Arena Boss Room

May 7, 2024

The Arena Boss Room is large enough to include more than one boss surrounded by a horde of minions.

A standard element in Slayscape is progress to the next level is literally gated by an extra-tough fight in a "boss fight" room. As early development progressed, Keith creates several special rooms for this purpose. The Arena Boss Room was one such room, with a focus on large, open space that could accommodate many players and enemies and could appear only as the last boss room in the dungeon.

The room is roughly circular and larger than normal. Players enter the combat area by dropping through a crumbling floor with no way to back out, committing them to the fight with a "kill or die" mandate. with a clear entrance and exit. Players are pitted against a tougher-than-normal "boss" NPCs as well as around a dozen weaker "minions." During early development, boss NPCs didn't yet have special AI or attacks, so "meteor strike" environmental hazards were added to act as placeholders for missing boss NPC abilities, encouraging players to move around the playspace and perhaps turn the dangerous environment against the NPCs. Once all NPCs are defeated, the exit becomes unblocked and the players can progress to the next level.

Like every Slayscape room, this room began as a blank template that was incorporated into several variants. Not every boss room in this game needs to be fully unique, and propping each variant in very different ways allows for a good variety while reducing creation time.

Tags: boss fight, combat design, multiplayer, Pangaea, PvP, quest design, systems design, worldbuilding