CAGD 270 Post 6

 2D Mega Man Level 2 Feedback 

Welcome back everybody to my blog. My name is Angel Suazo and today I will be going over the feedback I received in class for my last and final level for our 2D Mega Man Level. For this level we were tasked with creating a mid to intermediate level showcasing some of Mega Man’s abilities as well as introducing them to our players. That being said, I had to brainstorm up some ideas that could help me execute them properly. As for the abilities that I ended up going with where the NADO power-up and the SUPER. A. Once I decided on these two it was time to find a way to incorporate them into my new level. Luckily, I think I did a good job at doing so. 

What went right

First, I’ll start with what went right. During the playtest most of my play testers liked how I designed my level to where they could easily know where they were supposed to go, so naturally they all saw a clean path. For the new weapons/ abilities that I went with, players definitely found them easy to use and understood how to use them for the specific areas in my level.

One player especially liked how I had a specific area of my level intended for the NADO to be used only. When I was creating my level, I specifically made that part so that players could just blow right through the line of enemies I had lined up for them with the NADO weapon variant. Another player really liked how I made a couple of jump areas where they had to time it correctly in order to reach the other side of my level and they thought that the level of challenge presented to them was not overly hard but not super easy to them as well. Making the difficulty just right to make them want to finish my level. While I did not find anyone having difficulty using the new weapons /abilities to get past certain areas, there was only one player that wished I had not forced the new weapons or abilities so much to the point where they could not use them more freely. So technically this was something that doubled up as something that went right and wrong with my level. Whatever the case may be, my level ended up turning out good with the help of other qualities. 

What went wrong

For the actual stuff that went wrong, I can’t really think of much since mostly everyone enjoyed play testing my level. However, there was the case of perhaps maybe allowing the players more free time and experimentation with the newly added weapons / abilities for this new level.

This way the players can get the chance to witness the full potential of the weapons and use them to their liking. So, this is definitely something I will take into account for next time and also work hard to improve. Another thing that I saw for myself that I thought went wrong was just that my level was once again a bit too short for the 10-minute minimum. I saw that the majority of my play testers were finishing my level at around the 4–6-minute range, which was of course due to the underestimated anticipation of what I thought would take my play-testers at least 10 minutes to defeat. Having this in mind definitely motivates me even more to try harder next time to at least get to that 10-minute mark. This is something that I will work harder to improve on. 

Overall

This was a nice wrap up of our in-class unit for our 2D Mega Man levels and I definitely had a lot of fun creating them. 

CAGD 270 Post 5

2D Mega Man Level v2 Feedback 

Hello everyone and welcome back to my Blog my name is Angel Suazo and today I will be going over the feedback I got in class for my level 2 version of my Mega Man level. This time I am happy to say that things did go a lot smoother, and it turned out to be a lot more fun for the people playtesting my level. The only real change we were allowed to do for our version 2, was that we were allowed to introduce keys and doors to our level for players to interact with. This allowed me to go back and brainstorm a couple of good ways to implement these brand-new mechanics. 

What went right

As for what went right, I can honestly say that everyone who play tested my new version 2 of my level was definitely surprised at how good it came out. Since I had some of the same people from version 1 playtest my level again, they definitely saw major improvements and overall, really liked how it played out this time. They especially liked how I was able to execute the new implementation of keys and doors. One player said they loved how every door was different and required a different number of keys each time around.

When I was creating my version 2, I intentionally thought about doing that so that players could find themselves busy and require some challenge on their part and it turned out to be a hit. Another player said he liked how the last keys for the last door were kind of hidden along the pathway and needed some creativity and exploring in order to find.

When I was doing this, I did not want to make it super obvious for them that they would find them right away, so I made sure to make it a little difficult for them to find at first. Overall, the play testers all agreed that they liked how they knew where to go as well for my level, meaning that there was a clear path this time around with little to no confusion at all. They mentioned how this was very cool and important because they did not feel like they were going in circles or having to pick between different routes to take. Lastly, I did receive some feedback on how I was able to balance the enemy placement pretty well and did not overwhelm any of the players with heavy enemy attacks. Only one player mentioned that perhaps one of the enemies I had placed could be pushed back a little to the left so that It would not be just waiting to attack you once you made it up the ladder for a specific area of my level. That was perhaps the only thing that went wrong this time around for my version 2 of my level.

Improvements

Other than that small note of the enemy placement, I did not hear any negative feedback from my play testers this time around. Everyone really seemed to enjoy playing it and had very much fun. For improvements however, I would like to add a small note myself that I did notice players could finish my level around the 5–7-minute mark. For my version 2 I did go ahead and add more stuff and areas that I did not have before in my level, which ultimately made it better and a little longer however, I could probably go back and revisit this to the point where I can have players play for at least 10 full minutes before they complete my level. I will definitely work hard every chance I get to make improvements. 

CAGD 270 Post 4

 2D Mega Man Level v1 Feedback 03/06/2023

Hello everyone, my name is Angel and today I will be going over the feedback that I received on Monday 3/06 on my first version of our Mega Man level for level design class. We had to find at least 5 people to playtest our levels in class and gather some feedback on it. So that is what I will be going over for you all right here. For our level we were tasked with creating a level for someone that has never played Mega Man before and is completely new to the game. That being said, our level design had to be on a tutorial level in order for players to get to know the mechanics of the game and overall learn how to play. One last thing we were also tasked with when creating our level’s, was to at least make it 10 minutes long. This was definitely something I underestimated but for now I’ll dive into the feedback I received. 

What went right

First, I’ll start with what went right. At the beginning of my level, I gave the players an opportunity to choose different routes that they would want to take instead of just giving them one simple pathway. Ultimately, everyone liked this feature of my level because it gave them a sense of control. It allowed them to take a longer path but easier or a shorter path but with more enemies and finally an in between pathway that was easy but challenging at the same time. I definitely received good comments about this at the end. However, this was particularly something that doubled up on something that had gone right and wrong at the same time and I will go over that right now as well. Another thing that I received good feedback on, was the certain areas that I had in my level that required the player to perform some parkour. Meaning that there were some challenging jumps that needed to be timed perfectly in order to proceed into the level. When I designed these areas, I wanted to make sure that I did not make them too challenging for the players that they would find themselves getting frustrated over. As well as too easy for them that they could just find a way around them or ultimately avoid them. This proved effective and everyone enjoyed that. 

What went wrong

As for what went wrong, I’ll start with what I mentioned earlier. At the beginning some players felt there was no sense of direction for the reason that there were 3 different paths to take right from the start. This caused confusion for some players and kind of threw them off. Aside from that however, they all got a chance to explore the 3 paths completely which was fun they said. Another thing I noticed that went wrong was the enemy placement for one of the beginning paths. One player mentioned that they felt overwhelmed and that they were bombarded with enemies early on in the game. This was ultimately the harder path I had designed for those players who wanted a bit more of a challenge. Unfortunately, not all players develop skills at the same time, for some it can take them a while to master something, and others can pick it up immediately. This is something that I will definitely fix. Lastly, one thing that also went wrong was that for the most part all of my play testers were finishing my level way before the 10-minute mark. So ultimately, my level could have used some more creativeness. I thought that by adding a few more enemies or paths it would cause for more gameplay on the players end but that did not stop them from completing my level sooner. I definitely underestimated the meaning of 10 minutes long, but I will definitely work to improve on this.

 

Overall

The play testers had fun while playing my level and the feedback I received from them will definitely help me out when working on my version 2 of our Mega Man levels.