Hey, my name is Sol and I have been developing a platformer on Godot in the past week with a friend. He would make the sounds and music and I am in charge of learning this new engine, code, and level design. I let this friend design the idea of the game as I wasn't sure about starting (and I did start late as there was some lack of organization).
Anyway this is the design and concept.
- Concept
You play as a girl Easel, daughter of a famous painter she is sent out by her mother to get paints from her painters store, as her mother believes this is an emergency she has no quarrels sending her daughter out late to go get her replacement paints and this is where the game starts.
- Journey to the paint shop Scene: Night Time A relatively simple journey, Easel is sent to the paint shop to pick up ‘luxurious palette’ from the old painter. This level will have simple jumps, small drops, to introduce the player to the basic mechanics to the game, jumps etc. ‘Maybe a danger element within this level?’. At the end of the level shows the start of the paint shop, outside near the bin is ‘Simple Red’ item a small tube of red paint thrown out from the fancy store as it a cheap version of the exquisite brand. Easel loves the look of it and picks it up.
- The Paint shop
Scene: Old haunted mansion esk level. Think ghost house from Super Mario World and Castlevania
Celeste Haunted Hotel -
Dark wooden floors and background. As she is going up the old stairs of the paint shop they break below her, this can be where the wall jump feature is shown. A level with wall jumps is here, the only danger in this level are drops out of the bottom of the level. The level ends when Easel gets to the end where the paint shop owner ‘Fresco’ gives her the paints but transforms.
Have some sort of transition showing the nightmare world, a world where as a child things are over distorted and saturated.
- The Paint shop Return.
Same level design as the 2nd level, but the nightmare version, a few more pallete swaps, maybe a spider web that was there before holds a spider that if you hit you die. Paint drops from the ceiling become corrosive so hitting them causes a death. You are chased by the paint shop owner Fresco through the level, adding the element of speed against the clock to the level. You are going through the same level and where as the 2nd level gave you time to work with the wall jumps given to you by the Simple Red Paint, now you have to use the skill you and understanding you had in the last level in order to get through this quickly before you are caught by Mr Fresco.
Concepts of game feel and design
The Normal, Nightmare and Dream World
Normal world is the usual world you will travel from level to level.
Nightmare world – A distorted version of the normal world, the same level design as the normal world, but with added extra obstacles, basically represents the world Easel fears it will be, where things are harder and more exhausting due to her fears of what the world is like.
The Dream World – Bonus stages, where you can use your abilities to go through quick sections, ‘reminiscent of Raymans music levels’ where you are transported into a dream state and use the abilities you have to flow and run through a world. A place where you get to enjoy your abilities.
So at this moment there is one level done, at this point of the Jam I realize me and him should've definitely looked for an artist, all Ive been able to do is edit megaman sprites and use some resources I found online.
I dont feel like I will have a solid demo ready to present in the end but hey just wanted to share the thoughts and progress so far.
Thank you for this Jam as it has helped me dust off programming and learn a new engine.