Tribe

Level Design Tips and Examples

• Is fun to navigate – It uses a clear visual language to guide the player along the primary path, and creates interest through verticality, secondary paths, hidden areas and maze elements.
• Does not rely on words to tell a story – Aside from the explicit narrative called out by story and objectives, good level design delivers implicit narrative trough the environment, and provides players with gameplay choice from which to create their own emergent narrative.
• Tells the player what to do, but not how to do it – It makes sure mission objectives are clearly communicated, but lets players complete them any way they like, and, where feasible, in any order.
• Constantly teaches the player something new – It keeps the player engaged by continuously introducing new mechanics all the way through the game, and prevents old mechanics from becoming stale by applying modifiers or reusing them in unusual ways.
• Is surprising – Classic Aristotelian pacing is not always appropriate for an interactive medium, and it is not enough to simply pace all your levels to the standard “rollercoaster” model.  Good level design is not afraid to take risks with the pace, aesthetics, locale and other elements to create an experience that is fresh.
• Empowers the player – Videogames are escapism and, as such, should eschew the mundane.  Furthermore, good level design reinforces players’ empowerment by allowing them to experience the consequences of their actions, in both the immediate, moment-to-moment gameplay, and in the long term, through the holistic design of all levels.
• Allows the player to control the difficulty – It gears the main path toward players of basic ability, presenting advanced players with optional challenge through clearly communicated opportunities of risk and reward.
• Is efficient – Resources are finite.  Good level design creates efficiencies through modularity, bi-directional gameplay and integrated, exploratory bonus objectives that make use of the whole play-space.
• Creates emotion – it begins at the end, with the desired emotional response, and works backwards, selecting the appropriate mechanics, spatial metrics  and narrative devices to elicit that response.
• Is driven by the game’s mechanics – above all, it showcases the game’s mechanics through the medium of the level, to reinforce the uniquely interactive nature of video games.

Composition in Level Design

http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/MateuszPiaskiewicz/20140817/223513/Composition_in_Level_Design.php

Environmental Storytelling in Games

http://www.jethrojongeneel.com/articles/T4.php