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Old-School Level Design Contest 2021 Official Fan Judging Thread!

OLDC

Originally posted by SomeGuy712x
Actually, it's not A. It's the run button (Y or X) you're not already using.


I knew I'd get something wrong. Thanks for catching that.

Originally posted by Galaer
Also I wonder what happened with other fan judges. I hope my long posts didn't scare them.


Some people have more time available to them than others, and some people just devote less of their time to judging/fanjudging contest entries than others as well. Furthermore, there are a lot of levels to play and judge for this contest, and some people may have gotten demotivated. Playing, thinking about, scoring and writing about a level 125 times can be quite time-consuming, which is why I don't often have the energy to fanjudge.

Just to ensure that I don't go off on too much of a tangent, I might as well mention that I quickly played all of the entries and I found a number of them uninteresting. While I was glad to see that the overall quality of the levels had increased (at least since VLDC12), innovation was lacking. My favorite levels had to be (in alphabetical order): intangible assets, LIVING SPONGES, mycologic masochism, trial and terror, and Winning Level. There were some other good levels as well, but these are the ones that come to my mind. Also, the level "salute to tomato" had such a silly concept that I can't call it a bad level. (Whoops.)
Not really fanjudging but I've started a fails compilation.
I shoot and upload at irregular intervals, as of today there are two videos.

youtube playlist.
Originally posted by Galaer
Also I wonder what happened with other fan judges. I hope my long posts didn't scare them.
For what it's worth, I'm doing fan judging of my own : P
I'm about halfway done, but I'm going to post all of my reviews at once when they're finished (I'll link the Google Doc with them on it). I must say, so far I'm pleasantly surprised by most of this contest's levels.
Check out my WIP romhack!
Done with my fan judging. You can look at it here.
Check out my WIP romhack!
Nice job with the fan judging! Looking back, I probably should have done some fan judging myself, but it probably would have taken way too long. If BLDC2 happens this year I'll probably do it then.

Anyway, I'd say I agree with a majority of your placements/comments for the levels, but "Why Be Right?" is ranked too high for me personally. While I did think that level was pretty neat, a perfect score is... too much. But hats off to the creator (I think it was SomeGuy712x) for making a level you found so enjoyable.
Originally posted by Minish Yoshi
Nice job with the fan judging! Looking back, I probably should have done some fan judging myself, but it probably would have taken way too long. If BLDC2 happens this year I'll probably do it then.

Ironically I'm the opposite, I highly doubt I'll do fan judging for BLDC2 unless it's a small contest (which it probably won't be). OLDC levels are usually on the simpler side since the contest has so many limitations, but from what I've seen, stuff like VLDC and BLDC usually leads to more complicated levels that take longer to get through (on top of there just being a TON of entries)
Check out my WIP romhack!
Originally posted by JupiHornet
Done with my fan judging. You can look at it here.

Is it okay for me to reply here regarding your comments on my level? Or, should I continue to try remaining "anonymous" about my level for now? (I have stuff I do want to say, but if I'm not supposed to blatantly reveal which level is mine yet, then I'll hold off for the moment.)
That's fine to do, this thread is meant to be a judge-free zone so people can share their opinions about the levels. You could also keep your comments spoilered if that would make you more comfortable.
Considering we've been openly talking about many of these levels on Discord yesterday, it's fine to reveal which level is yours, because Jupi already knows it :P
But maybe do it in spoiler tags
It's easily the best thing I've done
So why the empty numb?
Alright, I'll put my whole reply in a spoiler box then.

Originally posted by JupiHornet
Done with my fan judging. You can look at it here.

I'm glad you really enjoyed my "Why Be Right?" level! Yeah, my "automatic plan" gimmick was in mind from the very start, but I also did try my best to make this look and feel like a level that could be played normally too.

Also, that was pretty lucky getting a 50 from the goal tape, because in all of my tests, things can vary slightly for some reason, but I tried my best to make sure Mario would always collect all 7 Yoshi coins and finish the level.

