Summary
While all Metroidvania games tend to share certain features and mechanics inherent to the genre, like ability-gated backtracking,Biomorphfaced some unprecedented challenges due to its unique core mechanic. The game’s titular Kirby-like “biomorph” ability lets players take the form of enemies they’ve defeated, allowing them to attack or move in entirely different ways. Naturally, this seriously complicated Lucid Dreams' approach toBiomorph’s combat, exploration, and enemy design.
In an interview with Game Rant, Lucid Dreams' co-founders Maxime Grégoire and Francis Lapierre discussed some of the unforeseen challenges that arose thanks to the bimorph mechanic, such as coping with a potentially changing player hitbox. They also weighed in on how the team approached enemy design in general, keeping in mind that players both fight and become these creatures.
Contact Damage in Biomorph Was Tricky To Balance
While Metroidvania games share many similarities, one slight mechanical change that can drastically alter their feel is the inclusion or absence of contact damage: when the player takes damage by merely touching enemies, such as inMario. Controls need to be extremely tight for contact damage to feel fair and there shouldn’t be any guesswork involved in collision detection. Agame likeHollow Knightwith its persistently-sized protagonist is straightforward with contact damage, but it quickly became apparent thatBiomorph’s shapeshifting mechanic made this difficult.
Another challenge that we had that we didn’t see coming but quickly became apparent was that we made the game with contact damage. You always have two choices: you have damage on contact or just from attacks. Contact damage works well inHollow Knightbecause it’s simple to understand and you may create fun patterns. It works well when you have one shape, one character.
But inBiomorph, you can have bigger monsters, and smaller monsters, so the damage on contact with the touch distance was challenging to pull off because with big monsters, we had to add bonuses to the touch distance so they’d clear enemies because they have a bigger hitbox. So combat was complicated to pull off and to bring to a state where you can have actual fun with all the monsters without feeling too constrained.
Since thecharacter can shapeshiftinto several creatures during combat, it’s difficult to retain the same muscle memory collisions as a persistent character. Along with some under-the-hood parameter tweaks, one clever solution was to have Harlo shapeshift to his standard form whenever performing a dodge. This way, the dodge distance and invincibility frames are consistent no matter what form Harlo took originally.
Biomorph’s Shapeshifting Mechanic Made Interesting Enemy Design Crucial
Few elements are more important thancombat in a Metroidvania, and coming up with enemies that are interesting to fight is an important part of the equation. Since players can also become these enemies,Biomorphhad to take extra care when designing them so they’d be fun in both situations.
The best way we approached it is that every zone has a theme: a main feature like some mechanics that we want and we wanted every biome to be different. Once we settled on the mechanic, we created the enemies and thought about their shape and what they could do that helped create this unique feeling in this biome.
Since the player becomes the monster and uses the monster’s attacks–with some tweaks of course–we had to be careful to balance the difficulty and the abilities to be fun to fight against, but you’ll want to kill it just to take its shape and see if you do it yourself. So first we started the monster to make them fun, and then we took the monster and and ported it to the player and tuned the weapon and abilities to give the feeling of the monster but still feel good as a player controller.
The result is a roster of enemies that tend not to repeat themselves mechanically or thematically, and this enriches the game in several ways.Open-world explorationis more interesting thanks to a more diverse cast of monsters, players are more motivated to unlock and collect each unique transformation, and combat throughout the game stays fresh.
Biomorph
WHERE TO PLAY
In BIOMORPH, players must use their skills to explore a vast, varied world. Solve puzzles and platforming challenges, fight deadly monsters and take their shapes to use their powers. But beware – every conquered creature can come back with new and even more threatening powers. Players will level-up their character as they fight through the vast areas around the city, collecting new abilities, mementos and chips. The journey will reveal surprising and alarming truths about our hero’s own origins.Play as the enemies by killing them and taking their shape. You will be able to use their skills to fight other enemies or use their powers to navigate in uncharted territories.Fight your way through a challenging AI system where previously mimicked creatures unlock new powers to create a unique experience while revisiting areas of the game.Choose your fighting style by using an arsenal of melee and range weapons, each of them having its own upgrade tree, to bash and shoot enemies. Create different builds in support of your play style by equipping and mixing different unique skills that you can upgrade.Explore a vast non-linear, interconnected world composed of many different environments, home of optional boss fights, eccentric NPCs, tons of secrets and upgrades to reward the most daring explorer.Rebuild the city of Blightmoor and befriend it’s inhabitants, learning more about their daily life and the town’s origins. Customize the look of the city to make it your own.
