As discussed in the other threads, I think we've had enough name discussions at this point. We need to start coming up with level concepts and pixel art—we'll worry about a name later.
How about we have some sort of pneumatic tube system akin to CPZ's in certain areas, excpet Sonic jumps into a river of rushing water? Maybe we could have it at the end so Sonic jumps out of the rushing water at the beginning of acts. The idea is that we could have Sonic walking along a path and when he reaches a dead end he could jump down a hole broken into the ground by wear and tear, or Robotnik or something, and it lead into an aqueduct that has a huge amount of rushing water where you can collect rings and hit badniks while dodging falling rocks and spikes, adding some excitement to the travel around the zone idea. We could have two or three an act, and we could even style an entire boss around it.
To be honest, this should have been the approach all along - the Dilbert episode with the product naming session immediately springs to mind...
I completely agree. I honestly kept wanting to post pictures or video links from that episode; I found it nearly impossible to resist doing so. In fact, the only thing really keeping me from doing that was that I couldn't decide on what would be the best part of the episode to link to. But that's why GRUNTMASTER 6000 is right there in my search history.
A sudden, random idea that has currently possessed my fingers and thus is being expressed; from the concept art this place looks pretty abandoned and secluded. It'd fit quite nicely in a Tomb Raider game even. How about trying to get some sort of sense of fear into the level? What if there was something following you? At points in the level you hit apparent dead ends, pillars block the way or some such. The place quakes and part of the background falls away allowing the player to get a glimpse of...something...back there. The screen quakes again as it moves away causing whatever is blocking your path to fall away itself so you can continue. There could be hard to reach routes that require very specific moves to get to that skip these mini cut-scenes so that speed runners don't have to waste those valuable seconds too. It's a bit cheesy, but some sort of mythical creature seems like it'd fit in the setting, hidden away down there (heck Chaos fitted in pretty well). A dragon, hydra, basilisk, something along those lines. At the end it could finally confront Sonic, only to be instantly killed by Robotnik who then fights you in a mechanical version of the beast of his own design (battling Robotnik in a mecha dragon in some ruins could be pretty awesome). The place could even have a random boss? When the level initially loads the game picks which creature you'll encounter this time, they pursue you and are killed, replaced with Robotnik's version of them at the end. The idea's a bit out-there, but I thought it could be worth putting forward to get a different kind of view on things. Alternatively do something cool with light. Depending on which routes through the level you take (I.e. how far underground you travel) the amount of light you have to see with varies. It'd give new uses for certain shields too; the fire and lightning shields could help illuminate the area around them perhaps?
Not too keen on the idea of monsters, it seems too much like the later sonic games for my liking with mythical monsters turning on robotnik and trying to destroy the world. The light idea is a good one though. I was going to suggest it for the jungle level, as I belive it was going to be a wet raining level I thought it might be a good idea to have the water all muddy and murky so you can only see a certain disatnce in front of you and then it gets blury. Obviously these sections would have to be kept to a minimun as its annoying enough being slowed by the water and having to look for air let alone not being able to see as well.
I really like the idea to be honest, but I think the whole time that it should be a robot that's a recurring obstacle through the stage, much like how the twin drill bot showed up in Marble Garden several times.
Having a robot octupus/squid thing might be a good idea seen as its a water level. Tenticals could burst through walls and stuff, maybe even have sonic fight two of them at the same time for a sub-boss before comming up against the whole thing for the main level boss
How about a 2D chase down a section of narrow corridor by some deadly obstacle? I'm thinking a boulder like that Indiana Jones scene, or maybe a version of the Marble Zone lava that actually has some speed to it.
I like Overlord's idea. Maybe we could have some sort of end or mid level trap where Sonic encounters a dead end where you can't go backwards at all, maybe after traveling through an aqueduct or something (Pneumatic tube system akin to CPZ's, excpet Sonic jumps into a river of rushing water. When Sonic is walking along a path he reaches a dead end that is broken open by a large tremor that destroys the floor and makes Sonic fall into an aqueduct that has a huge amount of rushing water. We could even style an entire boss around it.), and when he breaks out a small rock caused by a tremor seals the way. Then, something throws Sonic against the back wall. A large tremor shakes the zone for a few. Next, a hole just big enough for Sonic blasts open in a diagonal from the wall opposite him. A lava fall starts flowing and hits the ground, quickly starting to fill up the chamber. The only way for Sonic to go is through the hole. There should also be an indentation wherever the lava fall falls, so Sonic can have some time to drop into the tube before a tremor shakes the hall and lava comes pouring into the passageway he's in like a volcano just had an orgasm.
Bit of a rushed job but I though I might as well get some feedback on it in the hopes that we can get some actual content done.
That's pretty nice I think. But maybe you could change some of those colors. Instead of a brown tone, you could give it a more yellow tone, as you would probably expect from ancient ruins.. And the grass could use some more hue shifting, because it's seems like you're using just tones of green. So I think it maybe would be better to give it some yellow to that green.. Just to give some more attention, make it seem more lively, or something like.
Yeah. I wasn't too keen on the colours myself, I was trying to match it to the screen shot of Alundra Phoebius posted in another topic but im don't think it looks right at the moment (That and it doesn't tile properly either). Plenty of work to do on it.
<!--quoteo(post=250109:date=Nov 25 2008, 05:14 PM:name=Matwek)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Matwek @ Nov 25 2008, 05:14 PM) [/quote] that looks like it would work better for the Rainforest Ruins zone. I quite liked the orangey, neat tiled roman-esque theme that Phoebius was building up with his art for this zone.
There's too much talk on this project and not enough art. Lets fix that people. I'll start. I whipped this together. I did this in 2 styles-A more rounded off brick and a more square brick. The nicks in them are just for detail, I expect the details to be changed and overhauled as it went on, as well as the moss to change. Its just a bit of an early design, since few else seem to be making any art for this thing. Not to be a douche, but if we keep sitting around just talking, nothing's gonna get done. If you're not that great at making sprites(I'm sure as hell not) you can do level art, and vice versa. This project can be a lot more if people bother to contribute something past "I like this" or "No I don't like this...change it", blah blah blah. Excuse the .jpg. I'm too lazy at the moment to open up Giffy and convert from .bmp to .gif right now and Photobucket likes to convert to .jpg for some reason.
