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Regarding the state of the project

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Oh boy, here we go again, huh? Flogging the dead horse that is Super Mario World Central Production 2. It used to be such a great project with an interesting story, the graphics and ASM were cool for the time, but as the project neared its completion...people who were in charge of the hack just left abruptly. And then everyone else who was on this project (especially those with ASM) left as well.

Torchkas and Magi working on the project and improving the graphics was such a nice thing to kickstart improving the project which was left in the dust and quickly got dated. But, as of late, we've gotten...radio silence. SNN, Kieran, and everyone else in charge of this project are either periodically active, resigned from staff, or left the site all together. Nobody even bothered to think about this project, mostly because we either thought it was a lost cause or because we were confident someone else was going to do it for us.

So based on this silence, and how tired I am of seeing SMWCP2 and its legacy go to waste with nobody giving any shits about it, we'll probably have to kickstart the discussion and improvements to this game ourselves. We shouldn't be relying on our staff for ASM improvements anymore, nor should we be putting all our eggs in one basket like we did with Kipernal, RednGreen, SNN, etc. This is meant to be a project involving the entire website, not a personal staff member collaboration. I understand that this was because back then, staff members were ASM wizards, and anyone else were lucky to have known it. But nowadays, we know a lot of ASM wizards, and several of them are regular users.

We also have a lot of excellent graphics artists, such as Magi, StrikeForcer, even myself. We've got ourselves to rely on for a bunch of stuff. The rarest thing to find nowadays is anyone in the music department, but that's a whole 'nother beast. The point is, we the users of SMWCentral have been putting this project in the dust for too long, hoping that a staff member will just do it for us. If it means finally pushing this project to its actual release and get it out of development hell while also reimagining the project and bringing it up to our usual SMW hacking standards, I'll sit down and work my butt off with a bunch of other people who are willing to do this.

...not like anyone else is willing to anyway lol

Normally, I would say "fuck it, close the project, it's cancelled", but at this point, I just really want to see this game being released in full, and to live up to our SMWCentral quality standards. Because our original project, SMWCP1, may have been released, but it is HORRIBLY unpolished and to me seems like a blemish on our community. I really don't want to see this project just end up a ghost of its former self and left unfinished forever. And I don't think you guys don't want it to be left like this, either. Do you?

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BlindEdit:
thread hijack mode on

Gonna put here all relevant links posted so far, which were scattered across many posts.

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Repos and Resources:

Old ROM: BPS | All resources | Lui's repo
New ROM: BPS | All resources | Blind's repo (fork)

Old ROM Playtesting docs:
Teyla | FPzero | Aeon | lion | Blind Devil

Level Overhaul Spreadsheet

You may also PM Blind Devil/Falconpunch or DM through Discord to get an invite to the SMWCP2 Discord server if you wish.
He's dead, Jim.

There isn't enough interest from artists, composers, level designers or programmers to finish the rough edges up and a lot of key people involved with it are either gone from the site or have moved on. SMWCP2's spirit lives on in other collabs though. Except musically. I don't think we have any composers left.
I check in on the bitbucket every now and then in some of my free time and try to help resolve some of the non-ASM related issues, but I admit I'm running out of areas to help in. It would be absolutely fantastic for the game to at least reach a basic state with all the cutscenes, bosses, levels and credits in a fully beatable state, but whatever is left to fix now to fully complete the game still requires a fair amount of effort that not many people are willing (or able to) put in at this point.

At the very least, I don't want to give up hope on it.
Originally posted by Gregor
He's dead, Jim.

There isn't enough interest from artists, composers, level designers or programmers to finish the rough edges up and a lot of key people involved with it are either gone from the site or have moved on. SMWCP2's spirit lives on in other collabs though. Except musically. I don't think we have any composers left.


I agree with all of this sans the music part. Theres still plenty of musicians around here - Maxodex, Giftshaven, Ultima, beben-legg, Blind Devil, Dippy, Sinc-x, and the like still up and kicking on creating music compositions for our SMW hacks to use and for their personal benefits. Its just that like the others, they too have their own interests other than helping out with a dead community collab that people generally have no interest in helping to revive outside of the dedicated few who more than likely are working behind-the-scenes in which it doesn't really matter the outcome, as its not like theres much to regain interest in unless you make it really outstanding for a SMW hack that meets current standards for us to see its worth in its possible revival.

Basically you're better off starting a new community collab or work on your personal projects. Its an uphill battle to get and expect people to care about it again bc of how much it has changed hands in leadership and how much its been rotting in development hell to the point of abandonment from the community.
Modern Redrawn Mario Bros. 1.5 (last update - February 14, 2023, some new bonus frames, tons of minor touchups to various poses)

On Pixel Art Requests: Depends on what it is and if I have the time for it. If its complex and I don't have the time, don't expect me to accept it.

