Character Bio: Commander Gen Kabuto

• Direction: North East.
• Name: Gen Kabuto.
• Nick Name: Commander Gen, Iron Fist Gen, The Tactician of the Thousand Tricks.
• Sex: Male.
• Animal: Stag Beetle.
• Color: Green.
• Virtue: Courage.
• Power: Infinite Weapons.
• Season: Spring.
• Region: Diamond Jungle.
• Theme: Commando, weapon factory.

Gen is a Stag Beetle which lives in the North-Eastern Diamond Jungle. Gen takes too seriously his reponsibility to take care of his region, so he has established an army-like structure and doesn´t hesitate to attack anyone who may trespass into his domains uninvited, even if it´s another fellow Virtue. Treats his subordinates with an iron hand, but is well known for always leading battles from the front lines and protecting his comrades. Thanks to this, all the creatures living in the Diamond Jungle are really grateful to him and even the most peaceful ones will fight if Gen ever asks for their help. Kitsune´s carefree way of doing things always puts him on his nerves, so they don´t have a good relationship and Gen preffers to keep his distance.

Gen is the Virtue of courage, which manifests in his power as his ability to use a thousand different weapons. Gen always has a trick up his sleeve and never gives up, which has made him prevail over stronger opponents many times in the past. He uses the vast resources of the Diamond Jungle to create many different weapons, ranging from simple bow and arrows to laser guns or giant bazookas. He is also a master tactician, which added to his vast selection of weapons and tricks make him a formidable foe. He´s said to never have lost a fight, but he preffers to say that he´s just won when it was necessary. Rumors say he even beat Sun* once.

After being possessed by the black mask, Gen has started gathering all the resources form the Diamond Jungle at an alarming pace and has begun building an enormous fortress. All the inhabitants of the North Eastern region have been mobilized and Gen´s army is now greater than ever. His intentions are not clear, some say he´s preparing an invasion of the nearby regions, other says he´s just building up better defenses for his people...Kitsune will have to get into this hostile territory and find out the truth from Gen himself.

*Sun: Virtue of Loyalty, master of Chen (Kitsune, Virtue of Justice) and Tui (Ookami, Virtue of Honor) and said to be the most powerful of the 8 Virtues.

Level layout

This region will feature 4 levels:

Incursion: Level set in the Diamond Jungle, where Kitsune will have to face different traps set by Gen and his soldiers.

Desolation: This level will be set in a Diamond Jungle where the trees are begin cut down by giant saws. Kitsune will meet Gen´s right hand here and they´ll have their first face off.

Road Warriors: This level will be strongly inspired by Contra 3´s motorcycle level (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9GEtNfdObx8). Gen´s troops will use all kinds of crazy devices, including some giant flying airships, to transport the cutdown diamond trees. Kitsune will have to jump on the trunks and even take to the skies to take down a huge airship controlled by Gen´s right hand.

Weapon factory: A mechanized factory where the diamond trees were being transported to. Here the trees will be transformed into different weapons. Gen´s right hand will try to stop Kitsune once again.

Assault: Kitsune will assault the fortress, starting with an approaching sequence outside similar in ryhtm to Metal Slug 3´s final mission (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGzLIvyHVqY). The idea is to have a long, action-packed level where Gen´s right hand will attack Kitsune repeteadly using different tactics. When Kitsune reaches the depths of the fortress and corners Gen´s righthand, Gen himself will come forward and face Kitsune, symbolyzing that even under the black mask´s control, Gen will still defend his subordinates.

**Will update this entry with some concept art**

Theme and story in level design

Each level must tell a (simple) story. For example, in Tropical Freeze the Fruit Factory level shows all the process that fruit follows when recollected and masterfully spawns all level challenges with this theme: the player must walk on the fruit being carried on threadmills, avoid knifes cutting fuit in half, jump on the pieces that fly aways from the squeezer...Sawmill Thrill changes the minecart to a raft, back to a minecart using the wood factory theme. Saws change the scenery and provide different challenges as the player progresses. A giant saw even falls out of place and chases the player destroying everything in it´s way in a final, awesome rush.

These moments provide a nice change of pace to the levels and make them memorable and easily identifiable. All levels follow a basic structure, first presenting the current setting, then developing it through the level and finally introducing a change and a resolution. Does it sound familiar? Of course, this is the Kishotenketsu structure all over again!
So, apart from applying the Kishotenketsu structure to challenge development, we must also apply it to the level´s theme. The process we´ll have to follow will be similar to this:

• Define level´s main mechanic.
• Define the crysis moment(s).
• Define the theme and the secondary mechanics that fit it.
• Shape the level story so it builds up to the crysis moment(s).
• Define the chalenges so they fit the level story.

Bear in mind that the Kishotenketsu structure doesn´t need to be followed rigidly: in Tropical Freeze there are levels that have more than one moment of crysis:

• Irate Eight: There is an escape sequence close to the level´s midpoint and abother one at the end. Sort of a Ki-sho-ten-sho-ten-ketsu structure, or a wester 2-act narrative with a crysis at the end of the last act that changes the world for the second act. The second act build up tension for the final confrontation and the third act presents the second crysis and a final resolution.
• The Rocket Barrel level in the Fruit Island with the robot riding a big mecha: does something similar, pitting the player against the mecha several times before finally getting rid of it at the end.

