Here's what the map looked like as of the last installment:
Looking good. The underwater maze may need more work, but we can come back to that later on the detail pass. Like I said, anything with a modular design is dead simple to upgrade later. Now let's refocus our attention on the vertical shaft to the left of the starting room:
This will have some good old fashioned Metroid style vertical platforming in it. The player can, alternatively, use his jetpack to skip the platforming at the cost of some fuel, but only after the jetpack has been obtained. This makes it more of a pain to explore this direction before then.
Platforms! So many of them. I can't begin to tell you how tedious it is to create this many sprite based platforms, vertically stacked. You can't just make a child sector around one, then copy and paste it because they repeat vertically. Still, the hard part is done now. Time for detail.
There. The walls have some detail and are properly textured. The ceiling slopes towards the center. But it still looks poopy. A bit more work is needed before we can begin shading.
There, now the platforms have supports and the sloped floor(!) and ceiling are both properly textured. This will be a difficult room to light in an interesting way, since it's lit from both above and below, leaving little room for shadows. Perhaps another light cycler effect in here to keep things interesting, in the absence of artful shadows?
Here's what the ceiling looks like now btw. A little bit of spritework to spice things up. Remember what I said about not neglecting ceiling details. People do look up there occasionally, it should not be left barren.
However, I think I need some time to contemplate lighting solutions. This is gonna be a tough one. I obviously can't just leave it unlit, but there seems to be no room for complex shadows either. I will research fancy strobing/spinning light options and come back to this problem fresh for next time.
Stay Cozy!