something of a hallmark of the best platforming and action adventure games of all time, including almost all of Cavern of Dreams’ inspirations, so it is frankly no surprise that this sort of design philosophy made it into the game too. “Once the movement became more momentum-based, I found I could reach the goals in unintended ways, and that felt very satisfying to me,” explains McMaster. “I like being able to ‘outwit the design’ in other games, and I wanted players to have a similar experience. I also felt that this approach would work better with open-ended levels, where there are multiple directions to arrive at a challenge from.”
“I prioritized based on the goals of the game. I wanted the game to feel more low-stakes and puzzle-focused, so health and lives were removed,” explains McMaster. “I wanted the protagonist to feel kind and caring, so combat was removed in favor of environmental interactions and living entities. But things like discrete warps between levels (as opposed to an open-world format where all the maps are loaded at once) became a way to keep environments focused and distinct, so I kept them in.” When it comes to the other media that inspired work on
Cavern of Dreams, some of it is the Rare, Nintendo and Sega suspects that you’d probably have expected, and then some other choices from further afield and outside of games altogether.
“Banjo-Kazooie, Banjo-Tooie, Super Mario 64, Ocarina
of Time, and Sonic Adventure 2 were the main influences for Cavern of Dreams in terms of games, with the first two contributing the most in terms of game and level design,” says McMaster. “I also took some inspiration from Breath of the Wild’s Divine Beasts for one level, while Fynn’s rolling was inspired by Super Mario Odyssey.”
“I also took inspiration
from medieval bestiaries for character design, and medieval astrology for theming levels and areas, to give the game a historical and fantastical vibe.” In Cavern of Dreams, you can approach many of the problems presented to you in multiple ways, depending on your skills at the time. That sort of freedom is
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Of course, that design choice would mean that the developer would have to put himself into other peoples shoes, and regularly try to look at the game from perspectives outside of his own familiarity with his game world. “It’s important to think carefully about the psychology of a new player,” says McMaster. “When they are given freedom, what choices will they make? How will the results of those choices teach them how to play in the future? The more open-ended your game is, the more important these questions are. “
LESSONS LEARNED
One of the biggest challenges of making Cavern of Dreams was just how exhausting and demotivating that working on a project in secrecy for a long time can be. “I burned out hard at several points,” winces McMaster. “I woke up thinking about the game and went to sleep thinking about it, but I couldn’t bring myself to work on it, since it felt like every decision would have dire consequences. It was very painful. The simple solution was just to take actual breaks, to separate myself from the work and go do and experience other things. It’s very important to separate your work and personal life.” When it comes to what McMaster has learned from his time spent developing his first Steam release, and what he would tell another game developer that was just about to start out on the same journey, the answer is - a lot. “It’s important to have fun making things,” muses McMaster. “Let yourself make lots of mistakes, as mistakes are how you learn. If you’re always super comfortable when creating, then you should try to push yourself. “You don’t have to show your work to anyone if you
don’t feel it’ll help you, and you especially don’t have to post it online. You’re competing with a galaxy of other content for people’s attention, frequently distributed by algorithms rather than people, so it often won’t be
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