We should make use of this resource so that the levels don´t become predictable and can stand out more between them.

Rayman Jungle Run analysis

Wait, a mobile game? Yes, Rayman Jungle Run is a mobile game. And it´s awesome.

This game has tightly designed levels, incredibly responsive controls, a nice set of abilities for the player, varied obstacles...This game reminded me a lot of DKC Tropical Freeze´s minecart levels. But it even allows for more different actions than those levels, which is a huge achievement for a simple mobile game.

Just to get this out of the way, I managed to get out of the levels some time and other time I managed to get trapped, but they were small nuances solved in the single second it takes a level to restart.

I´ll divide the analysis in 2 sections:

• Player abilities
• Level design

Player abilities

Rayman is always running forward (this direction can be sometimes reversed) and the player controls him with 2 virtual buttons:

• Left: Use it to jump, hover if held, wall jump, and climb corners. The jump has a nice arc, it´s a high jump, with a good amount of hang time and nice rising and falling speeds, which make it feel agile but at the same time provides a lot of control. Hovering is used by holding down the button while in the air and works wonderfully; once you get the hang of it it´s really cool to maneouver on air currents by alternating long helds to gain altitude and short taps for small adjustments. It will also make you go slower, so you can use it to alter the timing of your run. You can also jump on some enemies to bounce on them.
• Right: Use it to punch or kick if in the air. Kicking in the air will make Rayman loose speed, but punchin while on the ground while make him go faster. This way of relating this action with speed, giving the player more control over Rayman is very intelligent. Hitting an enemy will push him backwards. The distance depends on your current speed, so punching will push them further than kicking and place them in the perfect position for you to bounce on them. Such a simple action is given a lot of depth with these small abilities, it´s just genius!

There is another ability: running. Yes, Rayman does this by default, but depending on your speed and on the angle in which you enter a wall you will be able to run up walls. Even the simplest action, which is not even controlled by the player, has some degree of depth.

This is a masterclass on how to squeeze out maximum depth, value and functionality from the most simplest control scheme.

Level design

But the above aren´t enough to make this game so good. In platformer, good level design is needed and this game has it. All levels have different mechanics and they always start by introducing them right at the start, only to later evolve them in cool different ways. A simple, senseless setup right at the beginning of the level later gains sense when you are going at full speed and an evolution jumps at you with little time to react. At this moment, your brain will draw the required association and make you perform the required actions to push through. The collectibles help guide you through the level while proposing more advances challenges at the same time and everything is placed and synchronized perfectly so you can speed through most levels. Challenges will wait until you are at the right position to start moving or acting (like flamethrowers not starting to shoot until you get close), setting up all their pieces so you can blaze through them if you know what you´re doing. There is also a time attack mode which, as seen in Tropical Freeze, is a great testament to how the developers designed all challenges with the main idea of maintaing a constant flow of movement.

But Rayman´s abilities also allow for timing options, and the game fully uses them to create interesting challenges, so the game isn´t just about tapping the right button at the right moment, but in fact makes you think about what ability to use and how to use it. Should I hover a bit more to land further into that platform? Or just fall so I can get faster through these fireballs and have more speed to make a longer jump? Should I break this door with a jump kick to stop, or do I punch through it? Do I slide down this wall all the way or jump to fall faster?

The whole game is about timing and speed on one side and combat and platforming on the other, the same skill groups present in SMW and executed beautifully. Everything works so well together and is so well thought that even in the unlockable levels, where there are no collectibles, you have no problem to find your way forward. In fact, most times I got through the trickiest parts successfully the first time, only to fail miserably at them in later attempts when I started to think too much about them. If you let your instinct guide you you will prevail, your brain will make the connections and send the right actions to your fingers without you realizing it. But even when failing repeteadly, you´ll soon find a solution and after a few tries will be able to execute it perfectly everytime, another proof on how great and fair this game´s level and challenge design is.

What to learn

• Simple actions with multitude of uses, everything affects speed and positioning.
• Good use of collectibles.
• Awesome, tight level design.
• Great level progression: Levels are structured thematically with gameplay elements an evolve in complexity and difficulty, both internally and externally.
• Time attack mode is a testament of the design principles behind the level design.
• Cool, fair challenges.
• Quick rythm, even in QoL elements like how fast the levels restart or having an always accessible button to instantly restart the level, specially useful when going for 100% playthroughs.

Level design guidelines

Every level should follow the design principles detailed in the following entries:

• Kishotenketsu: The Nintendo formula for level design
• Macro/micro level design and pacing

Additionally, there are some more specific guidelines that must be followed too:

• The level must tell a story
• There must be at least 2 paths in each level:
• Main Path: Easy, everyone should be able to complete it. 
• Pro Path: An alternate, harder path that branches off from the main path.
• Collectibles: Collectible considerations.
• Extra challenges: All levels will have 2 extra challenges.

All these principles will be detailed in the following sections.

