Experimental Escape/Maze Ideas

[Hugget Sukker]

hi,
are you an escapist?

Have you played a lot of escape/maze maps?
Do you want to spread the fun and fuse escape/maze with other genres?
Can you come up with some of the most original things for an escape/maze map that would astound veterans and beginners?

things??

Well, anything, basically. I'm hoping to do very unorthodox things to the genre; maybe even plant a new wave.

Think about this: What is the typical escape map like? You walk along a path, mustn't touch snow/abbyss/sand/whatever, and have to avoid the mindless and invincible zombie patrollers or DIE!
But what if not all enemies were toxic patrollers? Some might try to bounce you off the path, some might look like a tornado, pick you up, and drop you somewhere else. And why not some enemies who can actually be killed in some tricky-risky manner?
What if your escaper could buy single-use items that offered some assistance against the impossible odds, like temporary speed bonus, ability to create a single-use save point, slow enemy, temporary invulnerability, etc. ?
It doesn't have to get more complex, just more unheard of.

what's the point?

To gather lightbulb-juice for (a) fun escape/maze spinoff map(s) with more replayability and the possibility of longer games, simply.

but all the magic in the escape/maze traditions??!!

Oh yes, there will have to be re-magicked. If you want to hear my opinion: In order to allow the possibility for longer and fun games, I think it needs to be less deadly (but not easier).
EDIT: Or perhaps it needs to be more user-friendly and not deadlier and not easier. By that I mean that it's dead annoying when there aren't enough save points and you have to do the same things over and over.

rep!!

Reputation is not a topic.
But I'm going to be very pleased if THW users will help me with ideas. The only thing I can promise is this: If I actually get a map out at some point and use your idea in it, I'll definitely credit you.

Please tell me if I need to elaborate something. But the topic is simple: Out-of-the-box'ish ideas for out-of-the-box'ish escape/maze.

 

[defskull]

Escape-based map ?
MY FAVORITE !
I'll try to give some ideas to you

CHECKPOINTS are essential to create an escape-based map which is user-friendly and increase the replayability.

LIFE LIMIT is another important aspect in this type of map as it teaches the player to be more careful and time to undone their mistake for next time. You can set the LIFE LIMIT to at least 10 attempts or just make it infinite (but this would ruin this game because it will repeat TOO MANY TIMES.

PATROL UNITS AND TRAPS. PATROL UNITS are not unique as it has been done too many times by other map creator. TRAPS, is something different yet, unique. You can make as many traps as you want and be sure it is UNIQUE. Example: When the triggering unit enters a certain region, his life will decrease by X per second until the unit get out of the region. This will make the user panick and enjoyable by others to see the suffering unit runs like a chicken. It will create a happy atmosphere.

COOPERATION. You can make certain stage of the map where the region needs 2 or 3 unit to stand on a button that is far away from one another and another non-workable unit will catch a chicken or evade a jets of fire for X seconds before a gate is opened for the next stage.

ITEMS. Items are not important in escape map because the user will just run off and escape from the mazes of paths, but you can make an item that changes the aspect of the game. A +Movement Speed Boot / Blink Boot (blinks up to 300 units away, just 300 units, no big deal) / LifeSaver (resurrect the holder of the item when it dies). You can make the items to be found, dropped from certain creatures when killed or answer trivia question or even make it buyable. Include golds in your map. Try to think of something that the unit in the game can require a gold.

 

[Hugget Sukker]

Thanks: Insightful. I agree about checkpoints, traps, cooperation and your thoughts on items. Life limit at 10 might be fine, but I'd be mainly concerned about checkpoints.
I think the map needs lots of them, because it's not fun to repeat a boring part you've allready completed more than perhaps once or just twice at most.

Only when you get to the final and hardest levels there could be lets say a checkpoint just before every 3rd tricky area, and in the beginning levels; 1 checkpoint per challenging area.
It's even worse if you have to go through 10 seconds of boring parkstrolling to get back to the challenge.
This is why I like escape maps that are compact / in which units move fast / in which there are lots of fast-sliding ice (which is not original, but was a fun idea in the first place).

It must be kept in mind that escape maps get lots of players really annoyed really quickly, and some players will hate them too much and quit if you don't at least comb out the more senseless required efforts like having to walk a distance of 2560 (divide by 128 to get in tiles) every time you die.

