Jam's Plays: Spiky Block HD Remaster GOTY Player's Choice Reboot Ultimate 4K Edition [P1] [Final]

     In this all new adventure taken on by the Legend himself, Jumping Jim, explore the vast depths of the abyss as you avoid these totally radical spiky blocks and collect coins.

Okay, but.. all in all, this process of creating animation for an object in a scene was pretty fun -- I enjoyed the result. Unreal's timeline, however, is not very efficient at allowing it's user to quickly enter keys to the timeline and duplicate or shift them around accurately -- the process, relative to what I've experienced with timeline's in Maya and Blender, is much slower than it should be, granted I understand the fact that Unreal is not program meant for animation primarily. Aside from that, the process was pretty smooth -- the hardest thing being that I had to make sure I wasn't mixing up my X and Y curves in the timeline because re-entering the values takes a bit too long to do -- longer than it should.

I'm going to call these blocks Sleps. Avoid them -- they'll kill ya.

Game Design II Jams Plays -- V-Core: Stuck in Graybox [P1][Final]

Oho, man. Back at it again -- Playing the Legendary V-Core Alpha HD Remastered GOTY Player's Choice Collector's Edition tutorial stage.

A little about the game's "narrative" : You're on a spaceship that got heavily damaged by some space debris while you were asleep (you were super tired, so you didn't wake up from it :) ) and you just need to escape from the spaceship because.. staying there is not advisable!

Release Date: Sometime in the future, maybe

V-Core - Tutorial Level Design Layout I

V - Core - You are a character that is in space ship that has been violently vacated (most passengers have been massacred) by passing-by space ship that hacked through and raided the vessel. You were able to successfully hide during the invasion, but realize that as the invaders were leaving with their findings, they have prepped your ship to blow up and you must escape before you are removed from existence.

   Within this tutorial level, there are 4 main game features/mechanics that the player will learn to avoid/utilize  in order to get through the level. The stage starts off with an incredibly simple jump obstacle that requires the player to jump in order to get past and they player is then immediately tested upon their skill to jump to get past the spike pit on the floating platforms which will teach them to time their jumps. A little later, there is an introduction to spikes that the player must jump over, otherwise they will be set back. Along with this, they must learn to utilize the jump pad as well as obtaining the Teleporter Activators in order to progress. From here on, the stage focuses on these mechanics with a few changes to previously defined mechanics (spikes become retractable and a platform is movable, which both require the player to time their movements).

Platformers in Video Games - Rayman: Origins

     

Rayman: Origins - Tutorial Analysis

     

     

     Tutorial levels serve to teach new players how to play the new game they have at hand. They often include a simple level along with instructions as to how to operate the character the player will be manipulating.

Rayman: Origins', designed by Michel Ancel, has a tutorial level that is a simple, yet effective stage. It starts off with simple jumps and escalates into environmental changes and enemies that require specifically timed movements. This includes small earth pillars that collapse and require to player to jump off before they fall off the map to giant moving rock pieces that require the player to wait until the rock won't crush them to pass. There are even a few enemies that must be defeated before the player has an opportunity to pass. Throughout the first stage, the only instructions the player is given are the ultimate objective of the game and how to attack, once the ability to do so is received later on in the stage.

This overall pacing of the level is, again, quite slow but ramps up as the map becomes a little more populated with enemies and jump obstacles to ensure that the player must think before their next move, especially if they have never played the game before. Although it is still the tutorial stage, the player is still punished for making poor decisions by dying and being forced to resume the game at a previous checkpoint, which enforces the idea of quick, yet careful thinking, as the game presents itself as a quick paced game.

The tutorial doesn't integrate much of the Rayman: Legends Tutorial Layout story, as all that the player is told is that they must collect enough of an item of which is presumably obtained through the entirety of the game. There is another instance where Rayman rescues a damsel in distress, but her purpose in the story is not elaborated upon aside from the fact she gives Rayman the ability to attack. This tiny integration of story within the tutorial stage allows the player to be at least aware of some events that are going on without having to focus on remembering all the details of the world and being able to focus on simply mastering the mechanics.