useful as long as you stick to a certain formula. Your levels are disconnected from that formula, so it doesn't apply to you.

Regarding the issue of rings: If you don't have any hazards at all (not just enemies, any kinds of hazards), it's true that you don't need rings. In fact, I would prefer the type of levels that you do without any rings or power-ups at all. You're right that if you remove the reason for rings to exist, it makes no sense to continue using them. It's true that rings can give a sense of direction to a level, but level architecture can do the same if you're clever. Rings would just seem tacked on.

 

[BlueZero4]

So I guess this means I'm just making a big fuss about my non-standard levels. Well, darn.

 

[Ice]

Well damn, you made me want to pick up mapping again. Whenever I map (which not often at all), I'm usually aiming for a certain type of "atmosphere". I'm not sure if that's the right word to use. It's more like an emotion or mindset that I've felt before, and I try to revisit it. Most of the time I get creative block though, and I end up with things like Red House Zone, which was just a couple of stitched-together ideas that I never got around to finishing on their own.

But damn, I wanna map again.

 

[Ezer'Arch]

So I guess this means I'm just making a big fuss about my non-standard levels. Well, darn.

You are not making a big fuss about your damn non-standard levels. You are just rising points about level design that, in a certain way, are questioning the "new and higher SRB2 level design standards". The same standard the makes everything look the same, boring, predictable: an infertile perfectness of this precious SRB2. The standards that don't let people to think of out of the box, unable to think of new possibilities, approaches, experiences and feelings. The same standard that gradually lowered the production to nearly zero, with a dead submission board(*). At least that's my perception.

If I always have to please the majority, I'm doomed to mediocrity. So, what's the creativity for?

Sometimes, you shouldn't give a crap for the majority or official's standards (specially when it's just 1/5 of it was 3 years ago, and it's still considered, by "the smart half of the community", dumb, idiot, infantile, et cetera & et caterva). I make my stuff according to what I think it feels right, and I still listen to criticism and respect it.

"It's good to be different :)". It's good to subvert the line that separates the sacred from the profane, as well as, break the windows and let the fresh air in.

Thanks MultiplayerFusion, Egg Pallace, JazzAttack, Ghouls Forest, Forever Forest (which I visit once in a while), Nuclear Sunset, TEI, TBE, all hangout maps, overpowered characters, and all garbage and masterpieces that inspired me to get into level design.

I miss the times when SRB2 was taken as a sandbox game. Lots of crap were made, but in middle of this chaos something interesting was created. That creative chaos was more interesting than nowadays' productions.

Have a bit of non-standard experience. If you want, of course.

BlueZero4, I and other few guys understand what you want to mean. I enjoy your levels as well as I appreciate your comments.

You are most welcome.

EDIT:

(*) - I did pick wrong words. I mean, the add-on boards: maps, characters, EXE mods... Practically there has been no new topics, posts or new projects for long time.

 

[BlueZero4]

Well damn, you made me want to pick up mapping again.

You still have DB on your harddrive, right? I'm usually in Ubuntu these days, so I have to reboot to use Doom Builder, which makes it harder to impulse map.

I was surprised the first time I touched it again that I was out of practice. It took me a while to get my sense of scale back.

It's more like an emotion or mindset that I've felt before, and I try to revisit it.

I've had serious trouble using an emotion to fuel my maps. I suggest picking a theme or place or someodd that you find interesting, and looking at the map instead of the emotion.

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Ezer, you were definitely one of the people I was hoping to snare in this thread.

You are not making a big fuss about your damn non-standard levels.

I apologize. I feel insecure about my own maps, so I feel the need to justify myself to others. Obviously, because I'm writing from the same viewpoint as I'm mapping, my words go along with my levels.

But keep in mind, any architect who publishes a book is just trying to make himself famous.

So, what's the creativity for?

I was thinking that our expectation of maps is not a single standard, but a range of accepted normalcy which has room in it for variation. Creativity, even if not particularly bold, will put you somewhere unique inside that spectrum. I do think that we enjoy the unique parts of a map more than the formulaic parts. We might not need to abolish the standard to enjoy our differences, y'know.

 

[Ice]

You still have DB on your harddrive, right? I'm usually in Ubuntu these days, so I have to reboot to use Doom Builder, which makes it harder to impulse map.

I was surprised the first time I touched it again that I was out of practice. It took me a while to get my sense of scale back.

Got a new laptop, so yeah, I just downloaded SRB2DB. Probably gonna tinker around with it right now for a little just to get the feel back.

I've had serious trouble using an emotion to fuel my maps. I suggest picking a theme or place or someodd that you find interesting, and looking at the map instead of the emotion.

