next »

[kyn]

I never thought those kind of levels enjoyed such a bad reputation :<

[Atnas]

I actually like the vertical levels because they force you to think on your feet and give a fresh breath of life into what could have become stale, static gameplay on other stages.

And this would work well with Outer Wall because of both context and its simplicity.

Or there's always the wind pushing the players to the left, if it hasn't been brought up yet.

[Xion]

I'm all up for Outer Wall being an infinitely looping vertical scroller, always moving the camera up, forcing the player to move.

Ugh, no.
I hate these kinds of stage so damn much.

I'm not generally fond of those kinds of levels either, but I think it could work well here. I don't know if anyone saw it but I suggested a few pages ago to construct a very tall level, and have the view travel along a kind of sin wave, or maybe stopping at points of interest for a moment (bottom, middle, top) and then going back down.

[Gainsworthy]

I don't know if anyone saw it but I suggested a few pages ago to construct a very tall level, and have the view travel along a kind of sin wave, or maybe stopping at points of interest for a moment (bottom, middle, top) and then going back down.

This, I like.



OOP: Thought of something. If we go with this system (the whole go-stop-go thing) it would be nice to have an early warning system. So you don't get cornered by the camera. SO, how's about we add a Floating Cat (that's the "Night Spirit" bad-guy for those in the know) hovering in the background, to the right. If the stage is feeling static, she hovers in the middle of the screen. If it's about to move up or down, she moves upward/downward a second or two before it happens.

It'd negate any complaint of "ooh, I didn't notice that" and add some atmosphere. Whaddya think?

[William Broom]

The scrolling stages in SSBB are a mixed bag. I think Rainbow Ride and Big Blue are excellent. They keep you on your toes but rarely force you to concentrate on platforming more than fighting. On the other hand, Mushroomy Kingdom was a little too fast, and Rumble Falls was fucking awful. Against AI players on Rumble Falls, the best tactic is just to follow the scrolling screen and wait for your enemies to die. The reasons it worked so badly was:
- it scrolled up. Constantly jumping is much harder than constantly running sideways.
- it featured extremely powerful spikes that you would often jump into while they were off the top of the screen.
- it featured annoyingly placed platforms that you couldn't jump through, at one point creating a horrendous bottleneck for players to pass through.
- it scrolled too fast most of the time, and occasionally sped up for a few seconds, violently and with only a short warning, often just before the aforementioned bottleneck.

So that's some of the things to avoid, or control, if we make a scrolling stage. Personally I have nothing against scrolling stages but I would like to see Outer Wall as a tall stage that scales rather than scrolls, because that's something that has never been done in Smash Bros.

[William Broom]

Oh, and I discovered kind of what the lag issue is. It's the same problem as I have with my own game. I can fix it by covering up part of the screen with task manager. I'm still waiting for a response from ChevyRay on the matter, but I'm guessing it's something weirdly unique to my computer. The old girl needs to be put to sleep soon anyway.

[Rostiger]

I like the scrolling idea where the view moves in a sin wave. Also adding the Floating Cat sounds like a neat gimmick that would make the level more lively and also serves a purpose.

My only question is just how to handle the zooming of the camera then. Would it be completely disable for this level or would it be kind of adjusted to the scrolling, so there is some sort of buffer around the view (kind of a defined max zoom out)?

[Soulliard]

The camera would need to be disabled for an auto-scrolling stage.

I agree with Chutup's points about scrolling stages, so if we made the Outer Wall scroll, it should do so fairly slowly.

[medieval]

I think that auto-scrolling stages can be good, but since we fixed the issue that the camera might not look good (in that it does look awesome) I think a fixed Outer Wall is good.

[Rory]

Also the health bars need to be always on screen.

[Rostiger]

Also the health bars need to be always on screen.

Yup, I believe this has been said already. But while you're add it, Nightshade, you could add the portraits to the healthbar so the player knows who's who? 

[Soulliard]

Also the health bars need to be always on screen.

Yup, I believe this has been said already. But while you're add it, Nightshade, you could add the portraits to the healthbar so the player knows who's who? 

That's my plan. 

[Mush]

This looks great :]
Although I think that you should move one set of the bricks right a tad so you can jump up, I drew this quickly just to show what I mean.

You kind of hit your head on the block when jumping. Here's a version without the red scribbles http://www.majhost.com/gallery/Mushiman/NorthernCampaign/mockupouterwall.png

[.TakaM]

Very nice so far guys.

On the subject of level design, I think scrolling repeatedly isn't the way to go.
My favourite 'moving' level in Brawl is Delfino isle where the camera stops in places so the playing field changes every so often.
Obviously the exact same effect isn't possible, but I think it would be much better to have the camera stop at certain points that make for good fighting.

Also, those sand crocs totally have to be in this level, imagine knocking someone onto the sand and then CHOMP- they go flying.

Oh, and the zooming camera is very nicely done, I was very worried until I tried the little test demo, very nice work.

[medieval]

A little glitch concerning the fireball

If you stand at a certain position(see image below) and send a fireball to the left, it will bounce around in the space between and come up again


Though this is better a suggestion for Quote himself than this stage.

[Rory]

A little glitch concerning the fireball

If you stand at a certain position(see image below) and send a fireball to the left, it will bounce around in the space between and come up again


Though this is better a suggestion for Quote himself than this stage.

Yeah I noticed that too. Also, if you stand pressed up against the wall and fire a fireball, it gets stuck in the wall.