The Next Big Thing

My first published level is doing well.  I have 24 people who have played it now, a couple of hearts, and a couple of thumbs up.  Some of those folks gave me some great feedback on how to make it better, but at this time I am unable to make any changes.  I downloaded LBP so I could trade in my disk towards buying LBP2.  Turns out that the content I got with the disk version (Game of the Year edition) is not available to me anymore unless I purchase it.  Oops!  Until I get around to buying those packs, I decided to begin work on my new level.

As with the last one, I am working out all of the technical parts first.  The first big one I am working on is a puzzle akin to the old “pipes” games.  The player needs to create an electrical path to two locations by rotating either a row or column of “path pieces”.  The first step was to find a way to rotate the pieces. 

My design is a 5x5 grid of wheels that will rotate in 1/4 turn increments.  Since each wheel has a single motor bolt, and that means I can only have one trigger per wheel.  I finally came up with a matching 5x5 grid of pistons and magnetic keys that activate either one row or one column of motors.

This grid is controlled by a 2-way switch and 5 buttons.  The buttons allow the player to select row/column 1-5 based on how the 2-way switch is set.

The switch allows the player to select either rows (lever to the left) or columns (lever to the right).  The switch moves a line of magnetic keys left and right to move them under the magnetic switches that are activated by the 5 buttons.

When the players activates the button, one of the two magnetic keys will activate a piston in the controller unit for the row or column selected.

The piston will push a magnetic switch towards the matching magnetic key until it activates.  The magnetic switch is connected to the pistons for all 5 row or column pistons in the “OR” switches that control each motor bolt in the 5x5 grid.  This will activate all 5 magnetic switches for a row or column, which start the matching motor bolts.  Since I am in the development stage, I just have them connected to a 5x5 grid of LED lights.

In this example the 2-way switch is set for row and I am standing on the 2nd button.  You can see that all lights in the 2nd row are lit.

In this example the 2-way switch is set for column and I am standing on the 2nd button. You can see that all lights in the 2nd column are lit.

Eventually, when I add the wheels, I will add the connections that briefly break the connection in the row/column control unit that will turn off the “OR” switch and stop the wheel rotation each 1/4 turn.

The controller units for each row/column are part of a multi-level elevator, with controls, designed by DEFCON01.  I just adapted it for this use.  If you want to see his elevator design, which will be used in this level and my first one when I can edit it again, just search for “DEFCON01 elevator” on YouTube.

Are We There Yeti?...version 2

After much delay, and much video gaming, I finally republished my level.  Taking into account suggestions from fellow game developer Ben, I fixed the problems he encountered, and made some modifications to enhance the level.  One cool thing I was able to do was to make the snowball emitters better. 

He told me that having them just pop out of nowhere was very frustrating and didn't look good.  They needed to look like thery were coming from somewhere.  I found some great looking pipe pieces in my tool set and used those for a location where the snowballs come from.  To make it so it didn't look like they were random pieces of scenery, I added a matching number of pieces and a stone wall at the top of the mountain.  I added a steam enging sound effect and a vent on the stone wall, and VOILA! A snowball machine.  I wanted to use stickers to make an "ACME Snowball Machine" sign, but the letters offered are not in the style I wanted so I just let it go.

There are a few other additions, changes, fixes, and so on.  If Ben wasn't reading this I might mention them, but I don't want to spoil the surprise.

Published, now on to version 2!

I did some final tweaking, added background music and sound effects.  Tested, tested, and re-tested, and decided it was time to publish my level.  I put it out and sent a message to friends, and folk I have met playing LPB online.  No sooner had I published it than I remembered I forgot to add one final element.  It was the yeti’s house, which doubled as the façade that covered up one of my more complicated mechanisms.

I jumped back into edit mode, added the yeti’s house and republished.  As I watched the count of people who played the level climb to 7, but nobody finished, I wondered what was going on.  I played the published version only to find out that my yeti destroyed itself as it snagged on something.  I went back to my workshop and found out it was doing the same thing there.  Who would have thought that adding an object would cause that to happen.  My friend Ben called that the “Butterfly Effect”.  Guess I should have tested after adding that object.

He also sent me an e-mail with some feedback, and much to my surprise, he had a problem before that.  Now, with his notes in hand I am working on version 2 of my level.  Making some changes here and there, hopefully for the better.  My only fear is that some of my shapes are too complicated to modify anymore so I might need to redo large pieces to make this work. 

