"The wheel" level

So I just found this site and when I saw this section, I just had to make a level concept. I plan to make this level, when the game comes out, but there will probably a lot of changes, because I'm not 100% sure what can be done and what can't. I didn't give much thought to detail and focused more on the main idea, so I didn't add any enemies or spawn points. I still tried to make it "playable" (no dead ends) though. If you notice something I overlooked, feel free to tell me.
Now heres the actual level (Someone got a better name than "the wheel" =?):
http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/9132/lbpleveleu8.jpg
So thats the whole level, probably looks confusing (hope it isn't too "quick drawn" ^^). The basic idea is, you start from the left and have a giant wheel in front of you, which is devided into different rooms. To access these rooms you have to use the lever in front of the wheel to rotate it. Now because it can rotate, everything that is not fixed in one place will just fly around the room when the wheel is rotated. For that theres mechanisms indicated with a red *. These only activate, if the sackboy is in the room that mechanism is in (e.g. using sensors) , preventing non-fixed things to fall around. I didn't really give much thought to how they will be moved though.

As it is round and only one room is not rotated, I'll post images of the different rooms, so you don't have to rotate your monitor ^^ :
[SPOILER]http://img240.imageshack.us/img240/5...levelp1xs4.jpg
http://img161.imageshack.us/img161/4...levelp2rx0.jpg
http://img161.imageshack.us/img161/6...levelp3ls3.jpg
http://img240.imageshack.us/img240/7...levelp4su4.jpg
http://img161.imageshack.us/img161/8...levelp5jf3.jpg
http://img390.imageshack.us/img390/5...levelp6cm2.jpg[/SPOILER]

Before you read the Walkthrough, maybe you could try to "get through the level" on your own and tell me if it's not to easy/hard.

And a Walkthrough:
[SPOILER]Room1:
-Get up through random platform elements and get the green key.
-Use the crane to remove the black block beneath it, which is stuck in another movable block, preventing it from being pushed.
Room2:
-Get up to the green door using the strings with grabable spheres and the moving platforms.
-Push the sphere down to where the poison fog is.
Room1:
-Push the block in front of you to make the sphere roll down to where the red switch is.
Room3:
-Go up the now moving platform and push the black block down the fog.
Room4:
-Get through another part of random platforming to the spring, which is now being held down by the heavy black block.
-Go down to the lower part of the room and push the long block in front of the sphere.
Room5:
-Push the long block from Room4 into the little hole at the bottom (sackboy is too big to fit into there), setting free the balloon with a block attached to it.
-Go up (actually theres supossed to be a platform in front of the wheel which i forgot to draw) and use the spring to jump onto the block that is attached to the balloon.
-Jump to the right and pull the block with the balloon out of the hole its stuck in to make it fly into the corner.
-Go down and carfully jump through the fog to get the blue key.
Room6:
-Wait for the balloon, which is now stuck in the belt and circling around, and jump onto the platform to make it over the poison fog.
-Open the blue door, go up, and defeat the boss. Activate the red switch to make a huge platform in front of the wheel go up and down.
-Leave this room

-Jump onto the huge platform going up and down and jump over the platforms, that are hanging down, to reach the finish.[/SPOILER]


Personally I love this kind of "labyrinthlike", "rotating areas" and "everything you do will affect something elsewhere" stuff, and I'll probably make more levels with this idea once the game comes out.
Anyways, if theres still questions please ask.

So.. how do you like the level and the general idea?

I remember how excited i was when I saw MM's version of the "Wheel"...

and I'm glad you are putting this together...

I like very hard levels...so I look forward to cursing this wheel...:p

Dude, that loooks sooooo complicated.

Nice idea though, I hope it works :)

Nice to see the Spoiler Tag feature put into good use! :p

Nice level, I won't spoil it for myself, I want to try to figure it out for myself. :)

That's a very awesome creation! :)

OH this looks like some fun, wheel levels are always fun. Is going to be a timed level. It would be cool it it was.

I really like the idea, I hope you don't mind me throwing in some thoughts.

The main thing that comes to mind is that you have a clear order that you need to finish the rooms with, but if I understood it correctly, you can freely rotate the wheel from the get-go. This might confuse players as to where to go at any point. There's a few ways around it in my opinion:

1) Have clear indications as to which section the player should go at any point. However, this kind of nullifies the point of having the possibility of turning the wheel with the lever, as you still have to progress linearily.

2a) Have the wheel turn automatically at fixed intervals. For example, when you reach the first (green) key, a timed trigger would be activated, and the player would have X seconds to get out of this section quickly or the wheel would turn with the sackboy inside, potentially killing the sackboy(?).
2b) Instead of having to enter and exit a section, there could be a timer trigger each time you enter a section, and you'd have to reach a certain point in each section in the allotted time. For example, instead of having a green key in the first section, you could have an entrance to section 2 in that point. If sackboy doesn't reach said section in time, the room would be filled with poison fog and death could be imminent.

3) My preferred choice would be to keep the rotation lever in place, but have another lever in each of the 6 rooms. Each lever could open one lock/door/obstacle to the finish line. This way you could enter whichever room at whichever point, so the level wouldn't be as linear as it is now. In addition to this lever system, you could have the key / lock system or the puzzles where you have to enter the rooms in a specific order (ball/poison gas), but these puzzles could just lead to secret bonuses (fluff, etc?), that allow players to get a higher score / gold medal.


