Level Design: Making Waves

As far as level design for Disco Is Dead!, thus far I designed each level to have three waves and two moments, which I discussed in the last post. I visualized the level flow using a beat map:

Although this was a great start to developing our levels, the waves of oncoming enemies were being randomly generated. As level designer, I could choose which enemies appeared in each wave, but I had no control over how the actual wave would play out – it was all left up to random chance in what sequence they would appear. Our initial reason for this choice was that we wanted the game to be replayable and unpredictable. We didn’t want players to think it was too easy or boring playing with prebuilt waves of enemies.

Our coders went as far as to allow me to pick which enemy would initiate the wave, as a way to teach players a new enemy, but this was the extent of design power I had over each wave. Since this is the core gameplay of Disco Is Dead! we felt like this needed to be addressed – how could such an important piece of our game be left up to chance?

During the critique of our alpha build, our professors also took note of the ‘drumming’ motion simulated by our controllers, and the similarity to rhythm games like DDR and Guitar Hero. What if these games left their entire gameplay up to random chance? It wouldn’t be nearly as fun to play. Disco Is Dead! is lacking patterns that feel natural to perform in rhythm, as well as missing opportunities for two players to work in synchronization, or alternate beats.

It would likely take me months to code in planned sequences of enemies, since my C# skills are… a little rusty. I could design the enemy sequences on paper and have our programmers insert them into the game, but this would be an inefficient use of their time. So instead, they built me a system to use in Unity so I can easily design and test enemy sequences and insert them into each level. (Seriously, how amazing are our programmers?! They’re the best. )

So here’s what this system looks like:

I can create a wave, choose its length, choose whether its sequenced or random (but who wants random? Psssh.), insert enemy types that will appear in the wave, and finally, insert enemy sequences that I can create using another system.

Aaaand here’s what that looks like:

This one here is “Projectile Finale” – that is, it puts emphasis on the projectile enemies, and since it occurs in the final part of level 2, wave 3, it’s like a grand finale that challenges the players skill against projectile enemies.

With this tool I can add any enemy I want into the sequence, choose which player they will attack, and how long it will take for them to spawn. Then all I have to do is hit play and test out my new wave! This system is great because I can create a whole bunch of modular sequences and insert them throughout each wave, like puzzle pieces that make up a finished wave.

Here’s what “Projectile Finale” looks like all finished. It’s pretty awesome.

Notice how it’s designed so the players alternate the projectile attacks, then work together to smash the zombie ball backwards and squash the final approaching zombies. I think this moment will make players feel quite confident and powerful, but we’ll see when I do some playtesting later.

Finally, the last piece that was missing from this design tool was the ability to choose the direction required to smack away each enemy. I noticed this most when I was making enemy sequences that were identical for both players. The enemies that would spawn would be the same, but they would be generated with random arrows – so it wouldn’t quite as in-sync as I originally hoped. But of course our coders made this a new feature! I can choose which input will be required to defeat the enemy, so now our players can be fully in-sync! ….Uh, in theory. There are a few bugs. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ It’s a work in progress.

Coming up next I’ll be putting most of my attention to our tutorial level. Because teaching players is important! I’ve started off by creating simple enemy sequences that slowly introduce the player to defeating enemies. Next, we have to teach them how to build & activate buddy mode to unleash their full potential! Stay tuned for future updates.