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REMOVED] "Two" by Dipalon

Link Thread Closed

2014-02-06

Go to 1106882 for new version of Two


Permanent link to original submission
Quote
Name: Two
Author: Dipalon
Levels: 14
Description: If you've been his bro like Luigi has, you know Mario does some pretty bad stuff. Today, though, he crossed the line. Help Luigi get revenge on Mario for what he's done!
The title screen has been edited to a lengthy demonstration of Luigi playing through a level with Yoshi. The player is acting as a cautious amateur adventurer. It's rather cute to watch and the video makes the hack feel welcoming to less skilled players.

The introduction uses the same level as Super Mario World, but with a new message involving the new plot: "Luigi is on an adventure to kill Mario after he got with Daisy in Super Mario Land. Help Luigi revenge himself upon Mario for enjoying her!" I feel as though help Luigi revenge himself upon Mario is awkwardly phrased, and it would probably sound better as help Luigi get revenge on Mario.

The first submap is a large grassland with a homogeneous spread of green mountains, trees, and tan rocks. The design is new and ordinary. The main overworld is a slim, straight-edged island.

Guillemet Isle 1 seems to be cleanly designed. The sprites used have the correct graphics set and while the match up with those from Yoshi's Island 1, that's about all it has in common with it. The terrain, sprite distribution, and vines demand a variety of actions from the player. Message boxes tell more of the plot.

Guillemet Isle 2 feels quite different from the first level. It seems more layered with platforms, but the higher path in one area leads into a blind jump. The player has safe ground below, but no way of judging without knowledge of the lower path. This level feels more mindlessly designed than the first: there is little gameplay depth apart from bringing the P-switch to the end to get the regular exit; the upper path in the first half is devoid of threats, and the lower path in the second half has some inoffensive Super Koopas, with only Volcano Lotuses proving to be of any challenge. I would recommend making using the Volcano Lotuses in such a way that they're a threat to both the upper and lower paths in the second half of the level.

In Guillemet Isle 3, near and beyond the midway point, there are rotating platforms that are not attached to the cement block properly. One of them also vanishes if I bring a Goomba to the goal tape, so I'd recommend more space between that and the end. There's also a section where two Amazin' Flyin' Hammer Brothers are on screen with a bunch of rotating platforms, and one of the Bros vanish -- try applying the No More Sprite Tile Limits patch. While this level branches into paths and merges them again, there is little to warrant taking the riskier lower path, and no enemies on any of them, which isn't automatically a bad thing to me, but the paths should feel like there are different risks and rewards or types of adventure.

Guillemet Isle 4 is a water-and-sky sort of deal. There are gaps between the lakes, walled off by logs. Spike balls float outside the logs, and some may look down on that, but I personally don't see it as an issue. However, when I went on a low mushroom platform and accidentally killed the blue-shelled Koopa by running his shell into it, I found myself stuck because I had no way of hitting the block. (Thankfully, I had already beaten the level, so start+select.) There are some fun elements that break up the level, such as the P-switch leading you into the sky to collect Dragon Coins. That said, the upper path suffers from lack of foes, and the bottom path suffers from too many foes nowhere near where the player needs to be.

Iggy's Chateau seems conceptually no different from the original #1 Iggy's Castle in the first room - it uses the same elements in the same way, but at the same time, it feels like it's been rebuilt from nil. The second room, as expected, uses slow auto-scroll, but not as expected, makes no such use of Layer 3 smash. Instead, we have cramped corridors that Big Mario would cry at, although they are passable by ducking and waiting to be pushed by the screen or duck-jumping. Luigi's anger explains why he had to fight Iggy, despite the level's messages implying a more friendly exchange.

The overworld event after beating Guillemet Isle 4 and Iggy's Chateau don't make any sense - stuff happens in between these two levels that doesn't change anything, so I'd recommend reworking the events to, say, reveal paths.

Guillemet Isle 5 felt a like something between Guillemet Isle 2 and Donut Plains 1, in the sense that the design is very much like the former, but makes use of sprites in the latter. I don't see anything buggy about this level.

