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Super Mario Place (SML Hack)

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Hey guys I've not only recently created a patch for the last beta/demo before I release the final product. But there are some things that I need help with before I finish this.

1. How do I make custom music/sound effects for the Gameboy?
I honestly don't know... I wanna change the music to something that's new and fits the tone. I found the Music and most of the SFX at around E600-and beyond. So I tried editing the sound effects first because I thought that would be easier. After figuring out how the pointers work I went ahead and tried to change the sounds. But the sound effects seem to be coded with some sort of ASM. I was only able to change Mario's jumping sound to be more similar to other 8-bit Mario Titles. But other sound effects. To no avail... So that leaves the music! I assume the pointers are similar to that of the sound effects. But there's one problem... I don't know how to code music for the Gameboy! I mean I know how many sound channels the NES uses, Like 3... The Genesis uses 6 channels for the YM2612 synthesis chip. 3 for the PSG(Programmable Sound Generator) sound chip. The SNES uses 8 channels. But the Gameboy/Gameboy Color I'm not so sure... I think it has like 4? 1 being white noise and 2 being the actual sound just like the NES. I assume that fart/horn sounding instrument(you know what I mean!) is it's own channel. But I don't know... If I were to have some sort of help that would be great!

2. Changing up the post level bonus games.
Of course I was able to find the data not only for the Sprite Mappings,Sprite Variables,Sprite Code and The Music/Sound Effects! But I cant find ANYTHING on these bonus games! I now assume the code/mappings for the sprites is separate from the tile-maps of the bonus stage. But I still can't really find anything. I at least just want to make Mario go slower so that the entirety or at least most of the ladder climbing tune can be heard. Because if you haven't gotten caught up on your TCRF homework. The ladder climbing tune when Mario selects a corridor in the bonus stage goes on for like 10-12 seconds in total! Even though you hear like 4 seconds of it. Also other little changes to the bonus stage I don't feel like mentioning right now because this post is already bloated with so much shit.

If you guys can help me. That would be great!
Well it's impressive that you're even making a good SML hack. I edited 1-1 of SML and i could barely get it to act like a proper level.
Originally posted by XAGES
Well it's impressive that you're even making a good SML hack. I edited 1-1 of SML and i could barely get it to act like a proper level.

Have you tried Land Forger? It's a level editor for SML. That's what I use. even though it doesn't have access to ALL tiles. I still use it anyway and use a hex editor to change the tiles to the one inaccessible to the level editor, They also appear as a red square because there not supposed to be placed at all... But it still saves like normal.
But I don't know about this being a "good" hack. It's alright. I just put in what I would like to see in a Mario Hack. The reason I'm able to make all these custom sprites is because of how simple the code for the sprites are. I though this would be a good start for programming. Maybe someday I'll be able to do some ACTUAL ASM work. The coding format is so simple that almost anyone could do it.
Okay so I just read in a Document on ROM Hacking.net that the Game Boy does have 4 sound channels.Presumably the two square wave ones, the static noise one and the fart/horn sounding one.
I was figuring out the pointers to the music. the pointer list I found goes up to like Music ID 0C-0D.
With this being the ID list.
01-Level Victory
02-Death
03-Temple/Caves
04-Bonus
05-Vehicle Stage
06-Chai Kingdom
07-Normal Level
08-Muda Kngdom
09-Bonus Game
0A-Climbing Ladder
0B-Boss
0C-Can-Can(Invincible)
0D-Bonus Game,Item Get
0E-Bonus Game,Fuck You!
0F-Daisy Rescued
10-Game Over
11-End Credits
12-Fake Daisy
13-Tatanga

