Track Design: Trickster

Skill Theme: Boost (Towards/Speed)
Complementary Theme: Avoid Trajectory (Away/Precission)

Main mechanic: Ramp
This mechanic requires 2 things from the player: positioning and activation. Positioning is rather intuitive, so the training wheels challenge will focus on activation.

Complementary mechanic: Trap Ramp
Trap ramps appear, marked with a "forbidden" symbol. When taken player´s speed will decrease,  boost jumps won´t be available and the landing lane will become a red floor.

Complementary mechanic: Mines
These are an evolution of the Trap Ramp mechanic: instead of positioning the hazardous elements in the ramp itself, mines can be located just before the ramp. In long ramps, groups of  mines can be located at different parts in the ramp´s length.

Challenges

Training wheels challenge:
All the starting zone will be divided in separated lanes that don´t allow z-movement. The player will watch 2 opponents on different lanes. One of them just advances normally while the other performs repeated spins. After a while they will come to a ramp, the first one will jump normally while the second one will perform a spin and then make a boost jump. Then the player will come to a ramp so he can try to boost jump himself. After this first jump, all lanes will come together so Z-Movement becomes possible.

Standard challenge:
The standard challenge makes the player move towards a ramp and activate it. The ramp will be displaced only one lane up or down from the player´s initial position and it will be very wide.

Expansion challenge:
Floors which reduce speed will appear, thus increasing the penalty of the standard challenge.
The number of ramps will have more z-distance between them, so the player has to navigate the whole width to keep on getting on them.
Reduce the width of the ramps.
Series of ramps will appear allowing little time for the player between each one, so the Skill Theme becomes present.

Evolution challenge:
V1: Trap Ramps. The skills in play are the same, but the player must first consider which ramp to take.
V2: Trap Ramps are replaced by moving mines. The mines can be located anywhere relatively to the ramp: just before, in the ramp itself if it´s long enough...so it changes the challenge in an important way: the player must plan a bit more in advance if mines are before the ramp and, most of all, he still has to maneuver after entering the ramp and before boosting from it.
V3: Combine Ramps, Trap Ramps and Mines. Mines will only appear before the ramp moving in opposite direction to the mines, so there´s only one correct place to enter at any time. It´s not more difficult than V1 or V2 as the space to enter will be the same, but it will look more complicated. Difficulty can really be made harder if we force the smallest gap to be of 2 lanes in V1 and V2 and use a smallest gap of 1 in V3.

Mutation challenge:

Variying length ramps will appear, so the player must wait to reach the border before attempting the boost jump. This breaks the rythm and makes the player stay alert...so hazards can appear while the player climbs the ramp.


Crossover challenge:
Moving mines without ramps. It can be used to both break the monotony of the repeated series of ramps and to introduce mines in a forgiving way.

Cadence Prototype

1. T1: Training Wheels Challenge, 1 lane width ramp, no Zmovement allowed.
2. S1: Standard Challenge: Ramps that take the whole width. 2 consecutive instances.
3. X1...XnS1: Expansion challenge: All lanes but 2 will have ramps. From now on, all lanes without a ramp will have a Red Floor. Steadily change the number and width of ramps and add Red Floor to all ramps so it can only be avoided by boost jumping.
4. M1S1: Mutation challenge: longer ramps star appearing. Start with a ramp of L=2 or 3 and width=all.
5. X1...XnM1: Expansion challenge: modify ramps like in the standard expansions.
6. V1S1: Evolution challenge: A ramp that takes all lanes will appear, with 1 moving Trap Ramp. Repeat.
7. X1...XnV1: Expansion challenge: Reduce the number of safe ramps. Repeat while reducing the number of safe ramps until there´s only one left.
8. C1: Crossover challenge: Mines taking all lanes with a hole of width = 2 or 3. First instance: stationary, next instances will have the mines move up/down.
9. V2V1: Evolution challenge: Mines. Start with positioning mines before Ramps.
10. X1...XnV2: Expansion challenge: Moving mines. Change their position to only in the middle of the ramp, then combine, tweaking ramp length to get more options and instances.
11. V3V2: Ramps, Trap Ramps and Mines. Only 1 instance as a final challenge.

Cadence formula:

The cadence will have to follow the Hishotenketsu structure (Intro-Development-Crysis-Resolution).

T1-S1-X1...XnS1-M1S1-X1...XnM1-V1S1-X1...XnV1-C1-V2V1-X1...XnV2-V3V2

These challenges may be too much to include in one single lap and don´t overlay well with the Hishotenketsu structure. What´s more, it could become too repetitive to have to go through all this 3 times, so we will reorganize the cadence with Lap Variations.

Lap cadence
To break up successfully the cadence into 3 laps and make the game engaging while keeping an eye on repetition, we must give a different purpose to each lap:

1. Lap1: Introduction: The simplest lap, it will comprise basically of the training wheels challenge, the standard challenge, some expansions, a mutation, one instance of the first evolution and a final expansion of the mutation. The idea is to keep it simple around the standard challenge, while laying the basis from where the more complex evolutions will grow in the next laps.
2. Lap2: Conflict: The first evolution briefly presented in Lap1 will take focus on this lap alternating expansions of it and of the standard challenge mutation. A crossover challenge will appear before a single instance of the next evolution.
3. Lap3: Resolution: The 2nd evolution will take focus now, alternating with the standard challenge and the first evolution while gaining weigh. the disruptive element (the 2nd evolution) will have to share time with the standard challenge and 1st evolution derivations, so it won´t be as present as the 1st evolution was in Lap 2. This will be like saying "this is all there is to this track", so that this lap provides closure.