Projects I support:


I still remember how I was excited when I joined the site and see the finished SMWCP1 and brand new SMWCP2 project at that time. Both of them has wonderful and high-quality stuff at THAT time, but now the fever has gone.

Nowadays, I think one of the major reason ruined the SMWCP2 progress is when all of the participators of the project suddenly (?) have higher quality demands. You know our overall quality standard has raised a lot and various remoderation in sections was finished. Lots of stuff became low-quality in several years and people trying to improve/add stuff for higher quality demand, then things become even more complex fast: more graphics/music/level/etc. need to be revamped, more bugs popped out, and we set more sub-projects of SMWCP2 for solving problems in the upper layer. That's a loophole.

So, I think even all the stuff I said above is some kind of hindsight bias, the situation of the project is still recoverable: Just simplify all of the plans (eg. stop these content revamping projects and just fix existing bugs). Even SMWCP2's quality standard is horribly outdated, releasing it is respecting all people who contributed to the project.
I, for one, am also worried about this collab. And I partially agree with tcdw regarding (not) revamping content (to the full extent of putting up to today's standards), though I honestly think that lots of stuff really, really demand a revamp not because the quality is outdated, but because of overall low quality. I refer to stuff like long and inconsistent levels, clashing graphics, unoptimized ASM resources, bad space management, and the list goes on. SMWCP2 demands not only simple bugfixing, but it also depends on resource revamping to some extent in order to be truly manageable, consistent and polished.

Well, in fact, this is happening. also oh yeah long text warning

Since February, when I got fired from my internship and still didn't have Internet access from my house, I began a saga to port the latest SMWCP2 base ROM and redo it from scratch, only importing and reusing the necessary stuff, as well as revamping tons of content, be it in ASM or level design department. More up-to-date tools were also used for this task (PIXI over old ST, uberASM Tool over uberASM patch, and other replacements), and the project got much more stable for development. Of course, it's far from being complete. Measuring by worlds, the new ROM has its contents implemented up to world 4A. And before returning to my usual activity, all that I was doing was top secret - neither the staff nor admins knew about it. It was meant to be a full surprise thing. But yeah... SMWCP2 is a collab, so I simply couldn't do it alone at all. I had to reveal my plans to the staff so we could reach some form of consensus. Then I was entrusted leadership of this project, and so I made my own SMWCP2 fork and a small Discord guild for other helpers to join in. The guild is still pretty fresh but a bunch of things were organized despite the slow progress and rare discussion.

Then this thread came out, and FPzero brought it to my attention. After some quick chat, a good amount of staff members concluded that it'd indeed be better for this project to be more open and transparent for all the userbase, and no longer a surprise thing. And for that reason, I am here. Believe it or not, back in 2018 I was the one who wanted SMWC to move on from this, and cancel SMWCP2 entirely. But the majority of staff members disagreed, and then, I decided to finish it for justice's sake. All in all, I want SMWCP2 to be no longer an issue. Cancelling it or finishing it leads to the same conclusion. The choice was to finish it.

So, enough with the blabbering. SMWCP2 is still alive, and it shall be open for anyone to contribute again. There aren't any specific tasks listed due to how I'm managing stuff so all is down to testing the old ROM and comparing some stuff with the new one, taking notes and discussing about what can be done regarding things that still weren't implemented, and also checking issues from the old repo so these can be worked on for the new ROM.

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Here are the resources:

Old ROM: BPS | All resources | Lui's repo
New ROM: BPS | All resources | Blind's repo (fork)

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I think this is the kind of thing that demands a new thread but welp... let us develop our discussion within this thread for the time being.
MK2TDS
Oh my, that's weird and my bad.

Fixed link. I zipped it as apparently bitbucket hated my updates.
MK2TDS
Every time I see someone step up and attempt to fix everything that's wrong with SMWCP2, I feel great emotions of respect, but later, pity. If this hack is ever released, I hope it goes into history books under the heading "Greatest achievements of willpower by humans".
All right, Blind Devil, I decided to sit down and help draw some brand new graphical for this project. Firstly, I thought it would be nice to draw a new background for World 7's Fire/Ice themes. I mean, while Magi's revamp of this background for level 105 (Ice-Floe Inferno) is fine:


I still don't get the feeling that fire and ice are mixed together all that much, and it instead looks like just an ice level with mountains in the background. So I decided to start drawing a background from scratch and thought about how I could make a fire/ice themed background while not making it as ugly as the last one (not the one above, before it turned into that) was.


It's still a work-in-progress, but here's what I got so far. I'm going to add some ice floes getting bigger the closer it is to the foreground, to put more emphasis on the "Ice-floe Inferno" name, and a bit of simple Layer 3 as well: Some far-off snowy mountains, and clouds up in the sky. Simple as that.

