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Sol Invictus: search for the fountain of youth

Archive: 13 posts

Sol Invictus: search for the fountain of youthfreddykrugerfred
Go on a quest to search for the magical fountain of youth, belonging to the worshipped Sol Invictus, Sun God.
all
Hello everyone

I'd like to have some opinions on my new level.
It's intended to be part of a series (the sol invictus series) and this is the first quest of our young sack archaelogist in search for the fountain of youth.

I have finished the basic work on the first act (some lighting and sound effects still missing and a cutscene at the beginning), but I'd like to get some feedback at this point.

That way I know where to go from here or what works and what needs some clarification to the player.

It's a nice forgotten ruins level where you explore this ancient temple ruin, see some sol invictus statues, rooms, solve puzzles (quite a few I might add) and do some platforming.

Below are some random screenshots that hopefully give you the desire to play this

http://img12.imageshack.us/img12/8468/littlebigplanet013.jpg

http://img33.imageshack.us/img33/3079/littlebigplanet012.jpg

http://img33.imageshack.us/img33/1796/littlebigplanet011.jpg

http://img6.imageshack.us/img6/5258/littlebigplanet015.jpg		2009-11-29 11:18:00

Author:
nightwing
Posts: 422

Anyone interested in playtesting this for me please?

it got pretty good ratings so far and tomorrow I'll add some more visual effects.		2009-11-29 18:00:00

Author:
nightwing
Posts: 422

music added2009-12-01 18:47:00

Author:
nightwing
Posts: 422

hey,
so i'm trying your level as I write this... and i'm at the part where you got swing from where the statue of the man is to the other side, at the start of the level.

and its real hard! coz the sponges are attached to the pillars, its making it real hard to swing!
maybe u could have less number of pillars and put them on a wench?

will try to get past this part and add some more...

if ure doing F4F... please try out my level "Towers of Sackboy v1.1"... thnx		2009-12-02 12:08:00

Author:
SavNeel
Posts: 20

Yeah this level requires some actual skill to get to the finish.
My previous levels were too easy so I wanted to make something a bit more challenging.

it's not that hard though, you just have to swing a bit to the end of the sponge of a pillar , and then swing to the next. I never had lots of troubles doing this and this skill is required to pass a platforming section at the end that makes this look easy 		2009-12-02 16:59:00

Author:
nightwing
Posts: 422

**** **** *** *****
"Rewriting post due to faulty 'Undo'-button"

Decided to bump the number of plays of your level from 4 to 5.

First impression: Looks promising.
After a little bit of walking, I encountered a Jeep.
I jumped in, grabbed the wheel, only to find out that it's completely useless.
It does drive, but only for 2 seconds; one might as well just walk that short distance to the next part.
Would've been nice if you could e.g. only reach a higher part of the level by jumping from the top of the Jeep, but it's basically just a decoration in this state.

Your level looks okay, but it lacks atmosphere.
The only things that remind the player of the theme of your level, are the materials and the music used.
The puzzles are weak, the platforming is not exciting and some graphical design elements could've just been placed more strategically (e.g. the of row skulls all lying perfectly horizontal).

There's this part where you had to rotate thee discs to match an image, but the 3-way switches you used, were set to on/off output instead of directional output... Why?

Either way, a little further into the level I suddenly heard the sound of metal clashing, only to get "surprise buttsex" ripped apart by a big, electric saw. Now that really killed the little atmosphere this level has.

The title of your level contains the words 'search for the fountain of youth', but in the level itself, nothing is mentioned about this fountain.


A little disappointing, but I gave it :star::star::star: anyway.
Not bad, but not good either.

F4F: Survive the h4h-attack! (https://lbpcentral.lbp-hub.com/index.php?t=t=19380)


~ffha		2009-12-03 14:52:00

Author:
ffha
Posts: 48

mm thanks for the feedback.

allow me to give some small comments :-)

this is part 1 in a series, we will get to the fountain of youth in the second part.
i'm still working on this , expect some dialogue and more atmosphere elements to be added in the near future.

i don't really understand why the platforming is not good?
i think they are pretty good, especially the beginning and one particular scene is actually some sort of a copy of a well praised lbp level.


But anyway, I really appreciate your comments.

You are totally right about the jeep part, I think I created a very nice jeep but somehow thought I would have saved more space near the beginning for a longer ride. Will see If I can find a way to lengthen this drive scene a bit.

I will playtest your level tomorrow my friend 		2009-12-03 21:54:00

Author:
nightwing
Posts: 422

finished it!!! yay!!

brilliant level... really good quality... gave it 4 stars... waiting for the next installment

btw... did u check out my level?		2009-12-03 22:36:00

Author:
SavNeel
Posts: 20

hmmm i just played it.. well i anjoyed the lvl..
just need to say that i had some little probs.. but i made it to the end phew

so yeah i rate it 4 stars because i enjoyed it 		2009-12-04 01:30:00

Author:
Joey
Posts: 758

finished it!!! yay!!

brilliant level... really good quality... gave it 4 stars... waiting for the next installment

btw... did u check out my level?

thanks a lot! I will test your level this evening for sure!		2009-12-04 16:57:00

Author:
nightwing
Posts: 422

Hi nightwing!

