[Open Assets] Green Flower Forest Zone - GFFZ

[Snowy]

Oh boy, my first submission, and it's my first (Albeit short) map, too!

Originally made to be a three act zone, the second act was scrapped in favor of releasing act 1 and the boss on their own. Greenflower Forest is an 'alternative take' on GFZ, taking place within a forest that Sonic hopes to use to try and elude Robotnik on his way to the next Zone.

Within Act 1, parkour through the forest's trees.
Within the Boss act (Still is Map 3), battle the doctor on the tops of cut-down trees, using them to gain height and strike!

Update 1

Oh boy, first update already! From what feedback I've gotten so far, I decided to spend some time going back and changing things that I felt I could do easily- So what exactly has changed?

Some rings have been added, some badniks added and moved about, item monitors placed, platforms moved about, etc etc.

The 'Major' change is that the second path no longer leads to the spiral tree group's start, instead being an alternative quick route if you feel you can't platform your way faster than you can run.

The level has also been given a slight smoothing, and may or may not have been fed chemicals to make it's 'rooms' a bit bigger.

Hopefully, these changes work to make the map somewhat more enjoyable.

Edit; Realized a SINGLE tree off the main path was still defined as a pit. Fixed!

 

[Boinciel]

Welcome to Releases!

 

[Kuja]

I think your .rar archive might be corrupted. It doesn't appear to be openable. Could you perhaps try re-archiving the wad file and uploading it again?

 

[MascaraSnake]

I had the same problem with 7-Zip 9.20. Upgrading to 16.04 solved the issue.

 

[Kuja]

It was actually WinRAR that I used. Odd. But anyway, I just opened it with 7zip instead(Thanks MascaraSnake).


For the most part, it's definitely got that cozy "first map" feeling. Lots of pillars over a looming death pit, cramped corridors with a random smattering of enemies. But that's not what I'll focus on. They're definitely a problem, but its fine to experiment and see how map making works.


Good things:
*Level geometry and textures are cohesive. You chose a theme, and stuck with it, floated your rings, and Many first timers make a bunch of rectangles, choose a bunch of textures and flats to load into their level and see what sticks. I can tell that you had at least some idea of what it would look like before you started(the end of the level and the following boss are evidence of that), so that's nice.

*An attempt at alternate paths was made. Having a good amount of variability in paths for your level design is always a good way to keep it from feeling stale and boring. Even though going straight ahead in this level was more efficient than taking that path in the beginning to the right, I appreciate that you made a high/low path that led to powerups rather than keeping them all on the main path. Just don't go overboard like some people do and place so many alternate paths that it becomes easy to become lost.




*cough*


Needs Improvement or fixing:
*The player needs to be able to trust springs. What I mean is, a spring(especially diagonal ones) should always get you where you're expected to go, and not lead you to a death; At least not on accident, anyway. The diagonal springs you placed are just strong enough that you will overshoot the platform and go soaring right into the pit. Just keep it in mind when placing springs-TEST the spring to make sure they will safely deposit the player onto safe ground without additional input. It just feels better to play!

*Pick different colors between the textres and the flats. Pick a color other than brown floors if your walls are also going to be the same exact shade of brown. Its a bit hard to look at if you see enough of it.

*Avoid making cramped hallways. There isn't much excuse for those hallways to be as small as they are. I feel like a rat in a maze when they're this small; they could stand to be at least 500 fracunits wide so that we're not constantly bumping into the sides of them.

*Spread out your rings. 98% of the rings are in the latter half of the level, for when you no longer need them for anything.

Overall, it's an alright level. Remember to always make it so that it's fun to play, and use the official levels as an example of what to do and what not to do.