Splitting into gameplay and decoration…
GameplayIt’s okay, I would say. This level syncs quite well with the music and basically qualifies as ‘rate-able’ gameplay. There are a couple flaws in the level, though. Here are the comments:
- 0% to 14%: The background obstructs the view of the layout heavily so it’s really hard to see the outline of the pillars. Especially when you use the same light blue as the one in block deco, it makes an illusion that the gap between two platforms is actually a continuation of the block design. This hinders readability and forces memory, which I think is not really a good thing. Layout should not force memory and almost everything should be sightreadable.
- 15% to 30%: This is a slow wave done well! The layout syncs quite well and the slow build-up fits very well with the song. The gameplay is not very dynamic, but it shouldn’t be anyways.
- 22%: Bug. You can go under the spikes as mini wave.
- 30% to 43%: Also a steady ship, but there’s one thing to comment on. The part with the gravity portals is repetitive. The players just hold to go up and then spam to maintain its position, then pass the gravity portal and repeat. GD cannot tolerate repetitive gameplay, because it’s really boring. Try varying the movement, at least slightly.
- 43%: Be careful when you hide orbs behind other objects. Players may not be able to see them and crash.
- 45% to 75%: Double spikes at the ground appeared multiple times in this section. It’s okay on its own, but it feels boring when you repeat that. Again, the repetitiveness. Maybe add a platform behind a double spike? That alone will already vary your gameplay.
- 45% to 75%: That aside, this section is generally okay as a cube, but I think it could have more vertical movement. Slow ascends and descends work really well for cube gameplay.
- 53%: Invisible orbs are really annoying because they influence gameplay without players anticipating. GD values control of the character and these unexpected gameplay elements and mess people up. That’s not good because players will feel that the level is cheating. You want the player to feel bad because they mess up, not the level messes up.
-75% to 77%: A very questionable dual cube. The orbs are very clustered, making it prone to exploits. And the whole section feels like using dual for the sake of using duals. Dual is a very dangerous gamemode as it is hard to make good duals, even symmetrical ones.
- 77% to 100%: This double speed wave is relatively poorly made, in my opinion. The wave does not sync quite well with the music, which I would blame on the layout being composed of pillars instead of slopes. Yes, you caught the mood of the music with the speed, but the movement seems to be out of control when these seemingly random pillars are places throughout this section.
- Also, you often didn’t place spikes at the ceiling so the player can fly away. This does not look good and feel good because the player have to either press the replay button, which is hidden in default, or wait for the icon to crash, which can take seconds. This is also where extra pillar come in handy. The player can’t fly off to infinity if the gap is too small to do so.
- Just a nitpick, but the level length being just under Long feels a bit pity for me. Of course, it may be better to keep the length as is than to struggle for one more measure of the song, but usually Long and XL levels get rated so if you are looking to get that, yeah.
DecorationYou often use the exact same colour in each section. Like in 0% to 14%, almost the whole section uses the same, boring light blue, which not only causes the readability issue mentioned above, but also feel bland in terms of colour choices. Vary your choices even if you only pick blue. Use a colour wheel like the Adobe one to look for colours that looks similar. I found a colour combination that is blue and looks nice: 3b40f5, 4f7eff, 3c91e6, 68d8ff, 33ecf2. It’s even easier for gray because there are no saturation to care about. Other comments as follows.
- 0% to 3%: Can you see that the only objects for decoration is the background? There are no air deco, no blocks, even the pads are just floating in place. This sections looks really empty. If you do not want to disturb the gameplay, place spikes 3.5 or more blocks above the player (for cube, higher up for robot) so that you can have something in the scene without the player crashing into the ceiling.
- 0% to 14%: I appreciate that you added the detail to the blocks, but it still feels monotonous. This is because the design is not layered and feels like patterns printed on paper. Try adding shading, or adding other shapes below to give depth and the perception of detail.
- 10%: Extend pillars so that players cannot see the end of them. This makes the illusion of pillars extending from the sky, and it is easily done by only adding a couple more blocks.
- 15%: Please do not use the default blocks and call it a day. The essence of 2.1 decoration is to mix and match and to layer decoration. Almost every decoration you see in other levels use different blocks in different tabs. Creators scale them and place them in different Z layer to give more complex designs. It’s time-consuming, but the standard requires something like this.
- 45% to 75%: Maybe do opacity 50% on the shadow to make it look more natural instead of being pitch black at the edges. Also, the background sometimes don’t fit well as a continuous wall. The wall blocks don’t really tolerate rotations or flips, as far as I know. You are supposed to build full blocks using some of the ‘edge blocks’ given. (Which you have used, apparently. I don’t know why you filled the edge for some and left it out for others. For style maybe? Anyway it does not really looks nice – it just feels like the walls being cut by lasers.)
- 45% to 77%: And also don’t spam full-size spikes for long hazardous ground. There are much more options available at the hazards tab. Those grass, the wavies, etc. There is also an animated hazard at the orbs tab, next to the bat. Well, JSAB uses these full-size spikes allllll the time but that doesn’t mean you should copy in GD, especially when there are other stuff to replace it. (are you a jsab player just guessing)
- The glow you used sometimes only just makes the readability worse, but fails to achieve better decoration. You should use glow wisely and cautiously, especially when the colours you choose are already very bright. Also, you can often look for substitutes for these glow, such as the rotating objects at the ‘saws’ tab, or just make something rotate around or move around using triggers.
- Use Don’t Fade and Don’t Enter (selectable at the Edit Group pop=up) to make objects remains its opacity and position even at the left and right edges of the screen.
TriggersSpeaking of triggers, just use more of them. They are really useful to make your level more dynamic and lively. Here are some I use all the time when I make small creations.
- Move: You have used them sparingly in the level, but they all seem to have no easing. There are easings to control the speed of the object throughout the movement. Something like Bounce Out will make the object looks like it bounces to place.
- Rotate: The angular version of Move trigger. Also have easing. You have to assign a single object as the axis of rotation, however.
- Alpha: You know this so I’m not gonna repeat.
- On Death: Useful when you want to reveal information when the player dies on certain obstacles.
- And the Disable/enable player trail, Show/hide player, the block entry/fade animations. They are just remains of old updates, but they also have situational use. One use I thought of is the fading/entry animation used by Optical in Affix for the dots.
VerdictNeeds Improvement. The decoration is not going to cut it. 2.1 requires a high level of detail in levels in order for levels to get rated. The gameplay, though being solid, does not have anything impressive or extraordinary to deserve a rating. My advice is always, to play and copy other people’s levels and dig into how they layer stuff and make decoration. I had a GIF illustrating how to know what objects are they using and where to find them. Here, have a look.
Also, experiment. See what feels like your style. Maybe you want to step into modern and create stuff like those? Maybe you want to get into tech? Or maybe you want to develop your own style of decoration? You should ask yourself what do you want to create, and your aim to make a level. Good luck on your future projects!
>>> Moving to NI.