I heard an orchestral remix of a Megaman song and tracked it down, mostly just to figure out where I had heard it before. Then I noticed that there was gameplay in the background, and decided to watch that. And man... a lot of the things in these levels are really great design examples.
Here's why:
So, the beginning of this level is sort of mazelike, but the cool thing is that you can see what lies on the other paths. If I remember right, those brick doors can be blown up with the bombs you get from one of the other bosses. It's blatantly showing the players "hey, if you loop around to the beginning and take a different path, you can get more stuff!" with the optional flavoring of mandating they have specific items to access said stuff. This asks the players what they care about more: getting more loot, or the progress they've already made?
Later on, we see more alternate paths where there's less resistance from enemies, but also more rewards near them (and the drops you get from killing them, of course). That's asking something similar to the last one - teasing players with additional loot, so long as they think they can take a fight.
Ways to implement this would be a maze made out of reinforced glass (can be seen, but not smashed, though) or letting players see the end point of an alternate path from an elevated outcropping.
The first thing of notice in this is that there's one screen Megaman just kind of... walks through? With no resistance at all? Sometimes you just need to build atmosphere, or give a sense of descending. Flavor is a big part of the game.
The next really cool thing is that this level actually attacks the light source that the players rely on. That's an often-underutilized DM tactic. It might require some workaround to darkvision depending on edition - but that's usually as simple as specifying it as ~*~ magical darkness ~*~
During the running-from-lasers section (those one-shot you, by the way - which is something you'd want to telegraph!), there are items that exist solely to bait the player. Do you wanna risk trying to get them? Do ya feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk? It's also extra fitting for the level based around quickness.
Lastly, the mechanic of enemies respawning when you return to their location is brutal, and likely more of a technology limitation than anything, but it's really interesting nonetheless. It rewards aggression in a way antithetical to how Flashman's level rewarded backtracking (which is, again, fitting, as Flashman is Quickman's weakness) - push on, or else "reinforcements" arrive. This is another example of how quickness is used thematically.
Further experimenting with that "reinforcements" mechanic, this level actually uses it for the opposite purpose. The enemies are slow, but numerous and can easily overwhelm the player. You gotta finish 'em off before moving on, or else if you need to create space when the next enemy shows up you'll have double the number of enemies on your tail.
In D&D, this is as simple as the (poorly-hid) goblins waiting for the party to leave the room before they try to sneak up on and backstab them. Root them out of their tunnels and deal with them, or else they'll be a real pain in the ass when they corner you with the manticore in the next room.
Also, those bird enemies are great. They creating a sense of tension - shoot the egg or else there's gonna be a ton of tiny, difficult enemies. This begs the question: do I shoot the bird or the egg first? And of course, if you get too focused on that the monkeys will clobber you.
Finally, with some of the later rabbit enemies we see a great example of enemies using the environment to their advantage. You can't shoot the rabbit at the bottom of the stairs from this angle (replicate in D&D with usage of cover), but it can hit you just fine. You have to go pure-defensive while you approach it, and then beat the hell out of it when you do finally get there.
Another cool exploitation of system errors - black in these old NES games was transparent a lot of the time, so they actually use that to make it so attentive players can just barely see those drill enemies while they're in the ground. Sometimes the simplest way to challenge players is to just have them look closely at something.
Thematically, this level is also great. It has a factory vibe, and the platforms that alternate between speeding you up and slowing you down help that by lending a sense of "hurry up and wait" to the level (airport level where you ride on the baggage claim treadmills, anyone?). And those little flat enemies move quicker when Megaman is near them because they're magnetic! So cool.
Finally, let's look at a boss fight. The whole stage you fight Metalman on is an acceleration platform, which significantly increases the fight's difficulty. Thankfully, players have been dealing with these platforms all level and know how to work around them! In this, it's as simple as jumping, but in D&D there could be so many more solutions!
Jam a sword in the slit the tread rotates through! Shoot the generator to power it off! Knock Metalman off his footing so the tread actually brings him towards you! I don't even have to think of all the possible solutions, because it's designed to inspire creativity.
And that's fantastic level design, friends.
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