Animal Well it received huge recognition from the press, including our reviewer, and from gamers, with the latter buying it en masse. It is a metroidvania revelation that is really making inroads, despite the initial distrust due to the fact that it was financed by YouTuber Dunkey’s Bigmode label. There are also many prejudices in the world of video games, unfortunately.
In any case, the beauty of Animal Well comes above all from the art of its author, Billy Basso, who in an interview granted to Edge magazine confessed to having cut many rooms in the final version, some of which have already been designed. It is inevitable for every video game that something will be cut during development.
Inevitable cuts
“I think designing a metroidvania is a lot harder than designing, say, a linear platformer where you can load levels,” Basso told Edge. “Putting the new rooms into the map is the first step, then you have to go through probably five or six iterations of game to test and try them out… I can think of a new item that has implications for the entire map, which made me rethink everything.”
Basso explained that the creation of the rooms was a “super-iterative” process, and then said without giving it too much weight, that he had “designed at least double the rooms in the game. The main map is 16 by 16, therefore 256. I would say I’ve probably over-planned 500 rooms during the making, which were cut or changed beyond recognition.”
Inevitable, as already said. Not everything that is created or designed during the making of a game ends up the same, sometimes because the idea is not good, others because it seems so, but in practice it proves not to be, still others because it would always be nice to have infinite time, but then you have to materialize.
Before leaving you, we remind you that Animal Well is available for PC, PS5 and Nintendo Switch.
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