Guillemet Isle 6 has a blind jump right before the midway point, and the only indication of land to me was when I pressed R and saw a Monty Mole pop out of the ground. Also, one Sumo Brother's lightning is getting stuck in the wall - try a different platform or making the dirt act like tile 25, perhaps? Where the vine is near the beginning, I had too many sprites on-screen one time and the vine failed to spawn. Fortunately for me, I grabbed the cape. This level felt least like any level from Super Mario World, but an awful lot of it was Moley Moley Moles with long, flat platforms.

Guillemet Isle 7 starts off like 2 and 5 with the multiple altitudes of land, breaking into two paths, but then it disintegrates into a lot of jumps across pipes. There is also a blind jump where the second and fourth Dragon Coins are. The way the level's second half goes with an alternating powerup block and plays kindly with the Star is strongly reminiscent of Donut Plains 4. Again, there are sprite tile memory problems where the Amazin' Flyin' Hammer Brothers are.

Guillemet Isle VIII plays a lot like Donut Plains 3's little sister. The only thing I can suggest, really, is to make the Fuzzy that leads to the Dragon Coin able to get a little closer to the ground, and for more of the platforms that can move off screen and be a pain to reset to start stationary rather than moving.

Guillemet Mines 1 feels like a Donut Plains 2 edit. The only thing it really adds are pitfalls.

In Guillemet Mines 2, I could run through the slopes connecting to solid walls and end up inside the walls. This block would be useful. The lava raft also rides through the dirt, likely because of the behavior of the dirt. You could probably fix this by making the tiles the raft passes through act like 25. You can also walk through a wall next to lava and end up in the side of the lava; I'd recommend using solid walls next to lava. Many of the enemies along the upper path are completely benign, as it's very easy to get around them. The P-switch thing also plays an awful lot like Vanilla Dome 3.

Morton's Chateau has a game-breaking bug: When you enter the pipe in the first room, you get crushed inside the pipe coming out into the bonus room and die. Other than that, the level plays like a truncated version of #2 Morton's Castle - no layer 2 scrolling room. After I kill Morton,
Luigi kills Mario and that's the end of it.
Admitably, it was pretty funny. In a twist,
Mario left everything to Luigi in his will.
That makes me feel selfish. #ab{:(}

Top Secret Area
is lightly edited from the original, but ties in with the ending. Mario's Pad is Yoshi's House; no problems with that.

Personally: I'm leaning toward rejection because of the player-killing bug in the bonus room of Morton's Chateau and because of the sprite tile memory problems in a few levels. I'm not too crazy about the level design, since a lot of it feels like Super Mario World, but let's hear what other people think.

Why do you (or don't you) like the level design, and is this the kind of thing you would like to see in the hack section? Share your opinions too, to give Dipalon a sense of what he's doing right or wrong.

Just look above you...
If it's something that can be stopped, then just try to stop it!

The grammar here is a bit bad. I'd correct the last sentence to:
"Help Luigi take revenge on Mario for doing this" or something. "revenge himself upon mario" is a bit awkward to say, and I'm pretty sure it doesn't make sense.


Overworld is a bit bland. Maybe add more structures and make use of '3d' elements by adding taller islands or water patches. Not too big of a deal for me, though.


If you look at the top by my lives counter, I collected a Dragon Coin off screen, and managed to make it appear as half. Maybe make the screen scroll with Mario or move the dragon coin down to avoid this glitch from happening.


I managed to step inside the ground here and kill myself. I haven't hacked in a while so I forgot how to fix this from happening. Maybe you cant fix it, but add a straight ground block before the edge instead.


I'm going to try not to post all the images of blind jumps I took, because there were quite a lot. One way to fix this is to add coins so the player knows where to jump


These Sumo brothers were shooting lightning, but not when they were off screen. When I was on the ground, nothing fell from the sky.


I forget what bug this is, but the P switch was moving horizontally on this piece of dirt. It happens with sprites. I believe the bug has something to do with the dirt block being tile 25 or something.


Why is isle 3 in a secret exit 'before' the castle?


That's uh.. quite hypocritical of him.


Dunno completely what happened, but this hammer brother I JUST killed. Maybe having more than one hammer brother per screen makes them glitch out like this. There were two hammer brothers really close to each other.


I can't get that powerup.


If the player is as stupid as me, they would have killed the koopa down here accidentally the first time, making them unable to get back up


Can't get that powerup either ;~;


1 Block tile spaces aren't really good to have unless you know the player is small. It's hard to jump through.


Nothing wrong in this image. It was just pretty hilarious to me.