The level must tell a story

• A level can have more than one crysis, but all of them must be centered around the same concept, thematically and mechanically. Having different elements take the focus during the crysis would dissolve the theme and make the whole level less memorable and focused.
• The whole level must be built around the crysis. Once that´s defined (which includes defining the main mechanic of the level) the rest of the level and story can be shaped around it.
• The rest of the level should be designed to establish the setting to be turned upside down by the crysis and to build up for the crysis.

The Main Path

• This is the easier path.
• This path must be beatable without running. Running will only be allowed when it´s the only action in the challenge: for example to outrun falling spikes or run over gaps on the floor). As it won´t be frequently used in the Main Path, we should have care to remind the player of this ability each time before requiring.
• It will follow the Kishotenketsu template.
• The Main Path must be beatable without needing to link more than 2 different inputs. For example: jump, change powerUp, jump is allowed, but jump, change powerUp, shoot is not. A link is defined as something that must be done during a single challenge.
• Ideally, we should try to place checkpoints close to where the Pro Path branches off, this way when dying the player will easily be able to choose one path or another, eliminating the risk of a casual player getting stuck on the Pro Path.
• Mandatory Secret Exits will always be located in the Main Path in places where they can also be accessed through the Pro Path.

The Pro path

• This path is harder to complete.
• The challenge progression will follow the Kishoutenketsu formula with some alterations, specially in the Ten section. Progression will be quicker.
• A player completing it should be able to get 100% of the collectibles of the level in a single run.
• It will intertwine again with the Main Path several times.
• Checkpoints in the Pro Path should always allow an easy way back to the Main Path, to avoid casual players getting stuck. However, they will only be necessary for long stretches of the Pro Path, as usually we´ll have a checkpoint in the Main Path right before the paths branch out so they player will always be able to choose paths.
• This path will usually be longer than the Main Path, but all elements will be specially tuned up for speed running.
• The Pro path must be able to be completed in speedrun mode, meaning that the player must not be forced to wait at any moment and enemy and platform placement must allow to always press forward as fast as possible.
• Speedrun can be completed with 0% item completion rate and any of the numerous abilities of Kitsune can be required.
• The Pro path won´t necessary be the best for speed running, sometimes a mix between Pro and Main paths will allow lower times.
• Secret exits will always be accesed through the Pro path, or in parts of the Main path that are shared, with the exception of mandatory Secret Exits that will always be accessible through both paths.

Collectibles

• Every level will have a final Bead located close to the exit and locked with coins. The player will need to grab enough coins during the level to unlock it.
• The first Gorinto Part of the level must be visible from this path and used to lead the player to the Pro Path. This way, Gorinto Parts will be used to hint the player at a more advanced playstyle.
• Whenever the Pro Path separates from the Main path a Gorinto Part will have to be placed to signal the way. The stunt required to get it will put the player on the Pro Path, so this way when there are more than one path it will be easy to identify which one is the Main Path and which one is the Pro Path.
• Gorinto Parts will always be located after checkpoints, so if the player grabs one he must survvie until the next checkpoint. Placing them before a checkpoint would clash with the idea that, unlike Beads, the player must hold on to them.
• When the Pro and Main Paths mix cases some collectibles can be placed in the Main Path (this will provide more variety to the Main Path, specially if we put in minigames for puzzle pieces, secrets or Gorinto Parts that require some advanced stunt to get them in an otherwise normal challenge).
• There will only be collectibles in the Main Path when it intersects with the Pro Path, so that no collectible is missable if a player goes through the Pro Path from beginning to end.

Extra challenges

Every level will have 2 extra challenges: One is unlocked by collecting all Gorinto Pieces and the other by finding all puzzle pieces. Some extra challenge examples:

• Beat the level under a set time.
• Beat the level without killing enemies.
• Beat the level using only Astral Palm/Shadow Edge.
• Beat the level without being detected (for stealth levels).
• Beat the level without getting hit.
• Beat the level without dying.
• Individual alterations: Some levels may change some part of their mechanics, like platforms moving faster, swapping one type of enemy for another...
• Hunt X enemy: The player must find and kill a certain enemy/ies. This special enemies may not appear during the normal run.
• Find X collectibles in time: Hide X pieces of a collectible and make the player find them under a set time.

Game analysis: Index

I´ll be reviewing some good 2D platformers, as a way to find what makes them great and try to use those concepts in Kitsune. 

Learn from these:

