game design - Why do most 2D platformers start off in the left and progress in the right direction?

In almost all 2D platformers I've played, your avatar always starts off on the left side of the world, and continues on to the right. Is there something designers gain by doing this?

Answer

I'm not sure if there's any technical reason, but a large portion of the world reads from left to right (and many early games were made in the portions that do, i.e. Pitfall!). So starting left and going right may seem more natural. Once enough of the early games did this, it became standard practice.

Additionally, it could be from the roots of design. If these games were first designed with paper and pencils, it would feel more natural to go from left to right, as that's the way the designers were used to writing.

So I suppose by continuing to do this, developers do gain something. Player familiarity.

The likely history behind this would go as follows:

1. Reading/Writing develop a left to right (LR) convention, thanks to the Greeks.


2. The development of hardware is heavily influenced by #1. Display technology included.


3. Software follows hardware. The design of games, influenced by the LR read/write convention and the hardware lead to a LR convention for side scrollers.

In summation, we can give thanks to the Greeks for their contribution to modern gaming.