Honestly, this part was a little hard for me. You marked this hack as "easy", but there is a lot going on in this screen, so I had to go back and slowly make sure that the Chuck throwing baseballs didn't spawn off screen so I could pass this area.


Blin- wait I said I wouldn't post these


This kinda bugs me, how the level name isn't consistent with the rest of the level names. Why didn't you just use '8' or rename the rest of the levels to fit with Roman Numerals if '8' isn't in SMW?



This pipe kills me.


That was uh.. kinda abrupt.


Yoshi can't fit through here ;~;


So THAT's where 6 was. It was in a completely different 'world'


I'd suggest you put your midpoint things all the way down to the ground instead of having the bottom piece on it. There is a weird animation with the bottom piece.


This lava is pretty weird. You should put a 'wall' block rather than the side blocks, if you know what I mean.


This part is almost impossible unless you scroll the screen right or use Slowdown


Skull blocks float in the ground


Same as before. I can go into the ground


This is just a long ride of nothing. Nothing happens, I just fast forwarded to the end.

All in all, it was okay. I would say that it needs a little bit more fine-tuning before it is ready to be accepted into SMWC. Fix some of the bugs. It did feel like I was playing Super Mario World all over again, since the levels are pretty much vanilla and are 'based' off the old levels. It didn't feel like they were blatant level edits, though. You could tell which levels were based on what.

The number of blind jumps were too much to count. The landscape is also bland at some areas, so maybe some additions to the landscape would make the game feel more interesting.

[Apologies if this post is too nitpicky. I'll try to be less nitpicky in future reviews]
Well, what to say about this hack.
First off, one can tell which level used to be which in the original SMW. It's not really blatant edit, but still.
Also, and I don't really know how to say this in a firendly way, the hack was rather boring. Most of the levels give you a choice between an upper and a lower path, with the upper being a major shortcut. With less enemies and hardly any danger (except maybe falling down). There also isn't much variaty in your levels. You stick with the standart sprites most of the time and just some tileset specific ones.

Screenies :)

OW could have been MUCH better. There is a new tutorial in the Tutorial section. Also, you kinda screwed up the recoloring of Mario there.


There is some slight cutoff with the bush and the smoke from luigi turning around


Some coins to prevent blind jumps would have been nice


You placed that sprite wrong, or better, all of them in this level.


Having two hammer bros + platform on the screen at the same time will most likly result in one of them dissapearing = not good


Look, a swooper... it's a rare sight to see something alive in this level.


There is some fence missing


Overall, if this was your first hack, it's not too bad. After all, there is no real cutoff (at least I didn't see any) nor any eye-huring palette or floating munchers, so GOOD JOB on that part.
If you improve a little on your level design and maybe add some difficulty, I could see a good hack coming from you.
Good luck for future projects
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Originally posted by mockingod

I managed to step inside the ground here and kill myself. I haven't hacked in a while so I forgot how to fix this from happening. Maybe you cant fix it, but add a straight ground block before the edge instead.

This block is the best solution I know of.
<blm> zsnes users are the flatearthers of emulation
Overall this was kinda enjoyable. Although the hack is really plagued with blind jumps. Other than that I honestly found the level design to be a bit lacking regarding sprite placement. Especially in world 1 you could just jump over most enemies, which made them kinda pointless, although this might have been intentional since it's world 1, but I still think it could be a bit harder.

Also I noticed that most of the yoshi coins are just placed a bit higher than the normal level. It'd be nice to see some more variety in the placement of those and some more differences in the level layout from level to level.

I gotta say, though, that I really liked the idea of giving short story parts explanations through the message boxes, although the grammar could have been better. Still a good idea, though.

All in all I don't think this is ready for being accepted yet, as there are still some issues left to fix. The level design might not be the best, but it's not too bad except for the issues that I and others have pointed out, so it might have a chance of approval if those problems are taken care of.