But now I'm kinda losing interest because nobody seems to pay much attention to the project. So I went over to other things. I still haven't uploaded the third beta though. Ninja Boy once reviewed the first beta and brought attention to some really huge flaws in the hack! One of the points being that the Koopa shells are messed up in which yes they were! But nobody has said anything except for XAGES... Like NB said he probably is really busy with stuff... I don't know what he's doing but whatever.
Okay so nobody seems interested in this project. I'm just gonna release this one final update. It's pretty much in a finished state. I think in the post world fake daisy scenes I tried changing the text so some text could be in the completely wrong position. The music is all still exactly the same as the original as I never got that figured out. So here's the last update. It may not be exactly the way I wanted it to be but whatever.
https://bin.smwcentral.net/u/26989/Super%2BMario%2BPlace%2BBeta%2B3.ips
Meant to post a comment after your last post about how I thought it was interesting and kinda cool you were doing non-SMW. Honestly, due to that, I never would've even have seen it. If not for me creeping through other people's post history. So that's probably why there's little comment. Glad I put this thread on my watch-list at the very least. Looking forward to seeing what you ended up with!

Edit: I died in 1-2 a lot of places...and spawned in the ground for an eternal softlock... Never played the original but this has been enjoyable level design so far. I appreciated that first jump. There's a few tight jumps in 1-3 which feel like a crazy difficulty spike given the relative ease of the rest of the first few levels (spiky area with 2 donuts and a crab). Unfortunately I've had to reset about every other death so I probably won't be investing too much more time into this. It's kinda frustrating when your x5 lives is pretty much x1.... maybe I'll savestate it...

Edit2:

Was that Nessie at the end?!?! :P
I'd have to say I wouldn't play it without savetates.

Too many random softlocks and the boss at the end is unfair.
It actually took me like 20 attempts at 25% speed to beat it (and I'm fairly good at bullet hell). For bullet hell you have to have one thing you can rely on. It doesn't even matter what it is (you being faster, a certain bullet pattern, being able to destroy projectiles, etc.). Unfortunately the collision on those bullets means you can't always destroy them in under 5 hits. They also either change direction towards Mario or continue on a superball-like path, but you can't count on either to happen. And they can sometimes get split in the middle and do both and you're screwed, there's literally nothing you can do since they move at the same speed as you (but teleport to where they would be next when they split, so move faster when you destroy them).

On the plus side I just watched a playthrough of SML to give a fair comparison... and you're level design is a looooot less claustrophobic than the original's. I disliked the headbonk jumps but it seems the original was a lot more cluttered so I'll take those few headbonkers.

There's seems to be a lot more stars as well. Usually sneakily hidden or in spots that make you question if it's worth going for it. Not sure if that's a pro or a con on the stars, but it's interesting at the very least.

Probably the most unfair thing in the game though isn't the boss, that at least can be chalked up to difficulty... The worst was the blind-invisible-jump-inside-a-wall-with-a-turtle. You essentially need a superball to even begin to detect where the platforms are. And even knowing where they are it's a running headbonk jump.

The custom enemies are pretty cool.

The levels are fun to play, they're more difficult the slower you move because of how it effects your jump height and distance. But if you're moving at a high speed it's easier. Almost plays like Sonic in the aspect of encouraging you to move quickly. (That said I did get kaizo'd by invisible 1UP blocks at high speed... kinda a sour taste since they're probably there to help and not hurt me :P)
First off, Thanks for replying and giving me some criticism! I don't really know what exactly you mean by softlock? You mean in like world 3-1? Where the checkpoint spawns you into the ground? Because yeah that definitely needs some work... I'll try and make the spike area in 1-3 a little less grueling.
The final battle with Tatanga? Yes... I was thinking that might be way WAY too difficult for some people to beat... I'll try and find a way to fix that and still have the boss be hard. The part where the bullets split is honestly a pain in the ass... But the "teleporting" I'm pretty sure isn't actually teleporting. I think it's just the bullets randomly vanishing when there's too much crap on screen. and then suddenly becoming visible again. Yeah...... This needs some more work done on it.
The part with the inside a wall thing was an idea I had once when I was younger while using the level editor in this game called Super Mario Flash. It was my first introduction to level making and while I was playing/making a level, This exact same idea popped into my head, Albeit from what I remember a-lot worse than what you see in this hack. Of course I was never able to make this level in Super Mario Flash but I resurrected the idea I had when I was like 9-10 years old? and also knew nothing about level design or hell even game design! I'll get rid of that part... The slower=level is difficult and faster=level is easier I don't think was that intentional and playing like a Sonic game was not at all what I was expecting someone to say!
So thanks for giving feedback! I'll try and fix these problems!

