Steve Lee's Game Jam 9

This was my first ever game jam, and it was hosted in Steve Lee's Discord.

The themes this time were Extreme and 4'33 (the John Cage composition.)

I took extreme literally, so I went with extreme heights; making the player feel small and lost compared to the environment. 4’33’s most striking element was the idea of absence (and avant garde as a whole), so I made pretty much the entire level take place in a white void. the idea was to make it so the player couldn’t tell where a room ended, where they felt overwhelmed with emptiness. of course, due to playability and time, the critical route had to be readily visible.

I was pleased with what I was able to execute. Given more time and possibly a larger team, I think something really amazing could be made. I wanted a bold idea rather than a really fun, replayable level. I wanted to challenge myself.

Feedback: (From Steve Lee!)

Steve Lee's Game Jam 10

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The idea came to me the instant I read the themes: what does it mean to be the player? What would a level be like to play if it wasn't designed for you?

It took me three separate layouts and prototypes to land on the final concept, which ended up being a conjectured, uncouth playspace rather than my idealized "inside-out" puzzle.

The end result is much more of a logic puzzle, requiring memorization, canniness, and attention to detail.

Given the amount of time I personally had to develop, it's still somewhat raw, more of a concept than an execution. That said, this was my first go-around at puzzle design (before this I've only really made action levels!) so it was refreshing to try and conceptualize a more free form, player-centric experience.

I also have a sublime fascination with the Backrooms, and Quake has that digital despondence that comes packaged with the concept of them. A perfect pairing!

Ultimately I'm I'm proud of the final concept. I always view game jams as a way to experiment rather than finalize. It's a chance to try something new and then fuse what I learned with studio projects. This level was sort of inspired by Wayne Shorter, where his terse improvisation and linguistics (both in speech and music) leads to an edge-of-your-seat eruption.

In the process of development, within Steve Lee's Discord, a conversation sparked about how architecture and level design are often conflated, and LD is seen as a younger sibling to it. Someone (as well as myself in my own head) brought up the point of level design being approachable enough to be inspired by ANY art form. Which then begged the question: what would a level inspired by jazz feel like?