The emotion that I aim for is usually one that's extremely hard to describe, though. With Hidden Sanctuary, for example, I was going for a kind of wondrous-ish feeling that's hard to pin with a single word. So it's not like I'm just building an entire map out of "ANGER" or "HAPPINESS"; the actual goal I have in mind is much more complex. But it's still a single emotion, so it's weird. Maybe "mindset" is the better word to use here.

Also, as a side discussion, this is something specific I've always had to grapple with: How do you effectively make the player move down? My maps usually end up as a gigantic mountain climb, with the player several thousand units (what do you call those again?) above the starting point when all is said and done. I find it hard to move the player down in a way that feels natural, but I can only ever really move them up.

 

[Chromatian]

I make levels so that I can enjoy them with others. What I enjoy most about a finished level is watching other people from their viewpoint as they move throughout the stage I've created.

I haven't made any Singleplayer levels recently because I have a lot more fun mapping a level for Srb2kart instead. They aren't as complex or take as much time and effort, but the end result is almost always enjoyable.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnxxBQTTk1Y&list=PL4071DBE6946A6EF2&index=9&feature=plpp_video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFGKapn13MM&list=PL4071DBE6946A6EF2&index=14&feature=plpp_video

Two of my recent levels a group of users from #srb2kart and I played.

(Not entirely sure if I expressed my self properly, apologies in advance)

 

[CoatRack]

What's your working definition of art? I call art the category of any (creative?) work which is meant to inspire emotion. I've also heard art called anything which shows a great display of skill in workmanship, though it's not my favorite definition.

I consider art as work that one does with care, a good example of "art" in the SRB2 Community is Dumbventure. I call it a work of art because of how much care was put into making it, seeing that it gave off a new style of adventure for the player to mess around with. Not to mention it had some funny lines in the cut scenes, and that they take place in level rather than just a generic slideshow.

Also, as a side discussion, this is something specific I've always had to grapple with: How do you effectively make the player move down?

I too have a problem with moving the player down, most of the time I send the player sky-diving down a area to get them back down. Since any platforming you can add often times will be skipped, unless you do it like one level I played back in 1.09.4. Vibrant Vendetta Zone, it had a part where you had to wait for the platforms to rise up from a death pit showing you the way. Only once the last one popped up could you leave the room, meaning that making a blind jump would get you killed.

 

[Ors]

I like quite hard maps like ERZ2 but 15 secs moving platforms and zoom tubes are annoying. I have tried to post my levels on the custom level topic but there´s only a message that tells I have not yet right to start a new thread.

 

[Charybdizs]

This looks like the opportune time for me to expand upon my view of the three tiers of art. Before I go anywhere though, I want to revise a little upon BlueZero4's definition of art.

"the category of any work which is meant to inspire emotion."

The only reason I do this is because under that definition, it excludes many pastimes that are generally considered to be arts. Namely, cooking. Though cooking is widely accepted as an art, it doesn't really qualify under that definition, as it's only purpose is to bring pleasure. Though, I suppose it could bring such feelings as nostalgia (Ratatouille comes to mind), that is an independent emotion, unrelated to the actual art, and more to the background of the, well, eater in this case. Art is very hard to define, but I'll give it my best shot.

"Any form of creativity that seeks to invoke a positive or negative reaction in the receiver"

With that being said, let me get on with my categorizing. I guess it's just part of my OCDish nature, but I always feel I have to categorize everything and bring clarity to any blurry line. It makes me happy to do it, too. :)

Tier #1 of art, is what I would call
Pleasure Bringing

The simplest and most basic of all forms of art, the only real goal is to bring pleasure to the receiver, and give them a good time. Nothing more, nothing less. A good example of this, is jokes, or funny stories. Or Asteroids! In fact, arcade games are the most fantastic example of this that I can think of. There is nothing low about this form of art, that is not my intention at all. I simply call them tiers, because they, as the word means, stack. This is the most basic building block of any art, be it painting, book, movie, or game. It has to, to borrow some previously used terms, engage the receiver.

Tier #2 of art, is what I would call
Emotion Inducing

Sometimes this is a small step up from tier #1, and sometimes it makes a drastic difference. Art within this category seeks an emotional response within the receiver, to no particular ends. Because, emotion. Most often, the receiver will channel this emotion towards whatever they feel like. This would be the tier where most music, especially purely instrumental music, lies. It gives something to the listener, whether it is thoughtful sadness, jubilation, courage, anger, or hope for the future. The receiver, then, in essence being fueled, can use it towards whatever. No one is immune to this. Everyone at some point or another has experienced certain factors leading to inspiration for different acts. Think of the studies done on students regarding the types of music they listened to while taking tests. Generally those listening to classical music would outscore those listening to rock. Why was this? Was it because of the genre? I don't believe so. Isn't it rather because of the emotional quality of the music? Listening to hard rock, which in general maintains an angry or obnoxious emotion, would not be beneficial when studying. But the more peaceful, often uplifting classical music would prove much more beneficial in those circumstances. Also, don't get me wrong here, and take me for a rock hater or anything. I'm just pointing out different emotional qualities, and their value in their proper places. Coincidentally, this and the first tier are generally the category that SRB2 levels fall into.