Just went through your level twice, and overall it was a fun experience, although a bit sketchy and unpolished at points. It was neither too short nor very dragged-out, in other words, just the right length. I thought the jeep at the start was really well done, it's a shame you only travel about five seconds with it... you should extend the road leading up to the ruins and add some more detail like trees or bushes (maybe some animals too) to spice it up a bit... a level with only rocks is not very inviting, so a colorful start would provide a nice contrast to what is to follow.

The next thing worth remarking upon is the Sol Invictus image - I actually missed it the first time through the level, because I took the upper road, which left me guessing in the puzzle that requires knowledge of it later on. I'd recommend making it stand out more, or - better yet - making it unavoidable by placing it at the entrance of the ruins.

Then there was the statue puzzle with the two buttons under his palms - the way his palms rotate towards the sunrays is a very cool idea, I loved that one! I think that statue deserves a lot more attention, both in detail, which you can easily add, and in the way the camera behaves in that chamber. I just couldn't understand why there's a single camera zone for the whole chamber, it makes the details much harder to make out and actually obstructs some elements of the puzzle, like the lever at the lower end of the staircase. My suggestion would be to use two camera zones instead of one, the first for the staircase, the sitting skeleton statue and the stone door that the lever operates, while the second should focus only on the Sol Invictus statue. That way you can give it the attention it deserves, especially if you decorate him and the area surrounding him a bit.

The next part of the level was the most fun for me, lots of nice platforming elements all the way up to the ramp of cruelty (more on that later on ). Two things that had me wondering a bit in this section were the room with the two sun symbols under two arches made of grabbable material. The way these were positioned and lit made me look for a way to get on top of them, hoping to see a secret area, only to find out that it was pure decoration. While that's not a bad thing at all, there should be some visual distinction between something that's supposed to be traversed and something that serves purely aesthetic purposes. Alternatively you can turn those arches into some actual hidden path to some secret location, that could be even cooler. The other weird thing was the part with the electrified rotary saw - I felt a bit helpless in that area because not only are you surrounded by the lethal gas in the other layers, you also can't see a thing from the central layer... I couldn't tell if the path was leading up, down or straight on, which required another leap of faith, apart from the obvious one in your level.

There was only one thing that felt completely broken for me, and that was the grabbable ramp near the end. Attaching it with the bolt was good in order to keep it from slipping off the top platform, but the bottom part of it is simply too short, which nearly resulted in me having to restart the level because it seemed like I couldn't get it back to a diagonal state with the bolt set so tight. I had to try all sorts of fancy jumps from the small platforms to knock it back upward until it was scalable again. By adding a little more to its length, the ramp would reach the edge of the lower platform and that would prevent it from rotating or slipping any further. In short, a ramp with a lower end that isn't fixed or held by something just won't work very consistently.

All in all, it was an enjoyable level with some good platforming elements, but it lacked polish in some places and some elements weren't executed very intuitively. That said, I hope you'll revisit the level and add some tweaks to the problematic locations and I'll gladly replay it to see how it evolved. For now I'd rate it: :star::star::star:

Pros:
+ good platforming
+ ideal length
+ atmospheric lighting
Cons:
- generally lacks polish and attention to detail
- weird camera zones
- potentially broken ramp

Oh, and as for F4F: the thread to my level is in my signature, I just have to update it quickly. 		2009-12-04 23:18:00

Author:
sny
Posts: 144

Wow ! thanks sooooooo much for this great review / opinion.
That must be one of the best comments I got since I registered here

You are absolutely right in almost every aspect.

Now THIS is why I posted my level up here, with feedback like this I can really improve the level a lot.

As I mentioned before, I will get back to this level because I'm really just playtesting and working on it. Will delete the level and put it back online after a few weeks when everything is more detailed, more stylish and the less good parts are fixed.

The saw scene was actually supposed to be a bit like raiders of the lost ark , indiana jones movie. However I 'm thinking maybe to make the saw not electric as it distracts from the overall style of the level.

The jeep is indeed very cool and I will try to find a way to use it better.

My main concern for now was to make the level fun to play, now that I have that part good, it's up to me to add details and scenery.

Once again thank you so much for your fantastic comments. Really appreciate it a lot!		2009-12-05 09:25:00

Author:
nightwing
Posts: 422

Really Great Level Dude
i like the atmosphare and the game design,
5 Stars (:		2009-12-05 12:08:00

Author:
Jiri
Posts: 56


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