Mirror World, Dream World, and elegance

[jameslucas]

This question requires knowledge of the entire game and thus is one big spoiler.

I just completed this rather lovely game, and I'm left with one big speculating-about-game-design question: Is there any reason the first playthru and the second playthru didn't use the same map?

Unless I missed something (which I grant is entirely possible), the dream state corresponding to Normal World is fundamentally irrelevant, and the entire second playthru can be solved from Mirror World, without any return trips to Normal World. I began building Dream World triplet snowmen with the expectation that I might need to go back to Normal World to solve some fiendishly knotty puzzle, but this never happened, so I don't really understand the reason for the duality of maps.

In short: what's the point of Normal World? Could the first playthru have happened in Mirror World (or some minor variation of it that doesn't have any lawns separated from the main map)? Could the whole game be reduced to a single map (and the dream perspective of that same map) without losing any of its relevant complexity?

[BlaXpirit]

I think what you're saying here is correct. But hey, it's cheap replay value!

[Draknek]

Good question!

You're right, having two map layouts isn't very elegant. When I originally came up with the idea for the dream world, it was meant to be the same layout as the main game, and the dream snowballs would appear immediately in the dream world as you complete levels.

As I started working on it, though, it quickly became obvious that it would be very very hard to balance the competing requirements of "first playthrough has good tutorialisation/difficulty curve" and "dream world puzzles are challenging".

Possibly I could have made it work given enough time, but at this point we had a firm release date and lots of other things to finish, so the quick solution was to make it a separate area with a different layout specifically designed for interestingness of dream world puzzles.

We ended up with four worlds:
The normal world - to teach the mechanics and give people a fun self-contained experience.
The dream world - empty, but teases the existence of the dream world puzzles.
The mirror world - unlocked once main game is completed, eases you in to the dream world puzzles.
The mirror dream world - where the dream world snowmen have to be built.

We could have instead only had the normal world and a dream world which doesn't have the levels in the same places. In some ways this would be more elegant, but it would make the process of solving the dream world puzzles more awkward because it would be harder to keep track of which level is where. Also, a nice bonus of having the mirror world is that I could secretly exclude a handful of levels which didn't have interesting alternate solutions - I think the main game has 40 snowmen in total (which is not a multiple of 3) while the mirror world has 36.

Originally posted by jameslucas:

I began building Dream World triplet snowmen with the expectation that I might need to go back to Normal World to solve some fiendishly knotty puzzle

This would have been a nice puzzle! I don't remember if I thought of this during development, but I probably would have ruled it out since making you go back and forth would involve too much walking.

[jameslucas]

Thanks for such a thoughtful and comprehensive answer. Maybe if there's ever a reïssue, the maps could be unified. (A Tenth Anniversary Alpaca Mittens Edition, anyone?)

Originally posted by Draknek:

I probably would have ruled it out since making you go back and forth would involve too much walking.

I did the walking anyway (many times since I was convinced I was missing something), but I may just be the exploring type…

[The Alpha and Omega]

I too was confused by the different worlds and their relationship, but I think there might be a way to simplify things without having to redo any puzzles, in case you update the game in the future. I would like to make a few suggestions as someone playing the game with fresh eyes:

- First, one option would be to remove the north gate and its dream world. I think it confuses the player into thinking there's something to do there or that there's a relationship between it and the mirror world, plus it appears inconsistent to walk into that dream world without sleeping first. Instead, after the "The End?" screen, the camera zooms to the south gate and it unlocks, letting the player know the game continues there. A second option is to remove the south gate and make the north gate the entrance to the mirror world, giving the feeling of progression. A third option is to remove the north gate and allow the player access to the normal world's dream world through the benches early on. When the player builds a snowman in the normal world, the walls in the dream world for that area fall, allowing the player convenience to travel to completed areas of the normal world through the dream world benches. A few puzzles could be made from this that requires the player to use a dream world bench to access an inaccessible area in the normal world.

- Once the player reaches the mirror world through the gate, he's hinted about sleeping on the bench. An indirect way of doing this is a cutscene showing the monster being tired and taking a rest on the bench, only to awaken in the dream world. A more direct way is a message pop-up informing the player to rest on the bench ("Hey you look tired, how about resting on the bench there. Once you're seated, lean back and rest your eyes"). And the text ALWAYS pops up when the monster is near the bench until the player rests for the first time. The point is to guide the player into discovering the dream world so he won't wander around thinking there's nothing more to do due to lack of clues. If you use the third option above that allows the player access to the normal world's dream world early on, no hints would be needed for sleeping on the mirror world bench.

A few "nice touch" ideas:

- In the mirror world, give each snowman only 1 accessory, such as a hat, or a scarf, or a pipe. Then when the player builds a snowman in the dream world, that snowman is wearing all 3 accessories from the mirrored snowmen instead of the flashing animation.

- A treat for the player when he walks through the archway after building the dream world snowmen. One idea is that the monster enters a world where all the snowmen are alive, hopping about, waving and cheering the monster. Another idea is the monster enters a world that's a preview of a sequel game with the text "To be continued..."

[M]

It is confusing indeed. I liked the main game, but dreamworld, mirrorworld are confusing.