It is what it is…

Sometime you gotta play a little to get ahead

I’ve been working on the section of my level that takes place in an ice cave.  I was having a difficult time giving it that snowy/icy look.  Part of what I did was use the glass material on the third layer, and stone on the other two layers.  I put a sticker over the stone that was actually the hair for the X-Men character “Storm”.  It had a nice fade from white to a frosty blue and did a decent job of looking cold.

Next, I was having problems with my shapes.  I kept getting a message that my shapes were too complicated, and I couldn’t add anything else.  I looked them over closely, but couldn’t see what was so complicated.  I tried deleting portions of the shapes, but it didn’t make much of a difference.  What finally made the difference was using the corner editor.  I discovered that when I was drawing the shapes, or erasing portions, that the process was creating 3-4 corners for what I thought was a single corner.  By going around the edge of the shapes, I deleted about 75% of the extra corners.  This allowed me to continue adding to the shapes and make my design a little more solid looking.

Finally, when I was playing this weekend, I managed to get to the final section of the game.  Trying to track down the “Collector”.  Apparently he is the big bad villain that is causing all the trouble.  One of the prizes I won was the “Snow Paper” texture.  This texture is a grabbable material covered with sparkling snowflakes.  The perfect thing for my ice cavern.  Using the material changer, I did a quick update on the pieces I had made so far and VIOLA, ice cave.  Glad I took some time out play.

Time to get back to work!!

So, after a brief hiatus, while I kicked some corrupted butt in Prince of Persia, it's time for me to get back to work on my level.  When I left off, I had finished making some changes after an impromptu playing of my "level so far" by a random person I met while playing online.  Got those little glitches fixed, and now I am moving forward.  The next section takes place in the ice cavern of the ferocious yeti (screaming in the background as menacing music plays).  I am experimenting with materials in this part by using a glass material to give it a shiny glowy look.  This section is also going to have a few surprises, and even a few ways to die.  One of the surprises involved something popping up in the background.  I used a "thin layer" piece of the glass to obscure the object a little, and added bright red LED lights on the object for evil-looking eyes.  Well, long story short, the LEDs are on the same "thin layer" so the object got stuck.  Thankfully I placed the object on the third level so I just moved the obscuring glass to the 2nd "thin layer" and all is well again. 

I am also experimenting with the thin glass layers to add icicles hanging from the ceiling of passages and such.  It's just one way I am dressing up the level to give it a more finished look.  Hopefully I can finish the rough design of the ice cave this week, and get alot of it built over the next week.  After the ice cave is done, I just need to add the finishing touches to the village and the rock cave and it might be ready for a full-on test run.

No more breaks, unless I decide to go back and find the last 30ish light seeds in Prince of Persia.

Sack in the Saddle…Again

Well, my break from working on my LPB level was a nice one, but now I am working on finding a balance so I can keep playing and working on this at the same time.  But I digress.

I was able to finish roughing out the first third of the level.  I put all the elevators in, a few moving platforms, and even a cannon.  I am having a problem moving forward, something like writers block.  I’m sure if I just keep working on it I will continue to move forward. 

One thing that helped was meeting another player online.  I asked them if they wanted to see my level so far, and they followed along.  One thing this helped me do was a run though with someone who didn’t know the level.  I found a few technical issues, so I need to redesign a couple parts.  Both are elevators.  Anyway, this person started adding objects and slapping up stickers.  They apologized for messing with my level, but I decided to keep the changes. 

When I saved the level, I got a new trophy.  This one is for building a level with another player.  Bonus for me.  I sent them one of the objects I built as a thank you, and I have a new PSN friend.  With that little break, I think I can get back to designing.

Been a productive week

This past week I made good headway on this project.  I learned how to place large blocks of material, one layer at a time, to make it easier to carve out passages and rooms in the level.  I built two mine-shaft-style elevators, a hidden point bubble cache, and figured out how to use water to add a little detail to the level.  The biggest piece I completed was a giant “ferris wheel”, but that’s all I’m going to say about that.  Don’t want to give away too much.

One lesson I am learning, and it is something I read about in a forum, is that scale is an important thing to consider.  I started working on a vertical passageway, trying to add a little platforming element.  I quickly discovered that if I made the player jump their way to the top, they would probably quit playing the level.  I need to figure out how to eliminate some of the vertical climb while maintaining the pieces I already placed.  Shouldn’t be too hard, I hope.