Mid October, 2025 Update

After about a month and a half between updates, a lot has changed! A level has been made, movement added, and new components! I will try to break it down best I can from when we last caught up. 

Main Goal (10/14/2025)

First off, lets talk about what we are trying to create. Since we started, I wasn't sure what direction I wanted to take. As we have gone on I have been heavily inspired. I am personally a big fan of 'Cozy' games, and media. "Thumbelina", "Arriety" , "Animal Crossing" and other earthy-colorful media are some of my favorites. And so I wanted to combine the natural elements and idea of being a small person in a big world, with the stealth elements like the ones found in "Breath of the Wild" to create a cozy fantasy stealth game!

My main goal is to make the player feel like a hero, despite sneaking around. Sometimes, your hero isn't a big strong brute of a knight, but a stealthy assassin. And in my game "Winter's Grove", you will play as "Winnie". Winnie, while escorting the princess of their kingdom, was attacked, and is now trying to escape the grove, rescue the princess, and return back to their home kingdom. Players will find themselves in a world that feels bigger than themselves, but ultimately charming. However, they shouldn't be fooled, as this charming world is dangerous, and will not let them return home with ease. 

New elements

Let's get the nitty gritty out of the way first. We added a lot to the game such as:

- Enemies that will chase, and kill you!

- Rocks you can throw

- Yassified MC

- Creepy Enemies

- A crouch

- A Dash

- Noisy grass that will alert the enemies

All of these mechanics are put together throughout level 1 "The Camp" to introduce the player to the game. With this, I wanted it to be simple to introduce the player without overwhelming them, but also allow them to learn the possible controls, and feel a bit clever as they do.

Below I have included all the updated code blocks for these mechanics

Enemies

First off, you can see the enemies can patrol. They can be toggled between 3 options: Patrol, Teleport, or Random. Patrol points exist for the enemy to walk through, and rotate between whatever ones you assign to them. They can also simply teleport to these points. For later levels, I will use this to have enemies appear and disappear at special intervals, encouraging the player to take note of their location, and time their movements. 

They also have a new look. I went with knights, because a faceless look would make them feel less "repetitive" to the players, and with my limited options, I felt these fit the genre well. 

Lastly, they will attack the player, and send them back to their start or last checkpoint. Of course, this makes the enemies a problem. At this point in development, the player can only outrun, hide, and trick the enemy. The player is weaponless, of course, so they are fairly useless face to face with them. This can make the player feel weaker than their opponents, and push them to think of ways to avoid them instead of face them head-on. They can try to outrun them, but they will need to find ways to shake them. It may be easier to take your time, and find ways through the levels instead. 

Interactables

The player can interact with two new things. A rock, which you can throw, and upon impact it will make a noise to alert the AI. The AI will have to check it out, since they are of course looking for anything suspicious, like a pesky assassin looking for their princess. It floats and spins too, which is cute. It is fantasy afterall, perhaps the earth goddess favors our 'Winnie'.

Except, sometimes the leaves you step on will betray you and alert the Knights. So maybe not. 

In the level, I placed these about. The rocks are at opportunities that they can be throw, or the player can hold on to them, and find another place to throw it. It gives the player a chance to make a choice about how they want to face each enemy, and time their chances of escape. 

Player Mechanics, and New look

From the FAB shop, I have picked out the model 'Modular 011 Survival14' For Winnie. They look stealthy, and fit the fantasy vibe really well. I Found I really like the Low Poly style, It feels cute and cozy, perfect for my style.

The player can dash about, to get away from the pesky enemies, or can crouch to hide. This of course is coupled with a crouching animation. This is to aid in the typical Stealth Game Game loops, primarily "Sneaking" and "Fleeing" Both mentioned in the "Player Character Mechanics Document". This makes them much more mobile than enemies, so the player automatically has that advantage, even if they may be out numbered. 

Map, and New Level

Now lets talk about the visual elements! As you can see, we have a full map, called the "camp" Where Winnie first finds herself. She's just broken out of her restraints, and is ready to get out of here! But don't get caught, or you will be sent back to the start. You start in the infirmary, and can run through it to find a storage room, and lastly the open camp grounds. Once out you "win" this starting level, and the game really begins. 

The player will learn to hide from the enemies, throw the rocks, and can even choose to run and dodge them if they like. You can hide around corners, or in small nooks. There's a few moments to pause, and catch your breath, or plan, but once you get going, its a fast paced dart from the start of the room to the end. I want to create a sense of urgency with this, as the player is trying to rescue the princess,  and save her from what may be an untimely death!

The Level Design Document encourages us to consider how the place feels. I will go more in depth on how I achieved this in the play testing section, but I made a point to have "Safe" and "Unsafe" areas.  Safe areas the player can stay and think about their next moves, before rushing through. The unsafe areas are where they will be caught if idle too long, to create tension, and consider strategic movement. If the player is constantly rushing from the start to end, it makes the player feel more like they are in a running simulator, and not a puzzle-esque stealth. I believe a big part of a stealth game IS the moments where they player has to move slow and think. 

There's a few ways around the last area, But I will admit that there are some obvious and more ideal and encouraged ways. My play tester referred to these as the 'Speed Runner Paths'.

Playtesting, and improvements (10/16/2025)

Playtesting was where I found the most room for improvements. They say you have to look at work through others eyes to get a good idea of whats wrong.

I have included the video where my partner "Korben Shrotberger" plays through the game, and gives me direct feedback. Based on his suggestions I am changed the following:

- Adding a delay to the discovery of the rock, and returning to patrol. He said the rock felt fairly useless as a distration, as the enemies would go to the rock, then immediately turn around. This didn't give the player enough time to utilize it for long. Upon changing it, I found there were more ways to use the rock than the ways we first discovered due to the delay. This will give the player options in how they would like to get the enemies out of their way. 

- Giving a moment of relief between the second room and the outdoors. I added a platform to allow the player to look at and map the routes of the AI. As previously mentioned, moments of relief are very important in a stealth game. They give players a chance to think, and make choices, that if rushing, they may not have. Especially in a first level where they should be getting used to the controls and mechanics, these chances to ' breathe' are necessary. My partner pointed out he had to quickly dash between the two areas, since it was impossible to pause and think about his movements between them, and it made him feel as though he was pushed into the enemies without much of a chance to think.

- Doors between rooms. Adding some blockage between each room changes lines of sight for the player and enemies. This keeps players from being spotted while in another room from enemies they may feel they have 'cleared', and adds a bit of mystery to what is ahead, which of course, Unknown = Tension.

- Adjusting lighting to be less intense, but still keeping it 'bright' to keep the cozy fantasy feel instead of scary. My play tester pointed out that in the outdoor area, the lighting was blinding, and made his eyes hurt and that It was difficult to see anything. Now, Typically playing with what the player can and can't see is good, this was more irritating, and especially paired with the "running in blind" feeling between the two rooms, made it very hard to smoothly transition between the two rooms. 

I would also like to make these changes in the future:

- Enemies hear items in the other rooms, and this is triggering them in weird ways, that takes away the players 

- Enemy sight is inconsistent, and buggy

- Rock gets stuck on random geometry

- Cannot see through player to be able to throw rock around corners.

My partners critiques:

Quick example of some of the changes I made:

Conclusion for today

Overall, It was challenging to say the least, but I saw so much improvement through this, having to think about how my players will interact with the game, and how the rooms may feel more frustrating than challenging. My play tester did an amazing job pointing things out I hadn't noticed, and helped me identify weak points in the player experience.