• 1001 Spikes
• Ape Scape
• Angry Video Game Nerd games: They actually have pretty interesting level designs (skewed towards almost unfair challenge in 1, and slightly easy in 2)
• Braid: Focus on puzzles
• Castlevania 1: Levels and enemy patterns designed around the subweapons and player jump arcs
• Castlevania 3: Branching paths and level design
• Castlevania 4: Camera control, player movement and vast design differences from 1-3
• Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia: Nice level design, melee combat
• Cave Story: Pay special attention to the camera
• Contra 3/4: Study how respawning enemies are an integral part of the level design and the movement palette is still built around that
• Donkey Kong '94 (Gameboy): Triple jump mechanic+backflip, level designs... most of it
• Donkey Kong Country 2
• Donkey Kong Country Returns
• Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze: Good boss fights
• Duck Tales Remastered
• Freedom Planet: Modern Sonic done right
• Guacamelee: Cohesive graphical style, soundtrack and responsive controls. Great mix of action, platforming and exploration.
• Gunvolt: MMZ style bossfights
• I wanna be the Guy: Absurdly ultra difficult, etc, to check out how they handle difficulty and player anticipation/bait and switch (watch normal/blind playthrough and speedrun playthroughs, interesting stuff to see there regarding player movement, how to lead the player, etc)
• Leap Day (Android): Awesome way to make a responsive platformer for mobile. Great level design, very good challenges for double jumping and wall jumping.
• Mega Man 2
• Mega Man 3
• Megaman 3 (Gameboy): Level design and camera. Screen space is a LOT more limited than on NES
• Megaman 5 (Gameboy): Level design and camera. Screen space is a LOT more limited than on NES
• Mega Man 9
• Mega Man 10
• Megaman X for its everything (it does teaching the mechanics through its introduction stages/menu better than Super Metroid - honest!)
• Megaman Xtreme
• Mega Man Zero 1: Focus on boss fights
• Mega Man Zero 2: Focus on boss fights, excellent level design
• Mega Man Zero 3: Focus on boss fights, excellent level design
• Mega Man Zero 4: Focus on boss fights
• Metroid Zero Mission: Overall movement palette, and level design alternative paths for speedrunning
• New Super Mario Bros U: Best level design in Mario games?
• New Super Luigi U: Small tweak of mechanics to spice things up. Play immediately after Super Mario Bros U.
• Ori and the Blind Forest: Tight controls, original game mechanics, exploration
• Rayman Jungle Run
• Rayman Legends
• Shantae Risky´s Revenge: Polished up version of the original with similar level design considerations and a very interesting take on enemy patterns where they usually throw you off rythm compared to what you´re usually used to. Most enemies will either anticipate or wait a second more than you´d think, making most battles require a slightly different rythm than in similar games.
• Shantae the Pirate´s Curse: More varied traversal palette. more linear LD, but more open ended.
• Shovel Knight: Level design, development of mechanics, alternate paths looping back
• Sonic The Hedgehog (Master System)
• Sonic 1 Genesys: Original platforms & exploration
• Sonic & Knuckles
• Splatoon: Best holystic mechanics since Super Mario Bros.
• Super Mario World : THE GAME
• Super Mario Bros 2: Unconventional jump arcs (play anyone but Mario and relearn everything you think you know about platformers) and linear-yet-exploration-driven LD
• Super Mario Bros 3: Experimental
• Super Meat Boy: Focus on skill, challenge design & difficulty, tight controls
• Steamworld Dig: "Create your own level design" aspect and overall movement feel, one of the better ones in recent memory
• The Smurf's Nightmare (Gameboy): Triple jump mechanic
• The Wonderful 101: Game systems.
• Wario Land 3 (great exploration mechanics)
• Wario Land 4: Tighter Wario Land 3

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What NOT to do

• Mutant Mudds/Xeodrifter are pretty "by the numbers", but it's interesting to see what that means exactly in their respective subgenres :-D
• Mercenary Kings: Mainly for their delayed jump, to study how terrible it feels (at least, I think it pretty much kills the game)
• Tintin, Spirou and Indiana Jones on Gameboy/SNES to see and understand how and why collision can go horribly wrong :-D (and that's in addition to poor level design and other fun stuff).
• Shantae (original): It´s LD is hampered by its camera (way too close, leading to a LOT of blind/faith jumps).

Shantae Risky´s Revenge (feat. Pehesse)

Shantae: Risky´s Revenge

Beatiful pixel art graphics and humor.

I had the great luck of being able to discuss this game with Honey Rose creator Pehesse:

