I started playing around with the Portal 2 Puzzle Maker on Wednesday. At first I was lost and had no idea where to start, but eventually I discovered a design process which worked for me. I will discuss this process after I explain my awesome level!
Here is the Workshop Chamber link to my puzzle: (tweet me @taymanh if it doesn't come up) http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=95968310
As you can see, there are a lot of elements packed into one little deadly-goo filled room. Here's a quick walkthrough so you get the idea of it. I will upload a youtube walkthrough when I get the chance.
1) Portal yourself to the centre island using the portal-able ceiling tile. Place the reflection cube to activate the laser receiver on the left side of the room. This activates a light bridge connecting the 2nd level platform to the flinger platform near it.
2) Portal the conversion goo so that it covers the 2nd level platform near you (using a portal-able wall panel, and momentum), and your own platform, as it is the only way to get back from your island.
3) Cross the light bridge to the flinger which sends you to the button pedestal. Activate it to make a cube dispense from the far corner dispenser. Use the nearby flinger to get back to the starting corner.
4) Portal to the far cube and bring it back to the square cube button near the entrance. This deactivates the death laser guarding the exit door.
5) Make your way back across the light bridge and drop down, then exit to freedom.
Now it sounds very simple hearing a walkthrough and it also seems very easy to me, my friends that play-tested it told me a different story. What looks like a very straightforward puzzle actually took others between 5 and 10 minutes to complete. I believe a large reason for that is the need to use the conversion goo for multiple purposes. This made the puzzle tricky to figure out but not impossible. My best advice for the players was to observe their surroundings carefully before asking for help.
As to the design process, I had a lot of trouble trying to make the puzzle from the start by just adding things. Instead the first part I added was the laser wall blocking the exit. I then thought of how I wanted players to deactivate it. From there, I made a puzzle element which blocked the player from getting to the pedestal button, and then made an element to prevent them from reaching it (toggled light bridge) and so on.
Using this reverse process I was able to break down the puzzle chamber into its base challenges and chain them together from there. Once I felt satisfied about a puzzle element I made sure to playtest it myself and with others to find any loopholes. At this time I hadn't read the article Dr. Nacke had posted, but now I realize I was going through the same process the Valve team does when creating new puzzles.
The rapid iterations of playtesting and tweaking helped iron out all the problems and boring parts of the puzzle. A big problem for me was deciding on the proportion of portal-able tiles to regular tiles. I found that starting with all regular tiles and then adding portal-able ones as I went helped to streamline the process and provide players with visuals clues as to their next step.
With even a few more portal-able tiles a playtester was able to go straight to the pedestal button and skip half of the puzzle. This was more than just a smart shortcut; it ruined all problem-solving in the first half. To solve this puzzle you only need to place a few portals, but each one requires careful thought and observation.
With that said, I'm going to begin working on the Puzzle Maker assignment, so happy portaling!
The game I decided to play (and have been a lot lately) is Guild Wars 2. It is a new MMO which was released on August 28th, just a few weeks ago.
Being an MMO with a very diverse world, there are many different player and npc character models running about. I complement ArenaNet on a job well done with all the character animations in the game. From the very beginning, I noticed how smooth my character transitioned from idle, to walking, to a running animation. There was no jumpy movements; just a seamless flow of movement which looks very natural.
Pictured above is my Sylvari Ranger. In the picture you can also see the vividness of the world I am exploring. The grass and trees blow in the wind, creatures mill about, and npc's interact with each other. Great care was put into each animation to make sure it is smooth and organic.
In the screenshot you can also note the various particle effects going on around my player. There is sparkly dust and fireflies in the air, and a water portal in the distance to the left. All these particle systems are dynamic and have their own properties. Each adds atmosphere to the game world and helps bring it alive. A majority of the characters in GW2 are bipedal, and as such ArenaNet put a lot of working into making convincing movement and animations. There is no feet-skating present so your character very rarely clips through objects or the environment. The following screenshot is very good example of these systems at work.
Due to the huge variety in poses a character in GW2 can do, I believe all these animations are done using a skeletal system. Each races /dance emote makes the character perform a very complicated dance with a large number of different poses. These animations are on their own though, meaning they cannot be blended to or from a running animation.
One of the first things I noticed about my character when I started playing was how their clothing moved as they did. In the video above if you watch carefully you can observe the bottom of the tunic moving with the character. All the cloth and hair animation is done real-time using a physics engine. It moves and sways with the wind and with the movement of your character. As a ranger, my character uses a shortbow and longbow as their primary weapons. Early on I noticed that every shot I took was affected by gravity. The arrows would arc towards targets which were further away. This effect has a major impact on game play, as it can be a true tactical advantage to having the high ground. When trying to shoot an enemy up on a keep wall, often the arrow will not reach its target because of the arc path it flies on. Conversely, on top of a wall, it is easy to shoot at enemies down below, and from a fairly long range.
Its a little difficult to tell from the video, but each arrow fired is affected by gravity on its way to the target. It is a subtle yet important detail that is often missed in these types of games. ArenaNet really focused on making Guild Wars 2 both look good and play good, and this all comes about from consistent and effective animation techniques. If you go look at WoW for example, you'll notice a large difference in the fluidity of the character animations. Guild Wars 2 has been proclaimed as a 'beautiful looking game' and players definitely notice the high quality of the many different animations present in the game.
