>>536178707
I don't agree, but i'm just spitballing. I always do my development in reverse; the story, themes, and ideas form the bedrock that informs the level design, for example if I base an entire civilization and give it the theme of the sin of greed then my dungeon is going to have puzzles and enemies that play with that idea. like the longer you are in it, the more you are taxed in ability points or mp or some other metric the player chooses. theres so many gameplay ideas out there and so much scope creep available that it's highly important to have at least a base level of understanding in the world design how it can translate to gameplay.
Now I cant, again, say for sure whether team cherry did this or not, but as almost all of the shit they have is about the art they drew and bolted together into a platformer, I think it's pretty basic inference to assume that that art, and speculation on the world came first. then the souls like gameplay, then even more world building once a playable prototype existed with the basics.