Inside: Need Advice
 

Most of the tiles for this level is pretty much set, just lacking lighting effects and NPCs to add-on for this level.

Original:

http://i34.tinypic.com/f7wo5.png

Update #1:

http://i37.tinypic.com/2s7yv6t.png

Comments, advice?

i see they brought back the hedge on wall style from like 2004. ;p...

I'm not a fan of the use of those same two "trees" over and over.

I have to agree. Something artistically doesn't appease me by looking at that.

Omg, I love it! :D

Looks good!

Looks good except for the part where it makes no sense, you'll probably want to widen that narrow doorway where you have the treehouse stairs so players can navigate through it properly.

Make walls that make sense.

Personally I'd like to see different images in here as well, You could do better since what you can add is only limited by your imagination, Also I hope structure of the room (walls n things) are revised a bit. Otherwise looks alright.

It looks illogical, really. I mean you can say "It's a game" or "It's graal style" but in my opinion, the whole terrain looks pretty stupid. For reference, you could look at the levels on Link to the Past. They're simple but effective and don't have grass on one floor and snow on the other.

The Graal engine allows you to do stuff that wasn't usually possible on old game systems but it doesn't mean you should really try and make things that look crazy. I think level design is a lot more than just making stuff that looks pretty; it needs to have function and purpose and it needs to represent a real world in the best way you can with what you've got. I don't mean super realistic but more often than not it goes a long way to add a bit of logic in the mix.

I'll PM you across a link to a site that has full game map images from old SNES RPGs, which should give you a lot of references to work from.

When you started with "It looks illogical" I was prepared to read a rant about the positioning of the walls.

But to bring up an argument about grass on one level and snow on the other? I think it looks neat, tbh. Of course its not logical, you wouldnt see grass and snow inside.

Oh, and "It's a game". Because, it is. If you want to make levels that are illogical, but look pretty, your free to do so.
Every Graal server is like this in some way. You can't really go for realism in Graal. You can try, but only to a certain extent.

I think the levels looks good tho. Like other people said, seeing those 'tree' images over and over doesn't look all that great, but other than that, it looks nice.

you're*

Great improvement from the blank to the complete, but the outline does look a little odd and you should try to fix the perspective. Obviously the snow area is higher than the grass (there's stairs going up right?) so the wall shouldn't be the same height as the bottom level unless you make the outline walls the same height. *nit pick blah*

Looks like a generic, random, no real purpose, Classic Graal Level to me.

Does anyone else notice the snowman image that doesn't at all match the ground snow or look like his character? Random.

Actually it fits just fine, there are a lot worse ways to go at it. If it completely had to match he could have just made a transparent outline and slapt it in and made it block. That would look horrible.

On my new monitor the snowman looks completely white with blue shading, while the snow looks bone white (a shade darker) with cyan/turquoise blotching. Might just be me though, I wanted to point it out cause I saw it like "wtfisthat?".

lolsnowman.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...r_Nazi.svg.png

:blush:

Take realism out of the context.

Graal is not life, its a game as stated previously.

If this was realism, I wouldn't have used snow and grass inside a house to begin with.

As far as the snow and grass combination in the same level... I aimed for trying to be "different" and looking for criticism on things that "didn't look right" rather than a realism statement.

If this is the case, than it is a good level. Be happy with it :D

It's that exact attitude that makes Graal look like crap in the first place. Grass on one level and snow on the other looks plain stupid for a functional level. What's the point in making levels if they're not going to be functional? It's probably a bad idea to even practice making levels without function in mind. Hence why 90% of Graal's, namely UN's, levels look like crap.

I think you're trying to justify that, because Graal is 2D and has limited default graphics, everybody should just throw the logic and thought in level design out of the window in favour of stuff that looks good but, on the whole, doesn't function very well.

Maybe I'm being pedantic but there's this rule of thumb in MMP game development where you should strive for a least some level of immersion in the world you are creating.

Your walls still don't make sense

Decent level. Only thing that really stood out was this stuff, but they're not that big of a big deal. Perhaps you should recolor the bushes on the snow area too.

Just saying, You're being a tad anal. I think he's saying that graal is a fantasy game and people should be allowed to be as wacky with their levels as they want as long as they're well done. If it's not your taste in level that's cool but try to help him out a lil bit, maybe throw an example his way?

Well it doesn't have to make sense if its fantasy... You know what, it could be a level inside of a Earth and Ice spirit's house.

Why would elemental spirits build walls and a roof but no floor?

Breaking rules of realism or logic don't make Graal look like crap. Crappy levels make graal look like crap.

You can have a non-realistic looking level, and have it still look good.
Pretty much all of graal is non-realistic, and has little to no logic.
Most insides have walls that curve inward, then back outwards...is that logical? No.

But then if you had an inside that was completely square, people would complain how boring it is.

Because they can float!

This is the criticism I was looking for, and I appreciate the picture example to explain your thoughts as well.

The area you highlighted red, the level is actually elevated as you can see the staircase at the entrance.

And yes, there's no bottom wall on the bottom part of the level. I don't really like the "floating" walls in outer space style.

I plan on changing the trees on the snow area to white & blue ones instead (haven't got there yet)

I kind of like it, but then again there are things I dislike about the level also.

Totally acceptable as a player house design.

I like the Antago tree branch weird thingies. I really like the fact that you used those, but the placement of them is somewhat out of context. Like maybe you should make recolors of them for context purposes.

And of course I don't really like the walls (they suck), but at the same time, I really believe that you either have a server that follows the ALTTP rules of tile usage or you don't. Classic, for example, had better use the proper wall tiles. Graal2001 pretty much stereotypically does not often, and to a decent effect I might add. Stefan's quest comes to mind, it has very improper tile usage but I actually really like the level design, and if it were to be fixed I would propose that new tiles were made rather than to change the way the level looks to be proper.

Update #2:

hate that tileset, hate that game

Annoying on player, annoying on forums.

Ignored on both.

In the second level I really don't like the extra wall that's in the top right corner.

sword

Spirits like those conditions :)

I dont know what it is, but something about the level just looks a little... "off" to me. I'm not really sure what, but it just dosent look natural i guess. Im not sure

Your just saying this because the others said it :(

Update #3:

Incase you need help connecting the dots:

http://i51.tinypic.com/1zzop7b.png

Thank you Rufus for the color choice of the purple castle tiles.
Feedback and comments on the levels much appreciated.
Please don't give the "realism" comments because this isn't real life.

Why are the floor tiles floating in space (second picture + spar ring)? Don't "hurr, it doesn't have to be real", because it looks stupid - a bad sci fi movie isn't bad because it's not realistic, it's bad because it's badly written. At the very least have some brick tiles supporting them so it looks like that is floating, with the carpet on top of it.

http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/8929/lessstupid.png

Also, regarding that same thing on the second picture, the way you have the floor/carpet with random pieces jutting out is really stupid considering it's just surrounded by blocking tiles. It's more aesthetic than functional because actually walking on those areas would be unconventional, but then when you take into account that it looks stupid too, the aesthetic value really becomes completely worthless and you're just left with some stupid floor thing that is bad for all parties involved.

Here is why I don't do it and why everything looks worse when I do do that:

ya im staying out of this one
my insides suck