Introduction
Howdy! Everyone likes talking about how to make your maps unique, but no one ever dares to mention Ye ol’ Difficulty Curves. I decided I was going to change that, especially since I’ve been a level designer even before Gimkit creative, so I think I know what I’m talking about. enough of me yap, lets actually get started so I don’t waste more of yer time.[1]
Difficulty at the very beginning of your level:
Alrighty! so picture this, your player just starts your level, what should be the first thing they see?
a yummy penguin the main mechanic for your level, in a safe environment so they can learn the mechanic, maybe to get a collectable or open a door.
Difficulty during the main part of your level:
you know as in the actual platforming.
First of, start off with some easy jumps with your mechanic. then slowly increase in difficulty. it is important to note that if your level contains checkpoints, make sure the level’s difficulty is slightly decreased after the check point before slowly increasing again. to give the player a break from the difficulty for a bit.
The End of the level:
At the end of the level it should have a tricky platforming challenge using what the player has learned about the mechanic throughout the level. for example, if your mechanic is lasers, maybe the player has to time their jumps between lasers that turn on and off to finish the level. after they finish the level this is were the level ends (unless you want to do a wario land 4 or pizza Tower and have an escape sequence.)
Difficulty Graph
here is a graph of how the difficulty should look if you implement these practices into your game
(Thanks to '83 for making this graph, I am bad at making graphs)
the areas where the line stops going up for a bit represent checkpoints in the level. notice the gradual increase in difficulty over time? when playing the game the difficulty should have a subtle increase to the point where its still more difficult than the part before it, but still subtle enough to where it isnt obviously difficult to the players.
Conclusion:
In conclusion this is how difficulty should be generally done in maps (unless your whole map is based on being extremely difficult like YHMFT[2])
Thanks for reading, if you liked it just 
the guide, don’t be flaky and say good guide. if you are going to say something about the guide please give constructive feedback and criticism I genuinely improve my guides because of the feedback I get and it genuinely helps.
this land ain’t big enough for the 2 of us I mean have a nice day!
