[POWA] Temple of Doom (4884291)

[restive shale]

This dungeon was created for Powanoia's contest. Per the contest rules, it's focused around the Grappleshot. I took inspiration from Indiana Jones (despite never watching any of the movies all the way through...) and styled it after an ancient temple filled with traps and such.

Feedback is appreciated as usual. I'm particularly interested in hearing people's thoughts about the length, difficulty, and pacing.

Changelog 4/21:

• Moved the dungeon map to a different room. It can still be obtained without the Grappleshot.
• Added a heart container where the dungeon map used to be.
• Added a boss fight against Golmec. Be careful fighting him -- the arena can be hazardous.

Changelog 4/23:

• Added wall detailing to the boss room.

Changelog 4/28:

• Addressed a possible softlock when escaping the Grappleshot room.

https://mod.io/g/questmaster/m/powa-temple-of-doom

[cursive wadi]

Two Temple of Doom inspired maps? In my Quest Master? It's more likely than you think.

I'll def check it out!

[quick gorge]

Great dungeon! Well thought out. No softlocks encountered. Good job!

[restive shale]

any standout moments, good or bad? i'm not sure if the upper floor in particular is too short.

[quick gorge]

Lenght is perfectly fine imo, not too long not too short. I liked the room where you had to pull the chain and use that as a shield. That was pretty clever and imma steal that for sure 🙂

[fossil yoke]

Dungeon is very enjoyable! I liked this one. My thoughts: ||the upper floor is short and sweet, which is good, but having no boss fight felt a bit anti climatic. The "Remember the path of light" section was really cool, bit let down that the reward was a map, tho. The tile puzzles are extremely simple, I'd love to see a bit more of a challenge. Would love to see reduced the back tracking needed right after getting the first key!|| Keep it up!

[restive shale]

I definitely want to add a boss, I just don't have any good ideas for one at present

Would the compass be a better reward than the map for that one room? Basically swap the two in their chests

[fossil yoke]

That sounds better, yes!

[restive shale]

actually, followup to this: what if i made it mapless? that would increase the value of the map as an item.

the options are:

1. early map, later compass (current)
2. later map, early compass
3. early map, later compass, mapless tag
4. later map, early compass, mapless tag

[fossil yoke]

Before that, would you also consider making that particular chest contain a key? To make the room "required" for progression. If rethinking locked doors is too much, could also consider placing a heart container and relocating the map to somewhere else. I think the current compass location is perfect. Just the map could be easier to obtain.

[restive shale]

i like the heart container idea, although i'm not sure where i could put the map in that case. maybe the adjacent room where the key is, but placed so you don't need the grappleshot to get it?

actually i think i like that idea. i could tie it to the pull lever as a sort of early exposure to the room's primary puzzle

i'll tinker with that a bit when i get some time

[fossil yoke]

Awesome! Let me know if/when you update the dungeon. I'll give it another try 🙂

[restive shale]

dungeon updated. changelog is in the op.

[fossil yoke]

Good changes overall. New map location makes more sense to me. I appreciate the boss, fits in just right.

[restive shale]

dungeon updated again, strictly a detail pass on the boss room. no gameplay changes.

[coarse cypress]

Finished this a bit ago but forgot to give feedback when I did. I really enjoyed this! Everything just felt really fun to go through, and the whole dungeon felt like it was just really solid and well made. If I could critique one thing it’d be that the enemy count was a little high. ||Also I enjoyed the golden roller jumpscare. I didn’t see it coming at all even though I saw you designing it in maker chat lol||

[restive shale]

dungeon updated to address a potential softlock if you let the roller pin you against the wall when escaping after getting the grappleshot

also for those who care about speedrunning, my clear time was around 7:30 and i wasn't trying particularly hard so i suspect sub-7 is possible.

[cobalt orchid]

Just played this. Your flavor is great; you're excellent at creating setpieces for a dungeon, and making use of all the space. There are a lot of memorable moments which I suspect will make your dungeon stand out.

Mechanically, I wish you expanded a bit on more of your ideas. You often had an idea, like using the chain to shield from the wind, which you would reuse once or twice and then never take further. I mindlessly grappled every chain I saw, did the challenge in time, and that was always the correct answer. For Chains + Grappleshot, I would have liked to see, for example:

• A chain you want to pull out from the wall, but then you have to pull it again from farther away using the Grappleshot, and as you move away from the point of origin, the terrain gets tricker so it's harder to reach the chain with your Grappleshot in time;
• Grappling multiple chains at once to unlock a door - preferably in an area you can access before the Grappleshot, so players might try to pull it manually, fail, and realize they need an item, which will cause them to think "aha! I can come back and do that now";
• Grappling multiple chains from a wall to stop something like a bomb being fired at the right place to blow up boxes in a sequence;
• A situation where you want to grapple a chain at the correct location, which could potentially be changing due to a moving platform;

I felt similarly about the use of floor tiles. I was expecting a larger puzzle involving the Grappleshot and the floor tiles, but every combination of the two mechanics was fairly shallow. You always Grappleshot from outside the field of tiles.

I also felt that some of the rooms were busy-looking, like the downstairs area with the chain and the poison covered with grates, and the main area just before the boss room with the three keys. That's a minor gripe though.

I enjoyed playing through this dungeon! I don't know how much of this was due to the time limit, but I really would like to see an expanded version of this.