These are just ideas that I'm throwing around. Feel free to disregard them if you don't like them. :)

That looks really awesome... and hard. I can't wait to play it. Are you going to place any enemies in there besides the big boss?

@Linque

First, if I get what you mean, I actually intended that it is not clear what to do next at every moment. So you have to kinda go through, observe and see what should be done next for yourself.

1)Well as stated above and by you, this would defeat the purpose of the level.
2a)I don't know how this would stop confusion, but I like the time idea. Though it should not be like a race and still give the player some time to think what to do. Too little time + complex mechanisms = frustrating I guess.
2b)This would also eliminate the "observe and think about what to do next" aspect, as the player would always be where he should.
3)I think it is too liniar too, but one reason for that is that I drew a sketch of that level in like 30mins after having the "wheel idea". Most of the platforming stuff is also completely random "thought up in 1min stuff". Will probably give it more thought when actually creating the level. Now I really like the not too liniar and bonus puzzles stuff, but theres one problem.
The less liniar it gets, the less space there is for one particular mechanism/puzzle and the harder it gets to make complex stuff. But as I don't know how big such a level can be, it could be a problem or not. Maybe even multiple wheels are possible.

Anyway, nice ideas, keep 'em coming.

@Code
I definitely want to have some enemies in there, but I think it'll be hard to make enemies that are not stuck on the wall (e.g. like the pitfall crocodile in one of the vids), as they would also fly around when rotating the wheel.
But I will give it some thought when creating it, as I will to the rest of the level.

As I made this level in about 30min (drawing not included xD), I wonder what will come out of planning out a level for a whole day. That will have to wait till the game is out though, as I don't want to sit in front of a piece of paper with a ****ty drawing on it the whole day ^^.

I think I'm going to make a few levels based on this idea with different difficulties, reaching from easy (maybe Linques idea 1) would be good here) to really hard like "first go through the whole level and observe, then think about how to get through" and having mechanisms that block each other, if activated wrong (with a reset of course).

So.. more feedback & ideas please ^^

looks complicated and very cool. Hopefully you create this I would be in line first LOL
GO MM!!!!! :cool:

can't wait to try it out. looks promising:p

Alright, sounds good.

One word of advice tho: players usually don't like it when they have no clue about what to do next. Trial & Error in platforming levels is usually not a good idea, so generally you don't want to have situations where a player can get lost, stuck or too confused. Getting stuck is ok only if it's really apparent that there's a puzzle in front of them and they need to figure the puzzle out to proceed. Even then, staying stuck for a long time doesn't really add any value to the experience.

I really like your idea, good luck, hope it turns out well! :)

looks good. good luck makeing it...

A little confusing, but seems like a solid idea. I like!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Shiwayari

@Code
I definitely want to have some enemies in there, but I think it'll be hard to make enemies that are not stuck on the wall (e.g. like the pitfall crocodile in one of the vids), as they would also fly around when rotating the wheel.
But I will give it some thought when creating it, as I will to the rest of the level.

As I made this level in about 30min (drawing not included xD), I wonder what will come out of planning out a level for a whole day. That will have to wait till the game is out though, as I don't want to sit in front of a piece of paper with a ****ty drawing on it the whole day ^^.

I think I'm going to make a few levels based on this idea with different difficulties, reaching from easy (maybe Linques idea 1) would be good here) to really hard like "first go through the whole level and observe, then think about how to get through" and having mechanisms that block each other, if activated wrong (with a reset of course).

So.. more feedback & ideas please ^^

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Do you have a theme in mind for this level? Like is it futuristic, foresty, industrial? Or is there a theme for each part of the wheel?

I didn't think of any themes yet and don't want to without seeing what it actually looks like. It should also fit to the content of the room, so it could be like a ruin thing for this one, if there is something like that. (Kinda reminds me of the Zelda OoT Forest Temple ^^)

your level is similar to a dev level on youtube.

Watch this video at about 2:10 -- [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I13hyWNWwq4"]YouTube - little big planet comic con gameplay[/ame]

Your level is similar with your sackboy being inside a massive spinning wheel filled with obstacles but yours looks even more complex. Besides there is bound to be many of these types of levels but yours will be the first :)

Looking forward to it!!:D

I like this idea. The only suggestion I have would be to integrate a two player aspect. For example, your buddy goes into a part of the wheel while you operate the control. The only way for him to flip a switch to help progress through the wheel would be for you to pull the level and move the wheel to another position. This would release any barrier in the way and lock him in. You could have a bunch of rocks or balls or whatnot blocking the lever he/she needs to reach. It could also be a bit fun locking your pals in a massive wheel or "accidentally" sending him/her to their doom! Hehe ;)

that video link muttjones posted looks so cool i really want to play that level. The wheel idea looks real fun i wish you the best of luck and look forward to it being posted in the LBP community section when completed.

Quote:

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The only suggestion I have would be to integrate a two player aspect.

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Now that I read that, it's like.. why..the..hell..didn't i think of that? Well thanks for the idea, maybe I actually wouldn't have thought of it until the level was actually made and got feedback xD. I need to make a note to think of that aspect when making levels in my LBP folder, seriously.

Edit:
About the video: Well the similarities are that it is a wheel.. and that it rotates.. and that you have to make you way through.. But the way I see it, it's more of a pure platforming experience where it is also obvious which way to go. What I want to make is a mix of platforming and physics-puzzle that makes the players think a little.