How to Make a dungeon

[CoolZidane]

I made a thread about how to make a town here:

http://charas-project.net/forum/showthread.php?threadid=11917&forumid=29&catid=6

And then I thought I should expand to other areas in games. This part will be about dungeons.

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1. What is a dungeon?

A dungeon is a place the heroes travel through while not on the world map, yet is not a town, either. Most dungeons are filled with puzzles and monsters, and generally have a boss at the end. The typical dungeon is a cave/forest/temple, but this tutorial will show a few other ideas, as well as suggestions to improve the typical ones.

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2. Places you can make a dungeon, and why

Cave: Generally for the hero to travel into, collect something, and go back out

Tunnel: Like a cave, except the point is generally just to get to the other end of it

Forest: It is like a tunnel, but generally has things not found in caves/tunnels

Temple: This is like a cave, but serves more of a story purpose and has more advanced puzzles (generally)

Buildings: These are dungeons in a town. A good example is the Magitek Factory in FF6

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3. Consistency

In order to have an effective dungeon, it has to seem like one. Don't make a room filled with lava and fire in the middle of a glacier. Likewise, don't make a frozen room in the middle of a volcano.

Exceptions are:
 
a. Final Dungeon
b. Bizzare Area
c. "memory dungeon," where you visit the dungeons you visited before

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4. Puzzles

Dungeons do not necessarily need puzzles, but they are useful. Puzzles are meant to make the player think (or get the strategy guide, but I doubt you made one) in order to continue through the dungeon. Puzzles need to have varying difficulty, ranging from stepping on a switch to rigging a pulley system.

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5. Bosses/Monsters

Like puzzles, dungeons don't need bosses. If it does have a boss, make it relevant to the story. Although, sometimes you need to make unimportant bosses. But, you should have the majority of them be important to the story. Of course, if you have a boss, it is a good idea to make the dungeon have monsters so that you can train for it.


That's all I have to say about dungeons, so catch me again with my next tutorial, "How to make a World Map."

[mind-master: brain(mmb)]

good tut.

[maxine]

Well if i played a game and entered a vulcano. Then at the end i found a Ice room i would find it cool. A fantasy game (The games a like) shall be wierd and i would find that cool. Anyways good tut. but kinda obvious

[blackskullwarlock]

Common sens but useful for the beginners. Nice work Zidane.

[Moosetroop11]

It would be very good if it was expanded, this is just the basics.

[Dashman]

Tutorial looks good. Even by being basic, it's useful