In this case we have 3 mechanics: Ramps, Trap Ramps and Mines, so we can present each one in every lap. However, by doing this we may loose some coherence between all laps, so a better method would be to make a double division of the level so mechanics can cross over from one lap to the others:

Challenge	Lap	Mechanic	Intro	Development	Crysis	Resolution
Intro	1	Ramp	TW1 S1	X1...XnS1 M1S1 X1...XnM1	V1S1	XfM1
Conflict	2	Trap Ramp	X1...X2V1	Xn...XmS1/V1 M2V1 X1...XnM1/M2	C1 V2V1	XfM2
Resolution	3	Mine	X1...X2V2	Xn...XmS1/V1/V2 M3V2 X1...XnM1/M2	V3V2 X1V3V2	XfM1

The complexity peak will be in Lap3: Crysis VS Resolution. After that, the expansion of the first mutation will be repeated to relax the complexity and present the end of the race. Focus here will be set on the player himself, who will have to use his last resources for this final part of the race.

So, the general lap cadence will be:
[(T+S)/(X2S)]+[XnS+MS+XmM]+[V+(0/C/X)]+[XM]
We have simplified the lap cadence while at the same time arriving at a nice structure for each lap.

The track will be adapted in every lap, maintaining the same basic structure so the player knows what to expect to some point.

The AI will also have to follow this narrative, though this will be discussed more deeply when the time comes.

Track Design II - Obstacles and themes

Obstacles

• Ramps: If traversed with enough speed will make the car jump. If the trick button is pressed at the correct moment a boost jump will happen.
•  Bouncers: If the player collides with them it will send him rolling to a different lane and make him loose some speed. If the player uses the trick button when colliding he will go through them and get a turbo boost. If the player lands on top of one he will crash, but if he uses the trick button he will bounce upwards and make the multiplier rise by one.
• Gates
• Speed lines
• Drones
• Boost arrows
• Turbo walls: The player must be using the turbo to be able to cross safely.
• Switches: to activate/deactivate floors, gates, ramps...
• Jump pads: If the player pushes the trick button he will get a boost jump.
• Speed lights: Not an obstacle, it indicates if the lane which it´s above is free to pass or has an obstacle the player can´t currently pass because of level or anything else. They can be used to make lap 1 easier and then progressively start making them fail.
• Shield stations: The player has a shield that protects him from environmental damage, but this shield is constantly running out, so he must pass through the shield stations to replenish it. Running out of shield will make him loose speed gradually.

Themes
Testing track
Cloud city
Dome/Stadium
Space
Wasteland

Track Design I

Main concepts
Each track will introduce one main mechanic. They may also introduce other secondary mechanics or use mechanics shown in previous tracks.
Tracks are divided in 4 main parts:

1. Intro: The new mechanic is introduced in a safe environment. The player can experiment with it with little or no penalization. There will always be a starting safe zone to help build up speed.
2. Challenge: Some challenge is presented with the new mechanic.
3. Crysis: A different element is used in combination with the main mechanic. If the new element hasn´t appeared before, this part will be divided in 2 so the player has a chance to test the new element safely.
4. Conclusion: The player´s abbility with the main mechanic will be put to test with a final challenge. There will always be a final zone free of obstacles just before the goal with special signaling to help with final overtakings.

The player must complete 3 laps to finish the race. The track will change slightly in every lap, rising the difficulty and requiring more speed to overcome obstacles. This can be done with colored obstacles.

Main mechanics
Ramps
Bouncers
Gates
Speed lines
Drones
Boost arrows
Turbo walls
Switches: to activate/deactivate floors, gates, ramps...
Jump pads


Track 1 - Trickster

• Main mechanic: Ramps.
• Secondary  mechanic: Red floor.
• Description: The first track of the game. The player will learn to use ramps, boosted jumps and to change lanes.
• Parts:
• Intro: All the starting zone will be divided in separated lanes that don´t allow z-movement. The player will watch 2 opponents on different lanes. One of them just advances normally while the other performs repeated spins. After a while they will come to a ramp, the first one will jump normally while the second one will perform a spin and then make a boost jump. Then the player will come to a ramp so he can try to boost jump himself. After this first jump, all lanes will come together so Z-Movement becomes possible.
• Long ramps will occupy all the lanes so the player is forced to use them.
• Challenge: Ramps will become narrower, so the player must change lanes to take them.
• Crysis: Red floors will appear, so the player must change lanes to avoid them. Some opponents will spinJump over them to guide the player. Then, Red floors taking all lanes will appear so the player must use ramps to jump over them.
• Conclusion: Long red floors with very narrow and short ramps. Boost jumps are necessary to jump over the red floors. Few ramps to take.
• Variations: In each lap the area covered by red floors will grow. There is also a superior level at some parts that can only be reached after boost jumping with enough speed and that will allow for higher jumps.
• Notes: Allow for long parts with no ramps so the player can see the changes in speed after landing tricks.