Illusionary Walls Are Go!

[Thels]

Mmh. I have several puzzle ideas in mind that are related to illusionary walls, and I'm making sure that you have reason to check for illusionary walls on those specific spots in the dungeon, without having to bump into every single wall throughout the rest of the dungeon.

[Darklord]

Lets face it if a mod designer wants to make his dungeon near impossible he probably will. Imagine some annoying git creating a labayrinth where there actually isn't a way to complete it!

Daniel.

[Disasterrific]

Don't get me wrong, I think they should be in the game, but I'm just saying that more 9 times out of 10 they serve no purpose.
I think the crux of the problem lies in their properties being purely psychological. As soon as you know there's an illusionary wall, then for all intents and purposes it might as well not exist.

Give me a genuine example of a puzzle where they would make a significant difference. That EOB puzzle is the only one, and that works purely because it's the first time you encounter them, and there's good singposting.

Some of the reviewers criticized puzzles in grimrock where they missed a button, and it's exactly the same thing, if the entire solution rests in finding the illusionary walls then the player is left with a bitter taste in the mouth. They don't feel clever, they're made to feel stupid for not spotting it earlier, and then they spend the rest of the game banging their head against every wall in the game.

By all means, I look forward to you proving me wrong by building a dungeon that uses illusionary walls in way that makes it fun to play and run up against them.

[Thels]

if the entire solution rests in finding the illusionary walls then the player is left with a bitter taste in the mouth. They don't feel clever, they're made to feel stupid for not spotting it earlier, and then they spend the rest of the game banging their head against every wall in the game.

By all means, I look forward to you proving me wrong by building a dungeon that uses illusionary walls in way that makes it fun to play and run up against them.

I do agree with you that this is an easy trap for dungeon makers to fall in. Placing an illusionary wall with a secret behind is quite easy to pull off and indeed very annoying towards the players.

Illusory walls should only be used so players have a good reason to belief that the walls are at those exact locations, so that indeed:
A) They have a reason to bump into walls during those puzzles.
B) They have no reason to bump into walls through the rest of the dungeon.

Walls with signs on them could work. There's little buttons that are hard to spot, so if the signs are a little easier to spot than the buttons, it should be ok. Though I'm not too fond of this tactic.

[Disasterrific]

Yes, but it only works once, once you know what to look for then there's not that much point anymore.
Thinking about a previous post, you could definitely make a puzzle where you trick the player into forgetting they can throw things through them - but this again highlights the limitation that these are purely psychological obstacles.

There must be some way of intelligently working them into a labyrinth that doesn't feel cheap.

[Bees]

I can think of good uses. For example, even if the player knows that a wall is illusionary, you still can't see through it. So it would be a way to hide enemies or the layout of a room until the player finally steps over the threshold. Or they could be used to intentionally make multiple places look identical, forcing the player to drop items as landmarks to navigate. You can explicitely tell the player where the illusionary walls are, and they will still have an impact in game if they're used this way.

[Thels]

Exactly! Or what if they couldn't see past at all? For example:

-----Row of squares over which the player can navigate.-----
-----Row of pits.-----
-----Illusionary wall.-----
-----Row of pressure plates and portals on most pressure plates, where the missiles determine which portals do or don't activate.-----
-----Actual wall.-----

[Ixnatifual]

You could also use them to discourage people from bumping into walls. Put an illusionary wall in front of a pit that leads to nowhere interesting here and there. Especially at the end of long passageways where people tend to hold down the forward key

[Thels]

You could also use them to discourage people from bumping into walls. Put an illusionary wall in front of a pit that leads to nowhere interesting here and there. Especially at the end of long passageways where people tend to hold down the forward key

Lol. That would be funny.

However, I think it wouldn't really work. If only, I think it would make people more determined to check out every single wall, and only more annoyed each time they fell into a useless pit.

[Isaac]

I'm not that excited about this. Unless there is also a "true seeing" spell that would highlight suspicious walls, this just means having to bump into every wall of the game. Is that fun? I would say okay for very limited use and for some specific puzzles, but on the whole fake walls seem a bit cheap.

In practice, the dungeon designer would (should) put a rune on the wall, and that would be enough. Unmarked walls should be in semi-obvious places (like dead end hallways or a room with no doors; having fallen in via pit). I searched all over the upper levels for illusory walls; it's good to hear there might be some in the mods. I don't recall finding any in LoG.