The third, and last tier, is what I would call
Thought Provoking

I'm sure you've played a game, or read a book, or watched a movie, that had such depth to it that when you finished, you took a moment, sat back, and thought "woah." You know in your heart that what you just experienced has changed you in some way, and that because of it, you'll make some choices you wouldn't have made otherwise, or that you will never look at the world the same way. Maybe it just gives you patience and courage to deal with something that's been weighing you down. I could name a number of things that have given me this experience. Mother 3 was the game that opened my eyes to this tier in the first place. Before then, I had never really given a thought to the idea of art being used a tool to inspire change in the individual. But Mother 3 opened my eyes to this, first teaching and reminding me about the importance of friend and family structure. After that, I began to search for this on a regular basis in games, movies, books, and music. Some of my favorite examples of this tier of art are Lord of the Rings (the books and the movies both), Bastion, and Friendship is Magic. Lord of the Rings is especiall potent to me, because I read it twice, once before, and once after having my eyes opened to this value. The first time I read it, I thought "that was an exciting, even enthralling story." The second time I read it, which was in a literature class, I was able to explore the deep symbolism and meaning behind almost every part of the book. Remember Tom Bombadil? I didn't until I spent a while studying that part of the book.

An important thing to keep in mind, is that each tier relies on the one below it. If you try to teach a moral through something, but fail to both engage the receiver, or even emotionally effect them, you come off as dry and stuffy.

A few people told me things along the lines of "SRB2 is just a game", as if that somehow meant something. A game can serve other purposes rather than just serving as an entertainment medium.

I have so much more I want to say, especially about my motivations as I make a level, but due to time, this needs to be the end of my post right now.

 

[BlueZero4]

So it's not like I'm just building an entire map out of "ANGER" or "HAPPINESS"; the actual goal I have in mind is much more complex. But it's still a single emotion, so it's weird.

Yeah, definitely.

How do you effectively make the player move down?

Odd, I recall FFZ1 being the opposite. The reason for that was my heavy use of waterfalls, so I had the player moving in the same direction as the waterflow. I had a continuous flow of water throughout a good portion of the level. I'm not opposed to pulling out my calculator app to figure out what height I should be using, so I don't particularly care.

If you have the player jumping upward, you usually only give the platforms a difference in height of around 32 to 96, with 64 being a nice even number. You can put platforms farther apart horizontally if the next platform is lower instead of higher. I often have my players platforming naturally downward, but then I have to stick something contrived in like a spring to allow them to traverse backward. And then people think that springs are only used to move the player forward, so all my players get lost.

Another thing I do often is to lead the player from one area onto a place that overlooks the next area. The jump downward helps to define the entrance into the next segment.
(And the word you're looking for is fracunit.)

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I make levels so that I can enjoy them with others. What I enjoy most about a finished level is watching other people from their viewpoint as they move throughout the stage I've created.

That's wonderful to hear.

I call [Dumbventure] a work of art because of how much care was put into making it, seeing that it gave off a new style of adventure for the player to mess around with.

I agree. Dumbventure was great. I'm beginning to think that we (or at least, I do) pick my definition of art secondly as a justification of what we inuitively label art. I'm saying this before I've read Charybdizs's post, so I may eat my words farther on in this post.

I have tried to post my levels on the custom level topic but there´s only a message that tells I have not yet right to start a new thread.

Honey, you got to post your topic in the submissions subforum first. The judges look it over and tell you if you still need to work on anything before you get to go on stage, and then you go public. You'll get in the swing of things, don't worry.

More details here.

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My dear Charybdizs, under tier 1 you include a chocolate bar.

I remember reading an article in high school critiquing the book Ethan Frome, by Edith Wharton. The author of the article was making the case that all literature must campaign for a message. The author's argument was that Wharton brought the characters pain in the novel toward no greater message. Introducing pain to the characters for the satisfaction of the author was a great travesty, the article's author said. I still have the article, but it's too much work to dig it up.

I've already mentioned this to you: I listen to vocaloid music so heavily because I can get the musical styles I like with none of the words. I used to listen to artists like Paramore and Fall Out Boy before I found electronic dance music, but I had to stop listening to them because of their lyrics. These days, the english-speaking artists I reject are people more like Armin van Buuren. Off the top of my head, there's a Kylie Minogue remix I really enjoy, except that I can't stand the lyrics.

And when I discovered the fundamentally emotional nature of music, it killed my dreams of ever, ever hearing trance music during a worship service on a Sunday. Ever.

