Got a few pictures here of the 3 main side scrolling platform games that inspired me. Everyone knows who Nintendo's Super Mario is, and has at least played one of the games he has starred in. The same could be said for Sega's Sonic the Hedgehog. This game New Super Mario Bros. had the playe taked with getting to the other side of the level, running jumping and avoiding or defeating enemies. What was unique about the DS version is that, on the second screen displayed a 'progress bar' which shows how far the player has progessed in the level. The levels in this game were fast, smooth and could have been finished quickly. Just by having this progress bar, it is implied that the main goal of the game was to get to the end of the level. The simplicity of having an objective such as this, is something I would like to create for my game project.
Another Mario game to look at which would be quite useful for art style more than level design would be Yoshis Island, the simple almost hand drawn art style makes the game appear simplistic and uncomplicated. Things such as the background environment, mountains and trees are similar to the type of style that I want to create. Casual and Cartoony.
The same can be said for Sonic the Hedgehog, which is even more of a simpler gameplay goal. Race to the end of the level! What was also interesting about Sonic is that his jump was also his attack, which allowed to player to persist and continue playing thorugh the fast paced level, jumping and destroying enemies along the way.
