Crystal Towers 2 - I'm doing it

[davidn]

And this hub level map is... quite big (it may be a spoiler, or alternatively some much-needed help).

I think it might be time to give it a last run through, touch up the graphics and annoyances, boot it out into the world, and try to stick to projects that are more feasible from now on.

Comments

[lupineangel.livejournal.com]

Dammit, Teo, you beat me to the Solid Snake thing. :P

David, this looks amazing! The amount of work is evident just from a glance at the hub map. (I take it the... floating teal section in the upper right is how you handle places only reachable by teleport, so you don't have to make an entirely new map for it?) I've always loved looking at level designs like this; the first video game I ever played (Repton 3 on the BBC Micro, way back at the tender age of three) came with a level editor, so a large part of my formative years were spent looking at how different things look from far away compared to when you're immersed in them, and learning how co-ordinates worked so I could see how level maps fitted together, and so on.

Now... any chance of anyone you know doing a Linux translation so I can play it? :P

D.F.

[davidn]

Well, thank you :) It's often quite surprising to look at maps like this that you normally only see up close, with a very limited viewport - they can look very different when you can suddenly see all of them. I might have said before that I looked to the Sonic 2 levels for inspiration, to see how they were fitted together, and was surprised to find that they... weren't, really. But you as the player just don't see all the repeated tiles and tiles off in nowhere with nothing around them, because you have such a limited view of the area.

I think that my fascination with level editors (particularly for an Amstrad PC game called Construct that I'm yet to rediscover) fuelled my love for game design, and coding in general, today :) You're right that the roof section at the top right is only ever accessible by teleporter, and is part of the same layout to avoid having to swap between levels. However, all the other levels are in their own frames with their own sets of events - something which I can tell you from experience I will never, ever do again.

From what I can remember of MMF EXEs, it should work without issues under WINE. Otherwise, you're on your own (but you moved to Linux - you should be used to this by now!)