I've observed four different ways the level can end, due to the "randomness". It could give you the 50 (and perhaps even finish with a fitting 712 seconds left, depending on how long a certain part early in the level takes, since there's a possible variance there too), but you could also end up with 29 or 26 stars, or you could end up missing the goal tape entirely, which will happen if the "automatic" sequence causes you to wall clip on the stack of pipes near the end, causing you to enter one of them and go through a bonus room (this bonus room is not required for 100%, BTW, and it can also be accessed by bringing a P-switch here or by finding a hidden block, so the wall clip entry is not required to access it).

In addition, in the first half, there exists another non-required bonus room pipe, which won't be entered while playing "automatically", but it should be pretty obvious which pipe it is, and there are a couple ways to enter it. Inside is a hint towards how to get the secret exit in an "automatic" fashion. (And, doing the secret exit that way can vary in one of two ways, from my testing, but as far as I could tell, would also always work, which was the most important thing.)

Anyway, I hope the actual judges discover the gimmick and think highly of my level as well!
@Jupihornet: I checked #104 entry and bps actually works. True, after patching you get warning that patch may not work, but level plays fine.
Originally posted by Galaer
@Jupihornet: I checked #104 entry and bps actually works. True, after patching you get warning that patch may not work, but level plays fine.
The BPS doesn't work at all for me. The patched ROM won't even load in Lunar Magic
Check out my WIP romhack!
That is likely a result of header shenanigans on the target rom when the author created their patch, offsetting all the applied data. With flips, I could apply the patch correctly via GUI, or by NOT using --ignore-checksum in commandline / batch.
Finally, I was able to Fanjudge 20% of the OLDC entries :D

Here is my WIP OLDC fanjudge. (25/125 done) (V1.0.1)

*V1.0.1: Fixed typo at the name's entry n°40 (Thanks Galaer)

(it has also hints for getting secrets I guess)
My 1st romhack in progress (testing avaiable)...
(beta)
Thanks for review of my level. A few points. First level is called Shameless Sky, not Shameless Sly. About 1-ups: are you talking about 2 1-ups in puzzle with P-switch or invisible 1-up in moon challenge?

1-ups in P-switch puzzle:
you grab P-switch and take it into rock on the right of bronze blocks. Put it high, but not press it. Just like in side level, use it to clip into left rock. Go left while holding up to clip through bone.


Hidden 1-up in moon challenge:
after going through munchers, fly left while holding up. Activating all invisible blocks will somehow give you momentum to go through wall. Wait for big mole to get stuck on the left. Duck on him while pressing left, then quickly change to up + left and somehow you should again build enough momentum to clip through wall to 1-up and reset pipe.


As for 3rd dragon coin - I believe you are actually talking about 2nd dragon coin. The way you described is intentional way to get it and also is described in 1st message box. But I admit, it's probably not very well explained. I watched NopeContest's stream and he completely misunderstood this info from message box. Using this technique is intended.

This gimmick I discovered when I was creating the level, so I don't know very much about it. As far as I know you need 1 tile tunnel and be big to gain enough momentum to clip through walls or get hurt and then use powerup, which again will let you clip through wall. Thanks to that it's possible to get above level and fly to flag pole, but I have no idea how could you destroy moon challenge or even get moon indicator. So how exactly yours ultra cheese works?
Originally posted by Galaer
Thanks for review of my level. A few points. First level is called Shameless Sky, not Shameless Sly.


Oops! Thanks for reporting the typo #smw{O_O}

Originally posted by Galaer
About 1-ups: are you talking about 2 1-ups in puzzle with P-switch or invisible 1-up in moon challenge?


The ones with one just above another one (I should said the 2 penultimate ones #tb{''})

Originally posted by Galaer
As for 3rd dragon coin - I believe you are actually talking about 2nd dragon coin. The way you described is intentional way to get it and also is described in 1st message box. But I admit, it's probably not very well explained. I watched NopeContest's stream and he completely misunderstood this info from message box. Using this technique is intended.

This gimmick I discovered when I was creating the level, so I don't know very much about it. As far as I know you need 1 tile tunnel and be big to gain enough momentum to clip through walls or get hurt and then use powerup, which again will let you clip through wall. Thanks to that it's possible to get above level and fly to flag pole, but I have no idea how could you destroy moon challenge or even get moon indicator. So how exactly yours ultra cheese works?