• correojon: About backtracking: I´ve been playing Shantae Risky´s Revenge this week on the 3DS and well, the game´s beautiful and fun, the dungeons are great...but the constant backtracking really hurts it. It doesn´t use the upgrades you get to facilitate traversal in any way, in fact the game adds more and more time consuming enemies (the strong mummies, the mermaids which can hide in ponds of water to become invincible...) in the parts you have already traversed many times, placing them in locations that stop your momentum (like the fucking Imps in the trajectory of jumps over bottomless pits), making them respawn infinitely or without sense (enemies spawning just behind you, or right before you and instantly attacking). This hurts the game flow tremendously and even permeates into some dungeons: it seems the devs said "hey, a Metroidvania must have backtracking" but they didn´t stop to think about how to make it fun or even include it in the flow of the game. Instead of using backtracking to show the player how powerful he´s become it achieves the opposite effect and makes him feel like the new abbilities are extremely circunstancial and have only been designed for gating and to have an excuse to backtrack. Also, warp point locations make no sense, I can´t understand why there isn´t a general warp point in the city. The controls (turning and attacking always fails) and the hitboxes are a mess. I´m right before the last dungeon, but I just don´t want to traverse again the same locations to get to the door or to find more magic jams (which is a big pity, as the reward system for finding jam is awesome!). Is Pirate´s Curse better in these regards?
• Pehesse: Yes, I can see how you'd take things that way (I found your thoughts on Duck Tales Remastered quite interesting in the same regard, though I have a much more forgiving outlook on the game overall - I still prefer the original, and as you found out, find the experience on easy quite enjoyable). I agree about some of your points on enemy placement and rhythm on Risky's Revenge, though don't necessarily agree with your conclusion - I think it's actually part of the fun that they consciously throw you for a loop and off the common "flow". I believe it's a conscious design decision to have them work off a different rhythm than what you'd commonly expect, making the game hard to play when you rely on usual platformers rhythm and requiring to adapt to slightly different patterns. However, the backtracking overall is very poorly done, that I completely agree with, and the warp squids system especially is almost inexcusable - I hope it is a relic from the original design of the game which was butchered when the game was segmented into smaller parts, and not something that was planned at the later stages of development, because it demonstrates pretty poor judgement. Shantae games overall I don't find have the greatest level design (I'm surprised you criticize their controls, movement and hitboxes, though, since I think they're fairly precise and faithful to what's going on screen) - their use of backtracking is spotty, forward prevision isn't always the best either with blind jumps galore in the original and a general lack of sense of direction in RR. Pirate's Curse I think is better in all respects, though what it learnt in the process, it lost in personality - it feels a bit like a collection of design tricks used and recognized in many games since, which evidently work, but can't really claim originality or impact anymore. The heart of those games lie elsewhere for me (slightly off rhythm, as I said, and general presentation), so I can understand how viewing them strictly from a platforming study standpoint would make them a disappointing experience. Though that's why the adage exists: a game is sometimes more than the sum of its individual parts :-D
• correojon: I loved the Metroidvania approach at the beginning, but after revisiting the same location for the 4th time it stopped being fun. Besides, the upgrades you find for the monkey, elephant and mermaid seem almost one-time-use: you just use them for some very specific obstacle and may as well loose them afterwards; they are effectively keys. The controls worked pretty well most of the time, but turning and attacking would fail more times than work. Also, when walking next to a wall you had to release all buttons for Shantae to respond to any new commands. The hitbox of Shantae is fixed to the sprite instead of having soem safety zone, which would make you take some hits when only the tip of the sprite was colliding with the enemy, this is a big no-no and something games have been doing correctly by separating the sprite and hitbox since 30 years ago. When crouching I don´t know if it was because the controls took some time to react or the hitbox didn´t update in time, but I could never evade any attack at the last moment this way. The opposite happens when you are in monkey form: your hitbox is so small it was very difficult to grab chains or other things to climb in the middle of a jump. The backwards dash...it looks nice but I think I haven´t needed it once during the game. Maybe I used it in one bossfight, but apart from that it´s a move that makes no sense. It seems the devs put it in because Castlevanias usually have it, but didn´t take it into account when designing anything else in the game. The game has some platforming challenges, but I wouldn´t call this a platformer either. Anyway, it looks gorgeous and I´m studying it´s pixelart with detail and the music is great too, though not as good as Shovel Knight´s for my taste (after playing SK I´m a fan of Jake Kaufmann), though it may be more because of the style than anything else.

Ducktales Remastered

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1231675

First impressions

I´ve been playing a lot of well regarded 2D platformers recently (Mario 3, SMW, Megaman 2&3, Super Meat Boy, Shovel Knight...) and even if I found some flaws in each of them, it was clear on every case why they were regarded as great games. But then I reached the next item in my list: Duck Tales Remastered.

The pogo stick mechanic is good, but I´m not capable of finding anything that makes me want to play the game. In fact I´m feeling like I constantly want to drop it and that it is wasting my time and doesn´t properly value it. Apart from the problems not related to gameplay (constant cutscenes totally breaking the pace of the game), these have been the worst offenders to me: Bad hitboxes on hazards: This is specially obvious in the Amazon stage, where one stray pixel of the spikes is enough to hit you. Obstacles that force you to wait: The mummies in Transilvania or the spiders over spikes in the Amazon force you to wait until you can kill them/pass through. This is specially atrociuos as if you loose all lives you have to repeat the whole level from the beginning, so it became really frustrating. Which brings up the next point: Why design the obstacles based on timing if you´re going to make the player repeat them over and over again when he dies (and he will die)? This game would have benefitted a lot from a design more oriented towards speed running, with obstacles thought in a way that a player that has already beat them once could easily find another way to get over them quickly. I haven´t found any mechanic progression or interesting obstacles thus far. Everything seems to derive from the same basic mechanics but doesn´t do anything interesting with them, it doesn´t twist them or try to add something new. All obstacles are either based on waiting for the correct time to push forward, jump or attack without going any deeper or having any other consequences. It feels like the intro stage shows everything there is to the game and the rest is just repetition under a different coating. The diamonds are infuriating: They spawn after you go through their location, so you have to constantly take 2 steps forward and 1 backwards to collect them. I started caring about them before I finished the intro level.

The game is difficult, I´m dying a lot, but I have no problem enduring death and retrying until I get better. I´ve finished many games more difficult than this one, if they ever gave me reasons to keep on trying and I´m not finding any of those reason in Duck Tales.

