The Millennial Stone: Level Design

-Work in Progress: Aesthetics-

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Team Lead / Lead Programmer / Level Designer

The Millennial Stone

2D Platformer || Unity 4.5 || 5 developers || 2 months

Level 3, being the penultimate level of the game, had several specific design requirements:

1. Push the player towards more advanced applications of the mechanics

(Wall-Walk and Dash) and introduce circular traversal

2. Integrate a large amount of vertical movement, because this level takes place as the player

climbs to the top of a massive temple

3. Use a large environmental scale to instill a sense of smallness in a

greater forgotten world

The level uses massive background sprites and makes heavy use of the Parallax System to make the cave that houses the golem's body feel expansive and hollow.

The level ended up using a large-scale setpiece to justify the contstant upwards traversal. In this level, the player scales the ruined body of a massive derelict golem, which the player is unaware of throughout. At the end of the level, the camera pulls back to reveal the twist.

To accomplish this, the level is built almost entirely out of curved surfaces and circles, creating a much more organic and complex player path than in previous levels.

I designed and built the 3rd level in The Millennial Stone, titled "The Forgotten Behemoth". This level takes advantage of many scripts I was writing while creating it, including the Cinematic Camera Movement, Sprite Parallax, and Moving Platform scripts.

LEVEL DESIGN

The Layout

The Forgotten Behemoth

Scripting

Overview

UI Design

Alex

shilts

-Work in Progress: Aesthetics-

Team Lead / Lead Programmer / Level Designer

The Millennial Stone

2D Platformer || Unity 4.5 || 5 developers || 2 months

Level 3, being the penultimate level of the game, had several specific design requirements:

1. Push the player towards more advanced applications of the mechanics

(Wall-Walk and Dash) and introduce circular traversal

2. Integrate a large amount of vertical movement, because this level takes place as the player

climbs to the top of a massive temple

3. Use a large environmental scale to instill a sense of smallness in a

greater forgotten world

The level uses massive background sprites and makes heavy use of the Parallax System to make the cave that houses the golem's body feel expansive and hollow.

The level ended up using a large-scale setpiece to justify the contstant upwards traversal. In this level, the player scales the ruined body of a massive derelict golem, which the player is unaware of throughout. At the end of the level, the camera pulls back to reveal the twist.

To accomplish this, the level is built almost entirely out of curved surfaces and circles, creating a much more organic and complex player path than in previous levels.

I designed and built the 3rd level in The Millennial Stone, titled "The Forgotten Behemoth". This level takes advantage of many scripts I was writing while creating it, including the Cinematic Camera Movement, Sprite Parallax, and Moving Platform scripts.

LEVEL DESIGN

The Layout

The Forgotten Behemoth

I have no idea what I'm doing.

Scroll down for the Level Design details

Level Walkthrough

and an image gallery Walkthrough of Level 3, broken up into sections with the critical path:

Hover over each image for the Section # and a description

Below is a narrated video walkthrough of the level, discussing the level's concepts and design goals:

-Work in Progress: Aesthetics-

Team Lead / Lead Programmer / Level Designer

The Millennial Stone

2D Platformer || Unity 4.5 || 5 developers || 2 months

Level 3, being the penultimate level of the game, had several specific design requirements:

1. Push the player towards more advanced applications of the mechanics

(Wall-Walk and Dash) and introduce circular traversal

2. Integrate a large amount of vertical movement, because this level takes place as the player

climbs to the top of a massive temple

3. Use a large environmental scale to instill a sense of smallness in a

greater forgotten world

​​The level uses massive background sprites and makes heavy use of the Parallax System to make the cave that houses the golem's body feel expansive and hollow.

The level ended up using a large-scale setpiece to justify the contstant upwards traversal. In this level, the player scales the ruined body of a massive derelict golem, which the player is unaware of throughout. At the end of the level, the camera pulls back to reveal the twist.

To accomplish this, the level is built almost entirely out of curved surfaces and circles, creating a much more organic and complex player path than in previous levels.

I designed and built the 3rd level in The Millennial Stone, titled "The Forgotten Behemoth". This level takes advantage of many scripts I was writing while creating it, including the Cinematic Camera Movement, Sprite Parallax, and Moving Platform scripts.

LEVEL DESIGN

The Layout

The Forgotten Behemoth

I have no idea what I'm doing.

Scroll down for the Level Design details

Level Walkthrough

and an image gallery Walkthrough of Level 3, broken up into sections with the critical path:

Hover over each image for the Section # and a description

Below is a narrated video walkthrough of the level, discussing the level's concepts and design goals:

The level uses massive background sprites and makes heavy use of the Parallax System to make the cave that houses the golem's body feel expansive and hollow.