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Mega Man Levels 1 and 2

Adding Keys

Adding keys and doors had a great effect on my level in the transition from V1 to V2! Since my level was already laid out along a linear path, I had to make a detour that branched off from the midsection of my level in which the player acquired a key to reach the ending. I added a lava cave beneath my jungle that I themed around a mining site, with Drill enemies and lots of breakable blocks. It ended up being probably my favorite section of the whole level!!


Adding Weapons

Adding Weapons was really fun, because the new movement abilities allowed me to design new platforming challenges! The Weapons I chose for my 2nd level were Oil Slider and Charge Kick! I really liked the Charge Kick because the double jump both tested the player's timing and spacing skills as well as allowed me to design new kinds of platforming challenges! I chose the O Slider because I thought the surfing was so cool and that a surfing section would be super fun!! In the actual design of the level the Charge Kick Area was really fun when I tested it! But when I had my players testing it they had a hard time getting the double jump down, which made that section pretty difficult since it was designed around that mechanic, and when it was time to make the O Slider area I had a hard time thinking of how I could make it interesting, and in the end I think I could’ve done better with it but it was still pretty fun!


What Went Right

I think that the cave area in the first level was a design section that was really cool! My players thought it was really cool and I got to use a lot of interesting mechanics in there like blocks that could sink in lava and drill enemies that could break through fragile blocks. Another thing that I got good comments on was the pace of my level. My players said that it felt like a really good length. Another thing my level was complimented for was the visuals. I had a lot of fun going through the backgrounds with each project and picking out the ones I thought would be cool to use in my level, Mega Man has a lot of beautiful artwork! I also tried to use 2 tilesets in each section rather than just 1, as they could come together to form a more complex visual theme. For example, in the Cave Area I used a rock tileset in combination with a construction tileset to make it look like a mining site!


What Went Wrong

I think I seriously misjudged the difficulty of the C Kick Double Jump, as everyone seemed to get a little frustrated in that section. But playtesting is all about figuring out what works and what doesn't, so I was able to remedy it somewhat by making that area a bit easier with each playtester who struggled! Some other struggles in my first level were a couple jumps that were tougher than I thought, or some accidental spots where players weren’t able to backtrack where I wanted them to be able! I took notes on each individual playtester on what went wrong, as well as feed back from the players themselves. Then I’d make changes based on those notes and feedback, make note of the changes, and test them on the next playtester. One thing I really liked about the mega man project is that tests go a lot faster than they did with our DnD maps which usually took a quarter of the class period!


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