I´ve only played 4 levels (intro, Amazon, Transilvania and a bit of The Moon) but I already feel like I´ve had my share of this game. What am I missing? Why is this game so well regarded? I really can´t think of any reasons why anyone would willingly choose to play this over any other good 2D platformer.

Playing on easy

OK, so I tried the game in Easy and wow it really is much better now. The only differences are that enemies now deal half damage and that you have unlimited lives, so you no longer need to replay the whole level when you loose all lives. This makes the bad hitboxes much less frustrating. Also, instant deaths are not so bad now. IMO it´s a bad idea to put a limit in lives in a game focused on exploration, before I was too afraid to loose one of my precious lives trying to go after secrets, it really changes the way you play the game. Specially bad idea if there are instant death obstacles.

I played the African and the Hymalayan levels and I actually found them fun. I specially liked the mix of patterns of the rabbits and goats in the snow level, along with the restriction of getting stuck in snow if you pogo on it. I replayed the Amazon level and I enjoyed it a lot more this time. Also, I liked a lot the boss there. On the bad side, the game seems too easy now, there´s no real danger of dying apart from instant-death obstacles, There are no real challenges that require skill, enemies feel more like a small nuance than a real danger, specially if you find some of the heart upgrades. An intermediate setting between easy and medium with infinite lives but less health (and better hitboxes) could´ve hit the sweet spot.

The levels are a bit repetitive and the challenges don´t seem to follow any kind of progression: in the Amazon level you can find a secret room almost at the start where you have to bounce on 4 of those green creatures that jump from the water. They didn´t come back until much later in the level and the challenges they were used in were nowhere near the complexity of that first challenge, it felt a bit weird. Also I missed one piece of the engine in the snow level and had to retrace a big part of the level, when with a small modification of the level layout I could have gotten back in seconds...not something I liked, the layout felt a bit lazy.

I set hard pogo on but nothing changed and the option appears disabled in the settings now, maybe it´s not available in easy difficulty?

I´m not able to make small bounces, the controls feel really unresponsive when trying to do it. Big flaw as this limits severly the movement palette. Some challenges doesn´t seem to take this into account. The pogo bounce also failed sometimes if landing on the border of a platform.

This game is nowhere near Mario, Meat Boy or Mega Man, but at least I´m enjoying it now. It shows some bad design decissions here and there though.

Wrapping up

So I finished the game, I liked the last level a lot! Specially the last bossfight and the run to the top of the volcano. I don´t know if the complaints about this last run only apply to the original, but in this version I had no problem doing it on my second try.

One thing I liked about this game were the bosfights: the lunar rat was a bit simple, but the rest, with special mention to the Africa and final bosses were very good.

Not much to add to my last post, I ended enjoying the game :)

PS: The credits were awesome!

Super Meat Boy

Super Meat Boy (in progress)

31/05/2016

• Right trigger to run (optional): Apart from the standard face button, the RT can be used to run, just as I had programmed. I played using it and it further convinced me that this is a much better choice than using the face button, so I must encourage it in the game. Dropping the face button won´t be a good idea as many people are accustomed to it, so both options will be available at all times.
• Jump height control is really easy: Meat Boy reacts instantly to releasing the jump button with no accumulated momentum.
• Left and right movement: Meat Boy reacts instantly to left and right inputs, specially if the RUN button is held down. Maybe too much for my taste, this was clearly done to favor speed running. Direction correction in the air is not as responsive and there seems to be some momentum there. No overshoot in jumps, except maybe if the RUN key is held after jumping and before correcting.
• All momentum is killed when landing if no key is held: This gets some time to get used to, specially because left/right movement is so responsive, but it´s a great tool once you get the hang of it. Sonic in MS did the same and it helped a lot with platforming. Without this, the tight platforming in Meat Boy wouldn´t be possible. However, it feels weird when mixed with the high sideways acceleration when jumping.
• Level design is awesome: It teaches the player step by step all the necessary mechanics and evolves them gradually through the different levels.
• Level and game design are clearly focused towards speed running: The quick loop of dying->respawning or beating a level->going to the next one favor a fast rythm, as does the time counter at top and the result at the end of the level. There are alternate routes to try to get shorter times in every level and levels are short.
• There is also exploration: There are entries to a secret world and hidden bandages to get which favor exploration. The bandages also require tight platforming. However, with the fast rythm of the game exploration seems to be discouraged and feels out of place: when you explore you feel like you are wasting time because the rest of the game is telling you to hurry up.
• Graphics are a bit...meh: The game clearly shows it´s age and the small team that made it in this regard.
• Humor is awesome: Constant references to other games (Street Fighter, Castlevania, Mortal Kombat...). Dark humor (poor squirrels!) made me laugh more than once.