P.S. What does Nessie that sea monster from SM64 have to do with this? Does an enemy/boss in the game look like Nessie? Which one?
wow.. this is.. different, to say the least. well, good luck man! hope this goes well for ya! #smw{^_^}
former toddler
Yeah the checkpoints in general was what I meant by softlock. There's a particularly funny one that spawns you over a pit which drains your lives to 0 instead of softlocking. 1-3 spike area wasn't bad it was just a weird difficulty spike. More of a pacing issue than that specific section. Although dropping it 1 tile lower may fix the bonking issues and put it more inline with the rest of the pacing.
Seems you know where the issues with Tatanga are. Honestly even fixing one of the "bullet hell points" I mentioned is enough. You only need 1 crutch. Then again it is a massive difficulty spike at the end of the game. Maybe consider adding a 1UP after the final checkpoint (you made it here, now just get good enough to beat it). As long as it's fair, honestly the difficulty curve can be as absurd as you want as long as the time to get back to that point to grind isn't horrendous (retry patches being abused for this in SMW).

For the wall part, honestly I have a similar mechanic in something I'm working on. As it's nostalgic for you and it is your hack I'd maybe leave it in and remove the ceiling right before the turtle's platform ends. That way you won't headbonk. Nothing you can do I assume about guaranteeing a superball at that point for scouting (what I'm doing w/fireballs for my mechanic), but you can maybe add an enemy to each platform instead (don't remember about the far-side but the middle platform had none) platforms you can completely jump over without a headbonk don't need to be marked (for the player they're just bottomless pit that will luckily save them from death when they screw up their jump some of the time, which is fair enough). TL;DR removing the headbonk in that area honestly might be enough if you have the far-side enemy marked.

On Nessie: The sprite Mario rides in the credits looks liked a garbled Shoe/Nessie/Idk :3
A side-note: Your level design has some repetitious patterns in it, you could definitely chalk this up to theme inside a world but across an entire game it becomes sort of a defining quality (for good or bad). Not saying anything needs to change there, just something to be aware of.

Also, something of note maybe, a weird mechanic I noticed that I didn't really see a use for more than once:
You can do a max height jump without a running start if you crouch while big.
Actually after I read your comment. The first thing I did was in the spike part in 3-1, Make a couple of platforms lower down to remove this "headbonk" problem. Changed one of the koopas to a donut block so you have three at the end instead of two.
I also practically removed the entirety of the non solid/BG blocks that made the section a pain in the ass trial and error, and replaced them with a background texture that went completely unused in the previous builds. Because honestly that wasn't a very good idea... That's why I was waiting so patiently for Ninja Boy to reply again when I uploaded the 2nd public build. Then months passed by I already made the 3rd build for uploading. Nobody had any interest in it at the time so I gave up... Never uploaded the 3rd beta until now then it got some more interest again...
I slightly changed the speed of Tatanga's bullet attack to make it easier. But I'll add some extra 1ups as well if I can.
Also that thing that Mario and Daisy get into was supposed to be a hamburger/cheeseburger. As you watched a playthrough I assume you saw the end as well where the get into the rocket and fly off. That at one point was a supposed to be a burger but around that time I haven't found the mappings for the ship yet. Eventually I did find the mappings I didn't know how to change the width and height of the ship in 8x8 tiles. So now it's just normal... But if I do find that then you will see the burger in it's truest form. I will still work on the hack now and then to make it more enjoyable. BTW that part with the blocks you can't see was not that nostalgic, special or important for me. I just remembered a thought I had a decade ago and have rarely thought of before that and wanted to put it in my new hack. But I personally think removing those tiles was a better idea. But the solid tiles are still exactly the same.
I've now uploaded the 4th beta. I've fixed most of the problems with the checkpoints where you get stuck or have to fall through the level. fixed most of the head bonk problems. tweaked a boss.
So It's almost practically complete. the burger is still slightly unfinished, I'm still trying to find out how these mappings work. I was able to do so with the mappings for the normal level sprites but not Mario, Daisy and the ship. BTW there all stored in the same place together. I can edit what tiles they use but the X and Y locations of each tile, I honestly can't figure out the format there in. Also I think the mappings for Mario in level and in the bonus game are completely separate from each other given I've randomly edited the in level mappings for Mario but the bonus game ones seem intact. I still can't find the data for the bonus games. I also still don't know how to change the music.

