Check it!
I watch and rewatch a lot of videos to learn and get tips for whatever I am working on. Sometimes it is hard to judge whether a video is relevant to my interests or not. This will solve that problem for me and hopefully it will help someone else too.
What This Video Is
This video is about how the presenter (Matt Thorson) personally designed levels for Celest, how he leveraged playtesting and what Ideology he followed while designing levels.
It's Content
At the time of this presentation, Celest was unreleased so he starts with a trailer and an explanation of the game’s basic mechanics, he then goes into talking about his approach to making levels for the game.
Though Matt Thorson talks about more traditional things like multiple paths and teaching through level design.
The overarching theme of this presentation is about telling a single story or conveying emotion through individual levels, through the areas that encapsulate the levels and through the game as a whole. making sure they all work together to make a tone and narrative cohesive game.
Most (if not all) of Matt Thorson’s points can be applied to all games but the further away your game is from Celest (in terms of genre and type) the harder it might be.
Is It For You?
If you are a fan of Celest or want another design philosophy to add to your arsenal then this presentation is perfect.
“Always looking for ways to offload our narrative on to our level design”
~Matt Thorson~