Sonic The Hedgehog (Master System)

Sonic (Master System)

Level design is simple at first, but all levels hide a fair amount of secrets (lives, chaos emeralds, ring monitors, barriers, invulnerabilty monitors...). Looking around (specially downwards) can be used fairly often to find secrets. Sonic is very heavy on the ground, but he has great air mobility, being able to accelerate almost to full speed in the air from a still jump. The thing that makes platforming work is that it´s very easy to kill momentum in the air and specially that if you aren´t pressing any key when you land Sonic will "stick" to the platform he lands on. Overshooting jumps, positioning in the air and falling directly downwards is the way to go, though momentum can be killed even in straight forward jumps. This makes platforming feel awesome and with very little practice makes you feel like you can nail almost any kind of jump. I´m getting the impression Kitsune slides too much after landing from a jump (Mario in SMW doesn´t and as I´ve seen, Sonic either) so I should tweak momentum cancelling when landing. In fact, this approach of killing momentum is constantly enforced by the level design: the player must carefully stop and look around to search for secrets and if he rushes forward he´ll surely crash into an enemy or a spring that will launch him towards spikes or some other hazard. This made that those times where the player could rush forward feel a bit out of place at first, mainly because you could blaze to a hazard or just miss many secrets in a long jump after a descending slope. However at the same time it feels very liberating at times (is specially cool in the long ramps in Scrap Brain, where enemies are even placed to be killed by rolling off slopes) and can be great for speed running.

Low jumps are a bit trickier to perform well, but they still work acceptably.

There are almost no "extreme" jumps required in the whole game (last stage still pending), the player can usually overshoot all jumps and use airtime to correct landing.

The Jungle Boss was great (airborne boss throwing cannonballs on a half-pipe). I also liked a lot the Labyrinth boss, appearing both at the bottom to shoot to the side the player´s on (must wait until the last moment and jump upwards to avoid) and at the top (alternating sides, which forces the player to follow/foresee that). He shoots a slow missile downwards which, when at the height of the player will launch forward with a bit of tracking on the Y-axis. A simple attack, but that worked very well: it´s easy to implement and understand for the player, but has a behaviour that can be menacing in some setups. Pity is it could be cheated by standing at the far side of the screen, so the boss will shoot the missiles facing outwards and they will disappear offscreen without posing a real challenge, but this is also a consequence of following the boss from side to side of the arena, so it could be intended and is a nice reward for the player being proactive.

Special mention to the Bridge background (specially the clouds and somewhat the mountains) but most of all, to the AMAZING Jungle background. Very simple, but it really gave out a kind of "hand-drawn" vibe, similar to Yoshi´s Island but on a lesser level due to tech constraints. I must try making something similar for the Flower Beds in Sakura Field or for settings with more vegetation.

I didn´t enjoy much the Labyrinth stage, mainly because moving underwater was veeery slow and non-responsive, some and sometimes water bubbles wouldn´t spawn.

I understand how I could sink so many hours in this game back in the day, it´s really good :)

Sometimes I would know an enemy, secret or hazard was there before they could appear. I don´t know if it´s because I still somehow remembered it (doubt it, it´s been +20 years!) or because the level design and object placement made sense.

Braid

Braid highlights

Started replaying Braid yesterday with a more analytic mindset trying to get all the puzzle pieces. It surprised me a little that the game is more about puzzles than platformingm even to the point of making the platforming almost trivial. Levels are just small sets of challenges (sometimes even 1 single challenge), there´s no jumping or anything outside the proper challenges, to the point of having to travel walking long distances. In this regard it feels a bit underwhelming, as I was expecting more complex designs, but the levels are just cut down to the bare minimum, while at the same time adding long walking sections here and there.

The puzzles are very clever, but sometimes there´s no way to continue but to exit the level and restart it. Also, sometimes you have to rewind A LOT. Many puzzles are not doable the first time as you´re on a tight timer, so by the time you see everything you need you have to rewind and some elements may be immune to time. BTW, having to rewind long periods of time is boring.

I´m liking the game and I´m finding the puzzles very challenging, but for the moment I´m not convinced this is the masterpiece everyone says, at least from a gameplay and level design view. Still, it´s a huge accomplishment for one single dev and I hope I can come up with something half as unique and great as this.

Edit (12/05/2016):

I reached the final world, some puzzles were really tricky, while others required too much precission which felt akward in a game that hasn´t required such thing anywhere. Still, it´s genious how the game bends it´s own mechanics and even reuses exactly the same levels with these new twists, changing them completely. The revisit to the Hunt level or the boss one with the new mechanics of worlds 4 and 5 were awesome: you instantly recognize them, you know exactly what objective you have but the mechanics transform how you interact with these levels.

I specially liked World 4´s mechanic: moving to the right advances time and moving to the left rewinds it (it seems it´s more like the position in the timeline is defined directly by the position of the player in the x-axis).

Note: This is an awesome idea and I think it could work really well in one of Ookami´s levels. It can be really tricky to setup though, so for this level I could start by dividing the level into smaller rooms. Also, verticality doesn´t seem to be affected by the mechanic, so we could "easily" set up a vertical level, climbing a wal with time control would look really awesome.

Note: I should ask Jarosh if he got his inspiration from this level for the x-sensitive platforms in Octahedron.

An aspect I haven´t discussed yet about the game are the graphics: it´s really high quality, very artistic, like you are in a dream world or in a painting (everything indicates the author went for teh second one). The references to Mario games are very direct and I loved them. Music also sets this oniric and relflexive mood, so it matches really well the general tone of the game.

What I didn´t like were all the long texts in the books...I mean, maybe the story is great, but so much text really put me off when I just wanted to play and once I skipped one book, I just couldn´t bother to read the rest.

