At the beginning (over one year ago) Stonerid was a really simple game, and it’s mechanics was very simillar to other platform games, like Super Mario Brothers. However we decided to improve something, because our game had not any really good features (except quite good graphic, in my opinion of course).
That is why we wanted to implement two parrallel worlds in Stonerid. This is not a typical feature, but we had to ask ourselves: Is it really worth to do that? Will this mechanism significantly improve our game? Right now, I can tell that was worth to spent a lot of time and add “two worlds” feature, but there is no rose without spikes. To create a good level, with two parallel worlds I need to spent a lot of time, much more than I needed previously.
Below you can see the moment of change between two worlds (if you want to see this feature in action, watch the latest Stonerid gameplay video).
Main advantages of “two parallel worlds” system.
1. Game offers 2 playable characters: stone character and demon. Each of them has his own world. These worlds aren’t the same. There is a lot of differences between them (you can see that at our last gameplay video). We can easily switch between worlds (just by pressing “R” key).
2. Player can freely change world, but it is impossible to use this ability in all places. It works this way because these parallel worlds aren’t identical, so when you can’t perform the change, it can means that there is some obstacle (for example wall) in this place, in the alternative world. Additionaly, if you can’t switch, there is a small, red cross, appears over main hero’s head.
3. Freely changes can cause some problem for the player, like unexpected death. That’s why you have to be carefull when you switch between two worlds. You never know what kind of dangerous thing can be hidden in the alternative world.
4. Sometimes you can feel a little lost. When you do something in the first world it can affects on the things in the second world. You have to remember about that. If you don’t know what should you do next, maybe you have to look for an explanation somewhere in the parallel world. What will you do, if locked doors blocks your way? Where is the key? It can be hidden in one of two worlds. This feature gives really a lot of interesting possibilities.
5. There is many situations in our game when you have to decide quickly and there is no time to think if you want to stay alive. Stonerid very often requires quick reflex and players shouldn’t forget about that.
6. Each level is bigger and looks more open, when you have an option to switch between two worlds.
7. Now Stonerid is a quite difficult game. It’s not easy if you want to complete all levels, especially if you want to collect most of availabe items. We are not sure if the fact that game is difficult is an advantage, but we don’t prefer easy games, so we don’t want to make our game too easy.
8.Time doesn’t affects on an alternative world, it passes only in a world, in which you currently are. Each object, like a monster or trap, just stops when you leave the current world and switch to the parallel area. It’s a very usefull feature if you know how to use it properly.
As you can see “two worlds system” can be really interesting, because it provides many different possibilites and makes gameplay more complicated. For more information about Stonerid visit our website.
Reminds me of Giana Sister's. Interested to see how you would pull it off!
There is a lot of differences between parallel worlds in our game. It's not only about appearance, but each world has a different design, that's why player can't switch to alternative world in any place.