Project Q: First Look

If the graphics aren’t subject to change, then I’m glad we’ve still got Knytt Stories (and I donated $20 to Niflas for that, as I felt it was worth it).

Another previously said that Knytt Stories was beautiful because of its simplicity, and this is not so beautiful, but that’s not all there is to it. It was also the cohesion of art-style that made it beautiful.

Some developers of Knytt Stories levels understood that, while others did not. Has Nif forgotten?

Here’s an example; Death Mountain was a brilliant level, because it had a completely cohesive art-style and fit with the feeling and the atmosphere of Knytt. But then, there were these levels which were too complicated, ones that had painted backgrounds and curvy platforms.

Whiile the latter levels were pretty to look at, they only really worked as what the Knytt community referred to as environment levels. You walk through them and go “Oooh pretty…” until you reach the end, and that’s that.

The moment gameplay was introduced into such a level, it pretty much sucked… badly.

This video gives me the vibe that it’s one of those bad Knytt Stories levels, the art isn’t cohesive at all, in fact the art direction looks awful, and while the painted backgrounds are pretty, things just don’t mesh together well. It looks like it would be okay if it was free and the point was to just stroll through it, looking at the environments… but it wouldn’t suit gameplay at all.

Does that make any sense?

If not, play Knytt Stories and a bunch of Knytt Stories levels, you’ll come across what I’m talking about.

For Knytt gameplay to work, the… the nature of the environment has to be clear, you have to be able to understand it at a glance, it has to be intuitive, you have to be able to make out the dangers from things that are there just to be pretty or background life. You need a clear understanding of what is a platform you can climb on and what isn’t, and this allows the player to explore intuitively.

This doesn’t look like it has any of that, so I’m really not excited.

And that’s not the end of my criticisms either…

If Knytt Stories had stood on its own, it would’ve been kinda fun, but it would’ve been forgotten rather quickly. It was the level editor, along with Nif’s own level additions after the release and those of the community that made it awesome. This is kind of why I weas excited about LittleBigPlanet, but… the editor didn’t work on a console, so the majority of LBP community levels were bloody awful. It was near impossible to find even one good user-created LBP level.

If this has a level editor that’s designed to be used on a PC and not… ah, streamlined for console users, then that could save it, that could allow people to create their own graphics and use the engine to recreate a true Knytt feel with a nice, updated engine.

But the thing is, it’s probably going to be LBP if it does have an editor due to the console influence.

Let’s just say that I don’t have a lot of faith in this, and I’d really prefer to donate money for more Knytt Stories than get this.

Maybe I’m completely wrong about it, but… eh, I don’t know. It lacks the beauty of Knytt Stories, it lacks the cohesion, and it seems to lack the feeling of wonder too. :< I'm just going to hope that this is a PC exclusive with a damn good editor, because if that is the case then the fan community could salvage this and potentially make something truly great of it. But if it's akin to a bad Knytt Stories level with no level editor, or a particularly crappy one, eh... Aside from the obvious graphical update, it seems like a massive step back.