The more I play this game the less I think it´s a platformer, it´s a puzzle game where platforming is really not more important than the time mechanics, so even calling it a puzzle platformer doesn´t seem right. This is not something bad, it´s just a personal appreciation meaning that I think you really shouldn´t compare this game to SMW, just like you wouldn´t compare SMW and ALttP. I won´t be able to take anything regarding movement or platforming...however the time mechanics and puzzle settings (specially the revisiting) are top tier concepts I can see working in Kitsune.

Only one world remaining, tonight Braid finally falls!

Edit (16/05/2016): Finished the game, the last world presented a new mechanic where you could create a bubble where time will be slowed down, it was nice. I didn´t like (and this is not only a problem in World 6) that some puzzles required very exact positioning or fiddling of the rewind-forward mechanic. An example is when you have to climb the falling ladder while rewinding-advancing, I just don´t understand how I finally solved that puzzle when I did...it didn´t feel very rewarding.

The last level was awesome, it´s the only instance in the whole game where some story telling is done through gameplay, not counting any obscure metaphors the dev used throughout the game. And it was awesome, totally changing the meaning of the scene to the opposite of the original meaning.

So overall, I enjoyed the game, there were some very clever puzzles but I didn´t like the walls of text for story telling, some times the mechanics felt inconsistent (or rather, their required use) and the levels were short and simple. I loved how it revisited old levels with new mechanics and how it introduced and developed the mechanics through each level. It´s definitely a puzzle game, not a platformer, though there are some platforming components.

Cave Story quick review

Cave Story highlights (in progress)

The camera is indeed very good, but I´m not sure if I can take it into Kitsune. The game is a Metroidvania and there´s not as much platforming as I expected (shooting takes precedence, even more than in Mega Man games I´d say...) and there is lots of vertical movement, but the player usually moves, then stops to shoot, then moves again. The camera drags a bit behind (sometimes it even does a bit of leading) and seems to have a lot of momentum, but the gameplay rythm with the player stopping so frequently always allows it to catch up in a nice way, which is something that won´t be happening in Kitsune, specially in fast platforming sections.

I´ll continue playing it (mostly because it´s an awesome game, much better than I remembered) and pay more attention to camera behaviour, I´m sure that even though I can´t implement this very same camera 1:1 in Kitsune, there are some very nice tricks I can take home.

One thing this game does exceptionally well is to design bidirectional challenges: often the player has to of through one area and later go back. The challenges are carefully designed so they work great in both directions, often presenting a similar but more complex challenge in the way back.

It also does really great gameplay tutorials, there´s a Youtube video about it I should link here. 

Mega Man 3 quick review

Megaman 3 highlights

Overall, I think MM3 is a better game than MM2. MM2 is more irregular: it has some brighter moments, but it also has some very low points. MM3 is more cohesive from start to finish and I can´t remember a single instance of a challenge that felt cheap. One clear example of this is the spike falls in Shadow Man´s level (MM3) Vs the spike falls in MM2. In MM2 you had to anticipate them without previous knowledge, but in MM3 there is enough space to move and there are hints, like safe walls, that guide you through the safe path. Another great example is Bubble Man´s falling platforms at the beginning of his level in MM2: there´s no way to know how long they take to fall (there´s really no way to even tell what they do before jumping on one, though they do look a bit fishy). Falling means instant death as they´re located over a bottomless pit, so they are tremendously punishing. In MM3 however, similar platforms are presented first over a solid floor, so the player can (and will) fall if he takes to long, learning how they work without being punished. BTW, these same platforms are later used in another part of the stage in a beautiful evolving sequence.

That said, weapon and item balance is done better in MM2, even taking into acount the superiority of the Metal Blade. Top Spin is a useless weapon (except to instakill a few bosses), as is Needle Spike, Jet Rush renders Rush Coil trivial and can trivialize platform sections and Rush Marine is only useful in 2 challenges (though I really only used it in one). Puzzles requiring items are more common in MM2, it feels like items were an afterthought and some challenges were thrown in just to justify it´s existence.

There were many instances of evolving mechanics in MM3 (even through different levels, like the 4 Doc-Robot levels), all levels were very nicely structured and boss fights are awesome. The inclusion of the slide mechanic adds a lot of depth to the boss fights, even though it should´ve been used more in normal challenges. The returning bosses are a bit cheap and show the tremendous difference between the MM2 and MM3 bosses. For the first time I got that impression of dancing with the boss, letting him set the rythm for the battle until I was able to set it myself. For the first time in the franchise, they felt like proper Mega Man bosses, like those you could fight in the much more refined X series or even Dark Souls. The bosses had clear and understandable patterns, but these could easily be altered depending on the player´s actions. For example, shooting would make Gemini Man stop and shoot as well, which could mess your rythm and get you easily killed. Instead of begin constantly on the attack and shooting to get a lucky hit in, you had to plan precisely when to attack.

The bosses in this game are fantastic, it´s a must to come back to them to get ideas when designing Kitsune´s bosses.

Detailed walkthrough: http://megaman.wikia.com/wiki/Mega_Man_3_Walkthrough