(+1 by Counterfeit)
gonna try to avoid writing an essay/wall of text this time lmao

Love the plot of this hack lol. The little message boxes you littered throughout the hack really enhances this, so good job on that. An issue that exists much throughout this hack is poor level design. Some segments consist of too much flat land, some have are repetitive, others have enemy spam. You should add more variety to the obstacles. Add more ledges, more ways for more Luigi to get through the level. Simple things like that will remove the total linearity, and make it a bit more interesting and 3-Dimensional to play. The levels felt a bit too close to the original ones, to the point where I could tell what level it was an edit of. Not really a problem, but in some places, like Gullemet Mines 1, it becomes more like blatant level edits.

Some issues level by level:
-Gullemet Island 1: So you have to jump on a Banzi Bill to reach the first Dragon Coin. Ok, fair enough. The problem is that there's another Banzai Bills spawned lower on the screen that causes the one needed to preform this to not appear.
-Gullemet Island 2: Caped Koopas near the end were not an obstacle at all; they spawned far too low.
-Gullemet Island 3: Slow-down, sprite memory issues, etc. Most likely caused by the Flying Hammer Bros.
-Iggy's Chateau: Big Mario Luigi discrimination here in the auto-scrolling segment.
-Gullement Island 6: There's a blind jump before the midway point.
-Gullement Mines 2: The power here isn't that obvious to get. When Luigi leaves the pipe and enters that ice sublevel, he comes of out of it several tiles to the right of the actual pipe.

The overworld was quite flat. It could use more varied land formations, and more decorations. The ground used too much of the "checked" land tile graphic, which doesn't look so nice. There's a lot of empty/wasted space here that could be put to use. The revealing events when crossing between the submap and the main overworld were screwed up too. This happens when have tiles reveal on an map that is different from the one you're on. Just make them already revealed instead.

I have to say, despite these problems, I thought the hack was quite fun. It was a nice little romp. Fix it up a little and it'll be a great hack! But for now, I say it should be rejected.

(+1 by Counterfeit)
This is gonna be a long post...

Title screen:

- I personally think that the title screen drags on too long. It's somewhat boring and while it shows features of gameplay it doesn't motivate me to play the

game.

- the first Pokey encountered causes a little bit of slowdown.

Opening:

- interesting message. For some reason it reminds me of Game Theory's episode on why Mario is mental. I don't know why.

First level: Guillement Island 1

- I would change the area were you spawn for the midpoint. I think it's a bit misleading to have the rope there and then have the pit. I think it implies

you can go down the pit. That might just be me though.

- Seriously, those messages remind me of that Game Theory episode xD. That isn't a criticism or anything, just something I noticed.

- Pretty good level. The hills and constant platforming action is pretty great, and it's a pretty lovely vanilla level. No problems here.

Guillement Island 2

- the first image should end with a period, if that's possible (minor nitpick).

- (another nitpick) I feel the opening Yellow flying koopas were in awkward spots. Darn low flying koopas!

- The Sumo Bros on the mid-way point are too high up to be a threat. Consider moving the midway point and lowering the brothers or moving the Sumos to a

different location.

- Pretty good level. The P-Switch you have to bring with you does not cause any problems since the level is relatively short. I like how you've put more

enemies into the level and overall have made it a more dangerous level than the first one.

Guillement Island 3

- Near the mid-way point, sometimes the second Hammer Brother won't spawn. Consider moving him a little bit.

- Nice atheltic level. I notice that your levels don't tend to contain huge formations of land, instead going for smaller platforms with bottomless cliffs around it. It's refreshing from other hacks I've played. Anyway, good level, but I think you need to place more coins to liven it up a little. I also felt

there were less enemies in this level than the previous one.

Guillement Island 4

- Beating this level causes weird overworld shenanigans o.o

- I felt this level was very short in comparison to other levels. I think being able to get shells and P-Switches allow you to skip all the swimming.

- In one section where you have to get a dragon coin, then use a Koopa shell to create a vine, you can very easily kill the Koopa and be screwed.

- Decent level, not as good as the others though. I think it's length needs to be increased significantly.

Iggy's Chateau

- Chateau needs a capital in the first message block.

- The level itself felt very short. The small auto-scroll section before the boss was too short to justify the mid-way point IMO. I'd put in more platforms and enemies.

Guillement Island 5

- Short but sweet level. Them baseball chucks are in good positions. Not frustrating to battle, but satisfying to avoid. The yellow koopas are also in great positions. Again, I think there needs to be more coins shown around the place.

