David R. Lorentz

Posts Tagged ‘hulk’

[This is the second entry in my "Incredible Hulk Diary" series, recalling my experience as a mission designer on "The Incredible Hulk" in 2008. For more information and links to the rest of the series, click here.]

Mission 2.2.2: We’re not Giving Up – Part 2

Summary

Here’s a quick summary. For those of you who like to read, hit the jump for a truckload of detail.

• This mission is about protecting Rick Jones in a helicopter as he travels from rooftop to rooftop disarming bombs.
• The mission ended up very fun and memorable; this is mainly because the mission is built around a fun and novel challenge–jumping from rooftop to rooftop.
• The first major design task was to find a suitable set of rooftops to provide compelling inter-rooftop locomotion. I found this in a set of unique skyscrapers in midtown west, which offered challenging and varied locomotion challenges.
• The next task was to settle on a central challenge for the mission. I quickly decided to focus the gameplay around rapid inter-rooftop locomotion. To achieve this challenge organically, I set the helicopter to circle each rooftop, continually damaged by enemies until Hulk arrives to save it. All of this emerged from the focused premise of rooftop locomotion.
• I decided against adding peripheral challenges like protecting Rick himself when he leaves the helicopter; these proved a confusing distraction from the mission’s main trajectory.
• I did, however, throw in some unexpected variety, in the form of an emergency crash landing late in the mission, accompanied by a special objective to carry the final dispenser to Rick’s position on the ground. As a one-off event, this added some variety to the mission without throwing it off kilter.
• Hence, my recipe for a compelling mission: Hone a central challenge for your mission that drives the gameplay forward and makes a story for the player, without extraneous challenges getting in the way. Once you’ve accomplished this, throw a wrench in the works somewhere for a little unexpected variety.

For much, much finer detail, please read on!

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