Totten C. World Design for 2D Action-Adventures. Level Design Practices 2025

Textbook in PDF format

Award-winning action-adventure designers Christopher Totten and Adrian Sandoval guide you on a quest to create levels for different styles of 2D action-adventure games, from top-down dungeon-crawler adventures to side-scrolling non-linear “Metroidvania” titles. Blending theory and practical analysis, this book shows how principles of game and level design are applied in some of your favorite 2D action-adventure games. It uses examples from popular games such as The Legend of Zelda and Hollow Knight, while also providing insights from the authors’ own experiences creating independent games in the genre.
This book also intersperses these examples with practical exercises in 2D action-adventure world design using the free and easy-to-use GB Studio engine, allowing readers to practice their skills and see how lessons from the theory chapters apply in real game development environments. These practical chapters cover the basics of using GB Studio and related software, such as Aseprite and Tiled, to help readers create their own action-adventure characters, monsters, quest systems, switches, keys, and other mechanics - all the way up to designing their own dungeon!
World Design for 2D Action-Adventures will be of great interest to all those looking to improve their level design skills within this genre