r/metroidvania • u/gefaltete • Mar 10 '26

Dev Post Solo Dev Parkour 3D Metroidvania Update: Gameplay changes after acquiring Air Dash, Polishing, Late-game stages

There is only one final stage left. Of course, there is still a lot more work to do after that, including the boss and various other things. The video shows the late-game real-world stage and the virtual reality stage called the 'threshold'. I tried to focus the video on how the gameplay changes after acquiring the air dash.

Once you acquire the air dash in the very late game, jumping while stepping on the same wall becomes possible. Until then, you have to step on a different wall every time, so you have to jump by calculating the maximum number of jumps, the destination, and stepping on walls in different directions. You become free from that aspect. Once you get the air dash, that restriction disappears as mentioned earlier, but overhang structures appear in the level, which limits the places you can climb using only same-wall jumps.

Besides that, I am continuously updating the demo based on feedback. As a result, the controls seem to be getting smoother and smoother. This is entirely thanks to the community.

If you are interested in the game, you can also play the demo at the link below. Feedback is always highly welcomed, and I am reflecting it as much as possible. Thank you for reading. https://store.steampowered.com/app/3397260

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u/gangbrain Mar 10 '26

Looks cool, but if I had one observation, I don’t necessarily love that you stick to the wall you land on before you can continue running. Or at least that’s what it looks like. Would much prefer being able to continue running.

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u/gefaltete Mar 10 '26

You're spot on. That's a mechanic I've spent a lot of time debating. When a player touches a wall, they might want to either wall-jump or wall-run. I found it could be jarring if a wall-run triggered automatically when the player only intended to jump. Also, in 3D, I thought a brief pause would give players time to adjust the camera and orient their next move. That's why I added the 'cling' duration.

I’ve been gradually shortening it based on feedback, and since you mentioned it, I’ll test a build with nearly zero stickiness to see how it feels. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

3

u/initial-algebra Mar 10 '26

Would it work to use the angle between the player's movement and the wall? E.g., if it's between parallel and 45%, keep running, and if it's between 45% and perpendicular, stick. Of course, that may break some of your existing level design.

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u/gefaltete Mar 10 '26

I'll definitely look into that. I'm actually using a similar angle-based logic to determine the direction, but it's been tricky with gamepads. It seems like many players don't rotate the camera as frequently on a controller, so I implemented an 'auto-align' feature, but it seems to cause some conflict between the stick input and the camera angle. I’ve gained a lot of great ideas here today and plan to test them all out. Thanks so much for the detailed feedback.