Also, I think to attract more of those of the less hardcore escapers (like myself, of whom I believe there aren't few), who actually quit fast rather than do like me and stay and keep getting owned for half an hour, a less linear version of maze could be in place. Now to elaborate it: Many games have SIDE QUESTS/MISSIONS/PUZZLES/LEVELS that give you a BONUS. Side-challenges are genius if done well and advertised for. CON'ish: They're beside the point. PRO: You don't need them in order to reach the final levels, but in the final levels you will be glad that you spent some effort earlier to get these secrets cutting off some of the worst trouble you'll get in the end.
Besides, any game gets deeper and interesting once you may choose to go right OR left, and not just left. Exploration is a grand reward. Completing something hard should unlock a new, fascinating place to be explored.
More rewards. Rewards don't have to be some things that do something for some other things in a way you might like for some reason. It can be as simple as a joke, a fanfare, or a giraffe on antarctis. Making NPCs happy or unhappy in an RPG can be rewarding if it changes their AI behavior. Not necesarilly because it does anything to the gameplay, but because it is a cool detail. So I wouldn't say the map should have a plot, but just a little more environment and soul, setting it apart from many escape maps.

Puzzles. I like your ^^ idea about stepping on a button and someone has to avoid flames for 10 seconds and the gate opens. As long as it stays that simple. It's not really a puzzle, but it has a hint of it. Puzzles are even worse than the regular escape challenges in putting off impatient players. I know a few who bail on some of the most entertaining games only because they contain puzzles that are REQUIRED. They should all have a dialog in the beginning asking, "Are you fond of puzzles or not?", letting you choose not to let puzzles spoil your game.

If puzzles must be required, I like to have 1) some action, 2) a really easy puzzle, 3) more action, 4) a slightly harder puzzle using the same concept as the previous one, 5) MORE action!, 6) the final puzzle wrapping up the concept from the first puzzle (here it gets hard because now you should understand the type of puzzle), 7) the "boss". So the numer 3: 3 puzzles of increasing difficulty all drawing on the same way of thinking, broken up by some rewarding action.

EDIT: IDEA FOR NON-LINEARITY AND COMPACTNESS: When standing on a checkpoint, an escaper can teleport to any other checkpoint he has allready discovered. Thus, the mapmaker has the option of recycling old levels, and including things in all levels that you can't exploit until you got something in later level.

 

[Formula1]

I'm not a big fan of escape type maps, but I am a fan of sidescrollers

And the only difference in my opinion between the two is that one is two dimensional up and down and the other is two dimensional left and right.

An idea though is basically creating a jump spell. That allows you to jump on enemy units and is absolutely necessary in some scenarios.

Invincibility and powerups
-Personally I find many escape maps to be difficult to the point they don't seem worth the effort. However, if I knew I would be able to succeed through the levels without intense amount of fear I would feel better.

Puzzles
-Making each level more of a puzzle rather than getting from point a to point b
--Hit a switch to open up doors. hit all the tiles of the floor to open up a door. etc

Score system
-To differentiate the veterans from the newbies

Teleport/Level skip
-escape maps can be awefully lonely when your the only one playing : /

 

[The_wand_mirror]

Well i think alot of JASSy stuff would help.

Also, why should there be a life limit? Why not just grant the players have unlimited lives and give them a reward when they don't die too often.

 

[Hugget Sukker]

[insert noob excuse], I don't know what "JASSy" is.

Thanks for opinions.

I guess in order to please different players, the map should allow you to choose between 0, 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, and Infinite lives. And allowing you to choose difficulty wouldn't be bad either. It's the best you can do.

It's probably fun for any mapmaker to wriggle his mind in order to come up with something really difficult, but it actually takes a lot of skill and attention to find the magical balance between consequence and aid. It probably takes that amount of skill to make different levels of difficulty aswell, and make a nice and smooth increment as the players reach later levels. I get bored to death if the difficulty increment is too slow, unless the base is tremendously fun and manifold.

I liked the opinions and examples concerning items. Anyone got some specific ideas that sort of make a challenge concept or something else? Like ice and traps and such, but new ones or spinoffs from old ones.