Hello, everyone!
Vasilisa the Beautiful is the first knytt story we have ever made, and we are eager to get feedback from you. So, here it is, you can download it here:
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=A7MM2GGW (17.05 MB) [Updated link, May 2010: fixed some void screens (thank you, GrayFace), some graphics (thank you, yohji) and made it less sadistic at times
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"We" refers to myself and my girlfriend when we created Vasilisa, Susanna, our combined names of whom somehow make up the "Tsuzo" who is the creator of this level. She gets credit for concept and artwork, I get credit for the bad, cheesy jokes and the sadistic challenges...
A few words about the story... Vasilisa the Beautiful is a traditional Russian fairy-tale. Like most fairy-tales, it hides some deeper truths of life in its seemingly simplistic story. Vasilisa is a story of initiation, of maturation, and especially, of the attainment of womanhood.
With that in mind, we based this story loosely on Vasilisa's quest, as a framework on which to build. Of course it deviates vastly from the fairy-tale, to an extent because the level editor - although a masterly tool - would need 100 times more shifts and flags to help Juni find peas in wheat, as per the original story...
We should warn the hardcore knytters out there that we have used solely the
custom default tilesets and music. I know that some people say they don't like to see those anymore, and that's a fair viewpoint. But what we essentially have created is a
story, not a random walk in the woods where one finds power-ups and jumps over monsters without a purpose. It's the story that matters most, we think.
Also, since this is our first story, it is clear to us that the first parts we made are lacking very much in relation to the latter, as we learnt how to use the level editor in a more refined way. In any case, you can be the judge
Any feedback - on layout, problems, on the story itself etc. - is more than welcome!
We enjoyed very much creating Vasilisa, we hope you will enjoy playing it as much!
[Note: I edited out the 'custom tilesets' mistake in the original post, and I also uploaded the level once more, because I couldn't resist playing it again, only to find a void screen *sigh!* I also did two minor changes.. Sorry to those who have already downloaded it.]