Any thoughts or comments so far?
Just so you know, I'm very active on the site anymore like I was before; I'm mainly on Discord now.
As said in Discord in a previous moment, it looks good, and also fits with the FG environment of said level. There's nothing planned with layer 3 for it so it's alright to use it to spice up the BG.

By the way, people, if you want to help with this, you can join the little Discord server I set up. PM me or DM through Discord and I'll send over an invite. Or keep bringing up the discussion here.
MK2TDS
I heard about this hack for a while, though I haven't been able to see it for myself. Though after managing to find the Base ROM for this hack in SMW.servegame site and playing through the first world, I was very impressed! I really dig the cartoony- yet realistic- style of this hack; the graphics really pop out in relation to the other hacks SMW Central offers. And though the level design is a bit dated, its ideas and level designs are certainly not bad. In fact, I really like the large levels the game offers; it's a fun experience trying to find the many secrets and SMWC Coins scattered across the stages. Though I do have to admit that some of the stages try too much to be unique- causing ideas to be half-baked at times.

But besides these blemishes, the hack appears to be doing really good in terms of its content. And with development of this hack appearing to be starting up again, I'm certainly excited to see this masterpiece finally come into fruition after so long. And though I'm not as experienced in SMW Hacking as the rest of the contributors, I still want to contribute in some way to this hack. So- if it's possible- do you think I could work on polishing up the existent stages? And if I'm able to do so, what version of Lunar Magic should I use in relation to developing this hack?

Extras



I should have something witty to put here (even if it's just to update dated info), shouldn't I?

Advertising Space

Yo, just a friendly reminder that I am still available for adjustments and updates with any of the levels in the collab- whether they be my levels or someone else's. To a reasonable extent, of course.

Originally posted by Flippn'Fences
do you think I could work on polishing up the existent stages? And if I'm able to do so, what version of Lunar Magic should I use in relation to developing this hack?


Anyone is able to! I've been using Lunar Magic v3.00 for the new base ROM but I can eventually port it to use a most up-to-date version. Didn't do it yet because of a certain patch incompatibility. Again, there are no lists for levels, but since more people looks interested in re-polishing levels, I can make one soon.

Originally posted by MrDeePay
Yo, just a friendly reminder that I am still available for adjustments and updates with any of the levels in the collab- whether they be my levels or someone else's. To a reasonable extent, of course.


The more, the merrier! One more reason for me to get kicking on with the level overhaul list.

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I'm currently editting Beach Ball Brawl because it had some small inconsistencies, such as the out-of-place tidal wave section, and looking like a cave level even though it's an external OW level tile. The second SMWC coin was pretty demanding to get, too, so this is also getting reworked. In other words, various edits are being done, but still keeping the feel of the original.



Let me also add these links of old ROM playtesting done in December 2018 by several folks. The comments about most levels may be helpful when coming to specific design revamps. You can find some comments about miscellaneous non-level stuff, too.

Teyla | FPzero | Aeon | lion | Blind Devil

MK2TDS

Extras



I should have something witty to put here (even if it's just to update dated info), shouldn't I?

Advertising Space

Question: How much of the previous base/old version of the hack is in your current one, content/code-wise?


It really makes me sad to see big projects like this almost dead. I really hope this ends up actually going somewhere. I'd help, but I'm only mediocre at designing levels unless I'm super into it.
"Glauben Sie nicht alles, was Sie im Internet lesen." - Karl Marx
Originally posted by MrDeePay
Question: How much of the previous base/old version of the hack is in your current one, content/code-wise?


According to the BaseROM that Blind Devil has given us, seems like he's up to World 4A, having updated up to Tropical Turnout and Beach Ball Brawl.
Just so you know, I'm very active on the site anymore like I was before; I'm mainly on Discord now.
Originally posted by Falconpunch
Originally posted by MrDeePay
Question: How much of the previous base/old version of the hack is in your current one, content/code-wise?


According to the BaseROM that Blind Devil has given us, seems like he's up to World 4A, having updated up to Tropical Turnout and Beach Ball Brawl.


Exactly. Not only levels, but all level ASM content, GFX and similars were ported over up to World 4A.

And I did the damn list. Contains revamp status and brief comments about every level.

And with that big amount of links and resources provided, I'll go ahead next and edit the first post to include everything in there.
MK2TDS
The Fire/Ice backgrounds are all finished.



The day/sunset version is a reimagining of Ice-Floe Inferno, and the night version is a reimagining of Shivering Cinders. I hope you like the latter, MrDeePay, considering you are going to probably edit your own levels, this included.
Just so you know, I'm very active on the site anymore like I was before; I'm mainly on Discord now.

Extras



I should have something witty to put here (even if it's just to update dated info), shouldn't I?

Advertising Space

I most likely am going to (as usual), but I am curious in what Blind Devil has in mind for changes/fixes for Shivering Cinders and the like.

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