After checking, the dragon coin that had a issue is still the 3rd one.

The 2nd one (the one at the right of the 1st message box, right?):
The intended way seems to go to the turn blocks and break them, the message box tells about spin-clipping, and apparaently trivial navigation about narrow paths with a cloud and big Mario?


The 3rd one:
Originally posted by Oldc2021FanJudge_light.txt
To get the 3rd dragon coin, there is a 1-tile height path but unlike every other ones, the celling is the same as the entrance area of this path, the player can still access by ducking while having upwards momentum.

So basically, when Mario ducks on a upwards moving cloud, the mometum allows Mario to hit the celling while pressing down. When Mario stops ducking, his vertical hitbox goes from small to big which makes mario clipping the celling. I through this was unintended to beat the level since it breaks the whole level. At the end I was perplexed about getting that dragon coin and the 2 1-up said above without using this method


To show how broken this level is, I just made a movie (.smv, to play with a emulator, created with SNES9X), it also shows
how to get the 2 moons
and more secrets. Feel free to check it out! #smrpg{y}
My 1st romhack in progress (testing avaiable)...
(beta)
Originally posted by TheKazooBloccGosh
Finally, I was able to Fanjudge 20% of the OLDC entries :D

Thanks for reviewing my level but just gonna ask

Originally posted by Oldc2021FanJudge_light.txt
I used the low water tide to skip ALL the 1st part of the level (and also for the secret exit and the dragon coins) by going just below the ground.


Did you actually swim under all of the 1st section of the level or did you just point that out while playing and actually played through the first section like how i intended it to be played because im not really sure how to feel about you just swimming under it without even giving it a chance

hopefully im not causing any trouble just kinda curious about this thx #tb{:j}

This is my non existent layout I plan on adding one soon.. or never

I have a discord server, feel free to join if you want
Originally posted by codfish1002
Did you actually swim under all of the 1st section of the level or did you just point that out while playing and actually played through the first section like how i intended it to be played because im not really sure how to feel about you just swimming under it without even giving it a chance

hopefully im not causing any trouble just kinda curious about this thx #tb{:j}


I did indeed swim under the level, but I also do skipless to know how the level should play. (The difficulty does use the skip btw)

My 1st romhack in progress (testing avaiable)...
(beta)
Originally posted by TheKazooBloccGosh
To show how broken this level is, I just made a movie (.smv, to play with a emulator, created with SNES9X), it also shows
how to get the 2 moons
and more secrets. Feel free to check it out! #smrpg{y}


First of all, I checked Lunar Magic again and indeed 3rd dragon coin requires squeezing into 1 tile gap as big Mario. I mentioned way to do it in 1st message box, so that's intended to squeeze there. As for ultra cheese - you kinda duck and press up against ceiling to gain momentum, right? I tried that for 15 min and I couldn't do it. So my question is: Is this really done in real time? Or did you slow down emulator to do that?
Originally posted by Galaer
Originally posted by TheKazooBloccGosh
To show how broken this level is, I just made a movie (.smv, to play with a emulator, created with SNES9X), it also shows
how to get the 2 moons
and more secrets. Feel free to check it out! #smrpg{y}


First of all, I checked Lunar Magic again and indeed 3rd dragon coin requires squeezing into 1 tile gap as big Mario. I mentioned way to do it in 1st message box, so that's intended to squeeze there. As for ultra cheese - you kinda duck and press up against ceiling to gain momentum, right? I tried that for 15 min and I couldn't do it. So my question is: Is this really done in real time? Or did you slow down emulator to do that?


I did it in real time, I also found a easier method to do the ultra cheese:
1- Hold up and touch the celling, keep holding up.
2- Hold down, Mario will go up (apparently the celling doesn't stop the upwards momentum)
3- Quickly hold up and keep it
4- If Mario didn't clip, go to step 2 again
5- When celling clipping you can press left (or right) but you must keep holding up

(I hope I wasn't confusing to explain)
My 1st romhack in progress (testing avaiable)...
(beta)

OLDC