Guillement Mines 1

- The second yellow moving platform is very weird. At first I thought it was safe to go under, but it crushed me as small Luigi. I'd consider making it more evident that the platform is going to make you mince meat.

- This level is overall very weird. I think the auto-scroller you've used is causing problems, as the yellow platforms seem all over the place. There are times were Luigi can be in pits and survive, because the yellow platforms are under him. I think this is the only level so far that needs serious work.

Guillement Island 6

- There is a blind jump near the midway point. I would use some coins here to indicate there is solid land below.

- There is a blind jump near the end of the level, before the platform with the mole and the red-shell on it. Again, use coins and problem solved.

- Another nice platforming level. At this point of the hack though, I think you should use more of SMW's interesting platforms or gimmick things to keep the

level design lively and fresh.

Guillement Island 7

- No glitches, breaks or any bad thing to comment on. I like your use of Para-Goombas in this level, it makes the level feel fresh. I do think, however, there needs to be more perilous jumps in the level to take full advantage of the Goombas.

Guillement Island VIII

- Lovely use of the line guides here. I do feel the level could be a bit more action-y and longer, with a few more sprites and more intricate design, but it's still a good level.

Guillement Mines 2

- I'm not sure if you tested the part with the Phrina Plants and the Skull Platform, but Luigi does not have enough room to manover down there and avoid getting hit. Space the Phrinanas further apart and this should solve the problem.

- While I like that you are using skull platforms in your level, I felt the level was too flat. The shortcuts you can use to skip the skull-ride is almost necessary, at-least if you want to avoid getting hit by the Phranas. That, and I think you need to cut out the skull ride at the end, since there are no

enemies to behold there.

Morton's Chateau

- I'm afraid this level is way too short compared to the rest of the levels in the hack. While it shows some promise there needs to be more content.

- There's a pipe in here that kills you. I assume this leads to more of the level?

Comments on the Overworld:

- The overworld is very flat. I think you need to include more decoration, like trees and rocks and platforms. Raise the elevation of some of the areas. Don't make the overworld square.

This is a pretty good hack. It showed a lot of promise in the opening levels. However, I feel that the later levels need a lot of work. There needs to be more content. Also, you need to rework the sizes of the worlds - World 2 is significantly longer than World 1.

For now, I would reject "GAME THEORY: WHY MARIO IS MENTAL: THE HACK" (OH COME ON THAT IS SERIOUSLY WHAT THIS HACK IS). I hope Dipalon can improve on his work.

- BlackMageMario

P.S. +1
- Counterfeit
I like the title screen, it's effective in its simplicity. The story idea is intriguing and it involves the player since it's quite different. The overworld submap Luigi starts on is really flat and boring, so you should change it to add some variety. Personal note, I really wish you would've added dark paths instead of lights ones and changed the Yoshi House message, but that's just my advice to you. I like the personal notes to Luigi that remind him of Mario's misdoings, they're kind of funny. Also, dude, you don't need to spam the level with pink arrows, I know which way to go after the first one. And a quick complaint, no need to make every power up block on the end of a vine. Hate to say it, but when Luigi dies, his player palette is a bit fucked up. Make sure to fix this.

So, less specific and more general advice, your level design needs work. Yes, the levels work and I don't really have any major complaints about that, but the levels seem really... empty sometimes. Like there's nothing going on and I can just waltz past whatever is ahead. And I know this is the first world, but some of the obstacles you made were just a little too easy, if you know what I mean. I think you should go back and fix this hack before you submit it again.
One month buuuummmmmmmp~

Permanent link to new submission

Most of the level design is the same as the previous submission, but a lot of the complaints in this thread have been addressed. I'm not seeing so many blind jumps or buggy enemies anymore. Sprite tile memory problems have been reduced and don't cause problems for the player anymore. The levels have no issues, although I'm still not into the design: it seems based off the original levels, and they often play out similarly either to one another or to the level they're based on.

Guillemet Isle 8 has the wrong character in its title (it's not an 8. Did you forget to insert some graphics?)

Morton's Chateau fixes that player-killing bug, which was my major complaint.

I still love the ending. It makes me laugh.

My opinion on whether to accept the hack has been swayed in the hack's favor despite me not really having fun with it, because the major issues are fixed.

