WIP Dev Log #2 Map Design of Gate 3

With the 2nd Demo of Torii: Beyond the Gates demo out, we are excited to share with you an upcoming preview on what we have planned (without spoiling too much!).

The Sketch and Plan

This was our very first sketch and plan of Gate 3 (We cut off a little bit just to not show too much of whats to come!) If you have played the original demo or second demo, you may have seen a glimpse of Gate 3 from Gate 1.

We wanted to embrace the metroidvania style of gameplay allowing you to go through different parts of other gates and explore. The most difficult part of this is determining the platforming puzzles and enemies that suit this gate as well.

The Base

The next phase is sketching and drawing the assets. As each is hand drawn we create the sprites and place them in the rough positions. From there, we then determine how the puzzles will be solved and encountered, and thenpotential areas the player can move in the section.

Here is a more first look at the 'base' implementation of the puzzle. You can see what we are aiming for and how the platforming can be solved. It looks simple at first, but we can guarantee you it's not as easy as it seems! The base sets the tone of how Torii will navigate a tricky obstacle for a rare treasure.

At first we wanted you to traverse the puzzle backwards as well, but we found that to embrace a proper exploration and metroidvania style game, it should reward you for going through such a tricky course and allow you to open out back to the main route of the stage.

In Engine

Implementing the segment into the core stage begins! This is where we start to create the gate step by step. The most difficult part is having the initial vision and plan to then allow each segment to seamlessly connect into the giant world of Torii.

We hope you enjoyed this little sneak peek of Torii: Beyond The Gates! Please check out the new demo that was just released! we would love your feedback in our Discord or in the Steam forums.