So anyway... Here's the 4th beta.
https://bin.smwcentral.net/u/26989/Super%2BMario%2BPlace%2BBeta%2B4.ips
Yet again. Nobody cares... No one ever does.
This forum is primarily for SMW hacking and not many people have interest in other types of hacking, it would also help if you didn't try to throw a pity party because people don't respond to your thread. If people don't reply it's because they are either not interested or have nothing to say. Bumping your own thread with these type of posts will just end up getting you in trouble.
Fwiw, I'm in the nothing to say camp (although I;'m talking now...). I've been sick and I game test irl so playing games versus making them is not my ideal after-work activity. Typically only a weekend thing for me. Although I enjoyed all of the hack except the 3 things you already changed and I can only imagine that made it better.

Coincidentally, I actually referenced your hack last night as well by chance on Discord:
Originally posted by Runic Rain

So as far as the basics fairly solid intro level for a beginner difficulty. Bit harder than SMW Lv1 imo but easier than SMW Lv2. Not as fast as 1 but faster than 2. If you're going for "first time mario player ever" I'd add some sort of stretch at the beginning with a single enemy intro instead of the double + path choice. To introduce concept of enemy and "this is goomba" (stopper introduces "this is jump")
you haven't introduced "this is run jump" btw.

An example run jump intro: I just played YakSmoker's hack. I was unaware in that mario game you could run jump. Forced run jump to clear a gap at beginning of the game was good because it forced me to learn that control/trick at a point where losing lives, powerups, etc. aren't going to make me frustrated.


(Emphasis added of course)

Given what my time is and how crazy this coming month is for me I probably won't touch the update again for quite some time. It's in my patches folder though and waiting for a rainy day.

Prolly my last post in this thread. Once again: I'm impressed, it doesn't surprise me this non-SMW went with little notice, and only do things if you yourself enjoy them!!!
Originally posted by Ninja Boy
This forum is primarily for SMW hacking and not many people have interest in other types of hacking, it would also help if you didn't try to throw a pity party because people don't respond to your thread. If people don't reply it's because they are either not interested or have nothing to say. Bumping your own thread with these type of posts will just end up getting you in trouble.

Honestly I wasn't even trying to bump this thread up... As far as I remember this was still somewhere on the top... But yeah... Sorry about throwing a pity party, I'll try not to do that...
Originally posted by Runic_Rain
Fwiw, I'm in the nothing to say camp (although I;'m talking now...). I've been sick and I game test irl so playing games versus making them is not my ideal after-work activity. Typically only a weekend thing for me. Although I enjoyed all of the hack except the 3 things you already changed and I can only imagine that made it better.

Coincidentally, I actually referenced your hack last night as well by chance on Discord:

(Emphasis added of course)

Given what my time is and how crazy this coming month is for me I probably won't touch the update again for quite some time. It's in my patches folder though and waiting for a rainy day.

Prolly my last post in this thread. Once again: I'm impressed, it doesn't surprise me this non-SMW went with little notice, and only do things if you yourself enjoy them!!!
I didn't know you were sick or play tested so much stuff. It's pretty understandable that would make you hesitant on play testing the new update. Especially when the last updates had very low quality level design and relied on you to master a physic engine which compared to SMW wasn't as smooth,easy or in any way intuitive. So yeah... I was just upset that I was ignored again and threw a tantrum. So thanks! Hope you get better Runic.
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