Tier 3 is a rough spot to be in. I'm thinking of works like Groundhog Day, The Count of Monte Cristo, The Chronicles of Narnia, and there's many I'm forgetting. Many more that I'm forgetting.

I went back and picked up my copy of Uglies within the last few months and read a few bits of it. Well, really the second book, Pretties. I went back to it because there was one scene I remembered specifically. The main character Tally was talking with one of her friends Shay, and I remembered the scene for just one line. Shay said, "Tally, even if tomorrow I act like this never happened, know that I am not you friend." And then Shay went on to use her own bitterness to forge her own identity.

Similarly, there's only one scene I still remember from Twilight. Bella gets in some trouble with a hostile vampire, so she has to get out of town. She has to leave her father behind, but she has to lie to him to keep him safe. Bella runs into her house, pretending to have broken up with Edward. Her dad cares deeply for her, but he can't truly keep her safe. Bella has to break her father's heart to get away. It's hard putting a chapter into a paragraph, so I know I'm not doing the scene justice. Stephenie Meyer didn't either, though. Bella said:

"I do like him -- that's the problem! I can't do this any more, I can't put down any more roots here. I can't end up trapped in this town like Mom did. I won't make the same mistake. I hate it here. Just let me go."

The trouble with such moments where I want to stay there forever is that I can't. I hate getting caught there. No story can be a shelter for me. No story can ever give me the resting place I'm looking for. No story can heal that broken part of me. Only the LORD will give me true shelter. To point my audience anywhere else would be a disservice.

 

[MascaraSnake]

You are not making a big fuss about your damn non-standard levels. You are just rising points about level design that, in a certain way, are questioning the "new and higher SRB2 level design standards". The same standard the makes everything look the same, boring, predictable: an infertile perfectness of this precious SRB2. The standards that don't let people to think of out of the box, unable to think of new possibilities, approaches, experiences and feelings. The same standard that gradually lowered the production to nearly zero, with a dead submission board. At least that's my perception.

That's funny, because my perception is a little different: The releases subforum has always been empty. The vast majority of maps have always been submitted to the OLDC, not releases. The average number of OLDC submissions has gone down, but I dare say that the average quality and creativity of the maps has gone through the ceiling. Regardless of what you might think about Blade's and Coat's maps, the last contest featured Azure Temple, Sonic's Schoolhouse and Lightless Labyrinth, each of which showcases more creativity and original ideas than the entire contents of any given pre-2.0 OLDC. Now I know that I have given rather low scores to two of them, but I'm still very happy that they were made. I'd take a failed experiment over no experiment at all any day, but our voting system rewards entertainment, not creativity. The key is to understand the following: The scores you receive for your level should not be your indicator for whether it was worth making or not. Every map is worth making, and I think ShadowHog can be much prouder of his submission which scored 6.12 than Blade can be of his submission which scored 7.02.

As you can see, I vehemently disagree that this community's creativity is stifled by some kind of quality standard. Maybe the volume of the mapping output, but not the overall quality. And let me ask you something: When was the last time that you, one of the finest mappers in this community, have submitted anything to the OLDC? Three years ago. Why is that? Certainly not because you're intimidated by our expectations.

If I always have to please the majority, I'm doomed to mediocrity.

What are you talking about? Your own Mill Citadel, a level that I can safely say pleases the majority and very strictly follows the standards of what this community considers good mapping, is far from mediocre. Azure Temple, a level that took a lot of risks and was presumed by its creators to be very controversial, was overwhelmingly well-received. Forever Forest, certainly one of the most non-standard things to come out of this community, received good scores. The highest rated single player map in the history of the OLDC, Dumbventure, is incidentally also the most idiosyncratic one. As you can see, all the best maps are exceptional and appealing to the majority. Some of them cater to "the norm", some don't.

I was thinking that our expectation of maps is not a single standard, but a range of accepted normalcy which has room in it for variation. Creativity, even if not particularly bold, will put you somewhere unique inside that spectrum. I do think that we enjoy the unique parts of a map more than the formulaic parts. We might not need to abolish the standard to enjoy our differences, y'know.

Absolutely. That's what I'm trying to say. Our standards and expectations aren't nearly as strict as you might think, and they leave plenty of room for variation and creativity. And also, very importantly: You can defy these expectations completely if you want to, and you're very welcome to do so. Sometimes you will fall flat on your face, other times you will create something exceptional.

Coincidentally, this and the first tier are generally the category that SRB2 levels fall into.

I'm not aware of a lot of levels (if any) that inspire any kind of emotion.

 

[Monster Iestyn]

I'm not aware of a lot of levels (if any) that inspire any kind of emotion.

Except Charybdizs called tier 1 "Pleasure Bringing", not "Emotion Inducing".

 

[MascaraSnake]

Read his sentence again: "Coincidentally, this and the first tier are generally the category that SRB2 levels fall into." "This" being the second tier.