+1'd users below this post:
Everest (accept)
JackTheSpades (reject)
Koopster (reject)
Wurthering (reject)
1:3

Verdict for round 2: Denial =(

Just look above you...
If it's something that can be stopped, then just try to stop it!
Change or no change?

Well first of all I did notice some change from the last version but it is better if I started a new review which will allow me to revisit all of the areas. To be honest, despite some improvements I have noticed in certain areas, I am not the biggest fan of the hack and this mainly comes down to how the levels are designed. While there is nothing really wrong about the levels, I felt like they could be a little better designed in certain areas. Unique concepts could have been introduced despite it being a vanilla hack (it felt repetitive in some areas). I could also tell that they were based off the original SMW levels though they were for the most part completely changed so I don't have much of the problem with that though it would have been preferable to remove the scent of suspicion around the levels.

There aren't really many aspects to talk about overall. One thing I did like was the story and the ending seemed slightly hilarious to me. Good job on that. On the other hand, I can see an overworld that can be improved. The overworld is squarish and it does not really look very inspiring (it could also use some decoration. Play some other good hacks to get the idea of what a good overworld is Dipalon. The final thing I noticed is that there are some glitches from time to time, most notably sprite memory problems. An example of that would be in the level Guillemet Isle 2 with the Volcano Lotuses. That is pretty much all I have to say.

I am ambivalent about this hack. While for the most part there is nothing wrong with it, I am not sure about accepting it into the hack section. I would say it is acceptable in its current form but other opinions would be nice in determining the future of this hack.

(+1 -Cou)
You sure it wouldn't have been better to just make a new thread?

Anyway, onwards to review making :P (proper english alart)
First of, I gotta say that I don't see all to many fixes from the previous version. Kinda makes me wonder if you even read my review.
The problem with the messed up sideway walk for example sill exists:


As for the per-level review, I'm just gonna write the numbers for the level name doesn't really change anyway.

  1. This level was OK I guess. No real issue as to what I could see. The level wasn't flat and you had some good enemie placment here and there.
  2. And here stops my prising... I guess you did fix some of the old issues but surly not all of them. There are still planty of blind jumps around the level. The giant down arrow was a good hint for that one jump (a few coins would have been enough) but you need to do that at other jumps too ^^ (again, just some coins indicating where to jump)
    You gotta remeber that the people who play the hack, unlike you, don't know where it's save to get down from.
    You also seem to have a thing for the lotus flowers. You always place them in groups ^^ Not sure if that's an actual problem but it kinda irritates me.
    In addition, you should be more carefull with the placemtn of your sumo bros. Some of them create cutoff fire which doesn't look to good.
  3. Ok, you fixed those properly. No more hammer bro spaming and proper chain platform placment. There are still some blind jumnps lurking around though
  4. I also see that you fixed the one problem mockingod pointed out, but I see another one ^^' The spike-balls floating in the water don't have object interaction. That means they will just float right through your barrier on the sides:
  5. Not much to say about this level. I kinda just rushed through wither there being anything to really bother with
  6. Same for this one. I got the star in the box at the beginning and before I even knew it, I was at the end
  7. This one was also somewhat flat. Like, I know you had and alternative upper route and there are some ups and downs along with some pits, but I can still basicly just dash through the level. Also, the para-generator doesn't have much effect if you get throgh the level faster then the enemies fall
  8. At least I asume it's 8, given that the level name wasn't really clear about that.
    Yeah, you should make things a little more challanging. Just placing your flying koppas along the traks a little higher would help. As of now, you may have some enemie but only one or two of them actually pose a thread


Castle 1:
You still have the broken fence I mentioned last time -.-
Mines 1:
You added some enemies :3 YAY. Still, why does the auto scroll feel so insane slow? Was it like that in the original too? Also, the layer 2 hardly ever goes low enough to pose any real thread. I still spend most of my time in this level standing still and holding fast forward.
Mines 2
I couldn't acually beat this level due to dissapearing skull rafts. Maybe there was another way around it, but at this point I already gave up on the level.
Note that you can't have more than one skull raft onscreen at one time. If you plan to use more than one in a level, make sure there is enough distance between them, for the first to be gone completly before the second is even close to being on-screen.
Castle 2:
Bonus area (that's insanly hard to find *sarcasm*) takes me streight to the boss huh. Also, this is the first level that felt relly blatand edited.



