5SD046 Knytt Assignment
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As part of our course in Advanced Game design, this blog will detail my work with creating a Knytt level, the parts I worked on specifically and the ones I collaborated on. Our first day had our group of 3 brainstorming ideas of what the theme of the level would be, as well as the story being told. Our assignment prohibited us from using text to communicate with the player, and so our theme would need to be simple given the timeframe we had been given (2 weeks). Our first 3 suggestions were as follows: A literal journey up to the top of a mountain within a jungle, reaching the end of a space station symbolizing a being’s birth and development into a more adult person, and exploring a person’s mind on the hunt for lost memories. The latter idea was discarded early on due to lack of understanding of the game’s editor: How would this idea be communicated to the player without words, and how would the memories be represented in the timeframe given? Our remaining two ideas were mashed together, to create a narrative with a twist: The player would start out in a jungle area, that slowly transforms as they move deeper into it, making the player realize they’ve been in the hydroponics area of a space station. Outside of the station a planet and a rocket can be spotted, giving them something to strive for, an escape from the conundrum they find themselves in. Most movement would go towards the right, as there was not enough time to produce a truly sprawling level, and a gamers instinct is to move from left to right in a platformer game. The level itself would mainly take the form of a snake, taking the player forwards and upwards until it dropped down swiftly, giving the player one final challenge to climb upwards before the climax of the level. They would then taper out moving forwards along a docking bay, towards a rocket that ends the level as they climb aboard. What was lacking this early on was the player’s motivation or goal: What were they supposed to strive towards, and how did we communicate to the player the mystery of the jungle? That was to come in a later update, but the general idea was agreed upon here. Next Post should detail how the level’s framework was designed, and how work assignments were given out amongst a group of 3 when only one level can be worked on at a time.
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