Hidden Features
Level designers sometimes create hidden rooms and areas that usually require more tries to reach or to notice. These usually give some additional rewards, such as ammo or powerups. Casual players usually do not discover these, but these areas are interesting enough to be discovered and documented by dedicated gamers. Sometimes, they serve as easter eggs, containing messages such as the level designers' names or pictures, or political or humorous messages. One of the first games with a 3D engine to feature hidden features was Wolfenstein 3D, where certain walls could be "pushed" to reveal hidden passages. For example, Quake has many secret areas that reward the player with ammo, weapons, quad damage powerups, and in one hard-to-reach secret area, Dopefish makes an appearance. In fact, the hardest difficulty level, titled "Nightmare", is only reachable through a secret portal in the fourth dimension's entrance hall.
Sometimes, a whole level may be designed as a secret level.
Read more about this topic: Level Design
Famous quotes containing the words hidden and/or features:
“Look
There he is now, look:
There is no interrogation in his eyes
Or in the hands, quiet over the horse’s neck,
And the eyes watchful, waiting, perceiving indifferent.
O hidden under the dover’s wing, hidden in the turtle’s breast....”
—T.S. (Thomas Stearns)
“All visible objects, man, are but as pasteboard masks. But in each event—in the living act, the undoubted deed—there, some unknown but still reasoning thing puts forth the mouldings of its features from behind the unreasoning mask. If man will strike, strike through the mask!”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)