In genral your levels are a little boring, as much as it pains me to just say this out like that.
Also, while I know you properly redid the levels I can't really shake this blatand feeling because you use the same order and level-layout as SMW. I think you should look up some ways to change that.
As of now, I'll still go with rejecting this, sorry.
I know I kinda go agains the previous two but that's just my oppinion. If you went for fixing those, then I'd probably too be for accepting this ^^. So keep on fighting and don't let me (or others) demotivate you.

(+1 -Cou)
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Yay, I'm back on this reviewing thing. :3


First things first, the title screen video is way too large. Bear in mind that some people actually do watch them, and it gets incredibly boring if you're just going around the level that slowly and trying to get everything. Be quick.
The level itself looks somewhat flat and empty, but I'm still hoping for the playable levels themselves to be more interesting.

First overworld doesn't give me too much of a good impression either. It consists of flat land with a few decoration. Variate heights!

The first level, well, I can't say it was completely uninteresting, it was the first level after all, but still, it could be better. The layout of the level is kind of repetitive (slopes, straight land, holes...), and it really lacks enemies, not to mention the enemy variation is minimal (banzai bills, rexes and very few koopas). There were no secret things either as far as I could find, making it way more straight-forward than it probably should be.

There's a some improvement in the second level's design. The secret exit was actually well thought, and the enemies varied a lot more. Still, I can feel a lot of emptiness sprite-wise in this level.

The third level (as in, not the castle, but the secret exit for the second level) feels much emptier than any other level I've played so far. There are nearly no enemies, so the challenge is mostly only not falling in a pit as you jump on platforms, which isn't that interesting. Overall, this one felt really uninspired...

I don't really have anything new to tell about the fourth level. It's the same as the previous levels, except with water, a different tileset and a different set of enemies. It consists on jumping on platforms, dodging enemies, choosing whether to take the upper or bottom path, falling in a suspicious pit to get some item and take a vine to go back, etc. It got boring to see the same things over and over in the first four levels.

The castle felt a lot like the original castle, it just seemed like the design was revamped, but the ideas stayed almost the same. I would't say that the design is very bad, but it just doesn't feel original to use nets in the first room and auto-scrooling in the second one, exactly like SMW did it...

I played the next world as well and I have to say that it didn't feel too different. I finally realised that I could recognise each level of yours from the original game; the gimmicks were almost the same, although they were executed in a slightly different design. Sometimes I could even classify your levels as blatant edits, sometimes as a revamp of an original level. The design of them by itself was also pretty generic from level to level, some actually felt like the same thing except for the graphics and the enemies used...

My suggestion? Honestly, start over. I know you can manage to have your own ideas for levels and create a hack that doesn't look too much like the original game. Try to make every level unique and avoid using the same layout ideas in more than one of them.

So yeah, I don't think this is good enough to be accepted. I'm looking forward to your next stuff, though!

(+1 -Cou)
It's easily the best thing I've done
So why the empty numb?
While the major bugs pertaining this hack were fixed, I do not believe this is enough to warrant this hack acceptance. The level design is still not very interesting for various of reasons, those being that there are really no obstacles at all. Most levels consisted of only the same select sprites placed over the flat ground, rather than incorporated into the design of the levels. Try to think of the creative ways you can you use each sprite and combine them in ways that make playing the levels intriguing and enjoyable. Gullemet Island 1, for example, was just the Rexes and Banzai Bills spammed over a unintuitive level layout. You didn't make either enemy to complement each other and create obstacles, nor did you use the level architecture to make the enemies a challenge to the player. To state the problem blatantly: the level design doesn't make the player want to actually play through the level, it only makes the player want to finish playing the level. There is a distinction between the two.

Now I said all the major bugs were fixed, however there is a new one that appears in this version. My run of Gullemet Mines 2 was forcefully ended as I reach a pit of lava that I could not jump over. I'm not sure what happened or what was supposed to happen, but I'm guessing a skull platform did not spawn.

One strong point this hack has is the story telling. I really love it, and I wish there was more of it, but it's not enough to save this hack from the above issues.

Verdict: Rejected

(+1 -Cou)
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