Design of puzzle games on the example of In The Shadows

Original author: Nicolas 6502b
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There are many games of the puzzle-platformer genre, but I rarely manage to find one in which the plot balance, puzzles, and graphics are correctly observed. There is always some aspect that strains me. I really wanted to create a game with beautiful graphics, an interesting storyline and classic platform puzzles, but I also wanted to ensure that all these three aspects are deeply combined with each other. In In The Shadows I tried to make every aspect have its own rationale. To make everything work together is a difficult task, which in itself is a puzzle.


In The Shadows Development Diaries, collected over three years of work



The plot of In The Shadows is dedicated to overcoming fears, confronting reality, using the fear of darkness as a symbol. To ensure integrity, everything in the game is illuminated in real time and casts real shadows - the main part of the mechanic is associated with the frightening creation-shadow, gaining control over it. All three aspects of the game are related to each other. No tricks - the plot is transmitted both through graphics and puzzles with mechanics. It all turned out to be much more difficult than I expected to make it all work together, take a long time.

Creating Design In The Shadows


When I started working on In The Shadows in 2014, I already sketched a couple of puzzles using only three monsters from the game that I created at that time. I think I had about ten rather interesting puzzles and I was sure that I could easily invent more, considering that I had already invented new mechanics of monsters for the future. One thing is for sure - when creating In The Shadows, I had a lot of difficulties, but of them all, inventing puzzles was the most difficult . Working on graphics seemed natural, and the plot was clearly written in my head, but making puzzles was never easy.

Every step on the way was a battle.

Puzzle design and level design in most cases (in mine too) are tightly connected. Of course, you can focus on puzzles, place the platforms in any right place, and only thento decorate them with beautiful graphics, but I wanted the puzzles to look natural, blend with the environment and be part of the visual elements of the level. Add to this the plot and the natural increase in complexity, and soon the task becomes very difficult. I tried to find books on the design of puzzles, but did not find one. There are many resources on “level design”, but no one talks about what makes a good puzzle good, they don’t write anywhere how to begin to design puzzles at all and make it fit with the level design. For me, the learning process was very long, but perhaps my experience can help others.


Design of puzzles from an early draft to the finished design. The scheme has changed a lot since the first draft.



Puzzle style


The puzzles in the game are very “classic” in the sense that they are very much like puzzle pieces. All the information needed to solve them is in front of the player, nothing is hidden, everything is just confused, interchanged, or in the wrong order. The player just needs to figure out how, when or where to perform the actions. The game has "secrets", but they are part of the second level of difficulty. The solutions of the main puzzles do not contain secrets or tasks; they are pure puzzles.

Puzzles and Level Design Process


As in any other puzzle game, complexity naturally increases. Each new mechanic has a simple familiarization stage, which allows it to train the player, then there is an interesting twist, and then it is used with already well-known mechanics. When designing a puzzle level, the first idea may come from a variety of sources. I do not follow any specific rules, I am inspired by different things and I do not always start designing the design in the same way.

We start with the mechanics

I usually begin the process of working with basic mechanics to figure out how it works and see all the possibilities. Usually I come up with the idea of ​​a monster, let's say a ladder, and create a test pattern where I use it in a very simple and natural way. I do not want the player to learn about the mechanics by chance, but I strive to have no real opportunity to advance further without having learned about it, but I will tell about this later.


When testing new mechanics, I usually create a prototype level to see its capabilities. Here is the first test of day and night mechanics.



After experimenting with a simple scheme, I begin to add more stages to the puzzle, or start from the end and make it all the more complex, given the limitations of the environment. "If I add this monster here, it will happen or this." This can not be avoided, I just arrange the objects, try to combine them until I find something interesting. Sometimes it happens very quickly, sometimes it requires many iterations, or as a result I completely reject the idea. After I have a level with a puzzle, I begin to test it, trying to find ways to break it, skip some steps, solve the puzzle in an unplanned way.

Once or twice I was surprised to find new ways to solve some puzzles, and left them in the game because they either had the same level of difficulty as the first solution, or there was no way to fix it without completely abandoning the whole level. In any case, the passage must remain interesting.


When developing levels with the change of day and night, I spent a lot of iterations. Here are some examples of design when I tried to figure out what can be done with the mechanics, and the final level of the game.



We start with an interesting scheme.

Sometimes I start with an interesting, environment-based design with an interesting scheme that defines the constraints of the set of objects I work with. There is a very clear distinction between indoor and outdoor levels, each of which has its own characteristics. For example, take the three rooms of the first world - the first real puzzle to be faced by the player. I had the idea of ​​a puzzle that takes place in three rooms, where the player needs to run from one room to another in a specific order. I was not sure which monster I should use, and which level would be the result, but I wanted to make three rooms, and so I started with them. But this is risky, because often such schemes simply do not work. However, this is a fun exercise in adapting a puzzle to an interesting pattern.


In this example, I started with a scheme that seemed interesting to me. Three rooms with separate passages for the monster and the player.



The first sketch from this picture did not work when I tried it in the game. I often make sketches too narrow, and in the game the distances and dimensions should be much larger. I had to adjust and change the level during many iterations until I found a working solution. But the really good level starts working due to the feeling of delusion and the fact that although the solution is simple, it is not yet obvious, and it takes a lot of time to find it.

Delusions

In many ways, confusing puzzles is due to delusions. The best puzzles are those in which it seems that there is an obvious solution, but when you try to realize it, you soon realize that the task is more complicated and your solution will not work. In practice, this is very difficult to achieve, and often it is the result of a match with how the puzzle circuit is created. Some levels open up opportunities for entanglement better than others, but I still always try to find ways to realize it.

What should not be allowed is unplanned delusions.. If there is an object on a level, then it should always have a reason. NOTHING can appear there by chance. If there are such unplanned objects at the level, the player can spend time trying to solve it in an impossible and boring way. You can not annoy a player with a bad design, his difficulties should be his own fault, not yours. You need to create a design so that it may seem unplanned, but you still need to have complete control over the situation. If there is something on the level, then it should serve its purpose .


A rare example of a puzzle that worked just like on paper. I added a few more things to it, but the basic idea immediately worked perfectly.



Unbreakable puzzles

It is very important to adhere to the fact that the player can not break the puzzle. Regardless of the state of the level and the actions on it, the player must always be able to restore and correct it in order to solve the puzzle without starting the level again. In a puzzle game, the player should not guess if he broke the level - he should always be able to fix it. Otherwise, it will be very confusing, because the player will not know whether he wastes time or moves on. The player should never go into a dead end. It is acceptable for him to feel at a dead end, but only because of his inability to solve the puzzle, and not because he is in fact stumped.

Unfortunately, in my case, after a long test and release of the game, I still found puzzles that can be broken. Now I do not want to change too much the schemes of the game puzzles, because the game is already released. Since the levels are still playable, I decided not to change them yet. When I find a very good solution to this problem, I will eliminate it. This is another puzzle that I have to solve.

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