2D Essentials: More things to try

Try these optional activities to challenge yourself, build your skills, and improve your project!

Each challenge is tagged as Easy, Medium, or Expert difficulty so that you know what to expect. You can do one of them, all of them, or none of them — it’s totally up to you!

• Easy: Play around with sprite colors.
• Expert: Make your level more challenging.

If you’re not interested in doing these challenges, skip to the end of this tutorial to mark it as complete.

When you made the walls from simple default square sprites, they were white. But you can control the color of sprites from their Sprite Renderer component.

This optional challenge is classified as Easy difficulty.

Instructions

1. From the Hierarchy window, select all four walls.

2. In the Sprite Renderer component, for the Color property, select the color box and use the Color window to select a new color for the walls. You can even use the dropper tool to select a color from the existing scene.

Designing a fun level is more difficult than people think. In game design studios, there are full-time level designers who are responsible for crafting the gameplay space and flow, embedding interactive elements and game mechanics, and refining levels through playtesting to optimize the player's experience.

Can you make this simple 2D level more fun and challenging to play?

You might consider drawing inspiration from classic Sokoban puzzle designs. Sokoban is a type of strategy game where the player pushes boxes or crates around in a warehouse, aiming to get them to designated storage locations. The challenge lies in the fact that boxes can only be pushed, not pulled, and the player needs to navigate through tight spaces without getting the boxes stuck against walls or in corners.

This optional challenge is classified as Expert difficulty.

Instructions

1. Research “Sokoban level” online for inspiration on arranging collectibles in a way that introduces puzzle-solving elements to your level design.

2. Duplicate your existing scene to experiment with level design by selecting the scene and pressing Ctrl+D (macOS: Cmd+D).

That way, if you don’t like your changes, you’ll have a saved copy of your original scene.

3. It can be overwhelming to think about level design when you already have a bunch of stuff in your scene — try moving all the furniture off to the side and starting fresh.

4. Rearrange the collectibles and furniture in your room in a way that makes it more fun and challenging to play.

You might need to make some furniture objects immovable by removing their RIgidbody 2D component in order to make the level more challenging.

5. Just like a real level designer, have a friend or family member test out your level and see what they think, then iterate on your design.

No matter if you chose to tackle a single challenge, complete them all, or skip them, you're set for the next step.

Instructions

Proceed to the next tutorial where you'll complete a quiz and get credit for completing this project.