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Improvements, Thoughts, and SMWCP2

Originally posted by Roy
Are you referring to the first Thwomp after that Hammer Brother? (Before the large sections of lava.) If so, that jump is completely doable. Or was there another of those jumps in that castle later on?


The jump I'm thinking of occurs in a dark room, just after you have to do a running jump to get across. The Thwomp in question is on a 2 tile wide platform, with red switch blocks on either side (they weren't activated at the time of the attempt) surrounded by lava, and there's a rope platform to the upper left direction of it. I couldn't manage to make it while super, because I always hit my head on the block directly above the Thwomp. This one actually could have been in Bowser's castle, but the two levels were back to back, and felt almost like they melded into each other, so forgive me if I got the level wrong.

No real problem with the Spike Hell attack, except for the wonky feeling hitboxes. Don't know, just seemed like they made contact too early for the visuals.

Originally posted by GN
When I first saw them, I thought they were angry acorns or something, and I laughed. But then, by the time i got to the bonus area, I understood that they were the current dry bone heads. :/
Do they look proper when they taunt you(In SMW, it stuck out it's tongue), do they look glitched, or do they do anything at all? I never saw it, but i figured it might be a potential problem.


I had no idea those were Dry Bones heads, they looked like possessed cherries or something to me, haha. My biggest issue with them was that they were really hard to see, especially if you didn't turn around enough to get them to move. Never sat around long enough to know if they make faces at you, but I would figure if they were originally Dry Bones heads, all of the other frames would have been identical to the first.
Every frame is working correctly, it was supposed to be a living fossil(using the original dry bones head) though the dry bones head was changed to the new global graphics dry bone, the old one was bigger and easy to see, it can be updated with a new verssion release, it's not that hard to change the graphics.



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1. I'm at World 4 right now. My favorite levels are probably Danger Mine and Snow Cavern (The first level in World 4). I like Danger Mine because of the music and how the level plays out. I like Snow Cavern because of the Yoshi Puzzle and the "Shooter" portion of the level that comes out of nowhere. My least favorite level is probably Zephyr Manor. I think it is way too long and difficult. Along with that, it has WAY too many close-call moments.
2. The hack is really fun to play. My only real gripe is the difficulty curve. There are times where you go through a moderate level, then go through an insanely hard one, then go through a breather level, then through an insane one.

One additional comment

The "Shiver Mountain" Theme is horrible. It hurts my ears. No offense to the composer of that theme though.
The Shiver Mountain theme is pretty badly ported, yes. It's an extremely old one, and I meant to improve it before the hack was released. Time got the better of me though.
Ah.

By the way, I noticed in a few levels, the graphics get really flashy (i.e. in "Atop the Clouds", the second part of the level has a background the flashes every 5 seconds). Along with that, I saw a Youtube video for one of the boss battles in a level called "MegaAdmin" (Or something like that) where the background was EXTREMELY flashy in one portion of the battle. Although I'm not epileptic, flashes like that can hurt my eyes (Along with other peoples) a bit.
1:
Favorites:
Weeaboo manor: Just liked the level in general, since it was complex, but not long.

Luluboo's mansion: Same reasons as Weeaboo manor.

The Counterfort: This level just had total aesthetic beauty to it.

Least Favorites:

Wild Wet Castle: Long and boring.

Zephyr Manor: Ditto

Arbiter's Grounds: The idea here was nice, but the execution of Squacks just made this level unbearable to me.

2:

I really had no problem with any of the items in the game, though the curve was terrible. I'd like us to have redrawn more sprites though (custom ones)
Well, I just played rapture in reality. what kaizo hack did that come from?
No, really. That level's difficulty was NEAR KAIZO. It was the hardest level I have played so far.
To quote asdf:
"You should have seen it before S.N.N. toned the difficulty down."
To everyone: Sorry about Zephyr Manor. I know I have issues with difficulty (everything I make is either too easy or too difficult), but I really thought the difficulty of that level was fine for that world. Then again, looking back at my own testing, I guess I fail to see how I thought that, considering I was pretty much spamming rewind during my testing. I guess I just thought my skills were rusty or something. Whatever. As for how long it was, I swear that was unintentional. I just wanted people to have fun. :(

Also fun fact: That Unexpected Shmup Sublevel in World 4 you speak of? I made that for the end of Zephyr Manor...and it was moved because SNN said the level was too long. Speaking of which, SNN, why didn't you just completely deny my level and make me do it over considering how long and difficult it was? I could've made it better, but I was lead to believe it was perfectly fine aside from the length.
<Adam> I feel like smwc is a prostitute now, because we put up a porn ad for money
Because in the grand scheme of things, it really was (and still is) a -good- level, but it just wasn't cut out for world 4. I had hoped to remedy that by taking some parts out (as well as a bunch of enemies), but apparently it ended up being too hard still.

That, and my initial comment was "I'll fix all of the bugs myself". I've never eaten my words as much as I did there, because that was incredibly painful and tedious to do.

Extras



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

Advertising Space

I suppose stricter level moderation could be in line for the future, as to help "wake up" levels are caught much sooner.

As i said, a way to reduce the bug-fixing would be to each level have two sign ups, one for who will make the level, and for who will beta test it, so the level will be tested and will be inserted in the rom without any bugs.



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Thing is, these people submitting levels should really already HAVE someone to do the testing for them.

..different idea, though. While I'll be leading SMWCP2, it's no surprise that I have a couple of co-leaders in mind as well. Perhaps I could get someone reliable to do things such as level testing + sending "good to go" levels to me, whereas I'd basically handle the organization/base ROM/etc. Dunno. We'll see.
I had a weirdo idea and it came to me while I took a nap on the recliner:

I decided to join the SMWCP2 project, and along the way someone wanted to see a level or two that referenced the Vocaloids in some way or form, and thus I took up the challenge and did so since i had done minor references in the past (as people may remember) to Vocaloid in the form of Miku NPC, 8-bit Miku coins, and leek dragon coins.

In the two levels, the level was a happy grassland-type level which held a generally happy grassland0themed custom music, but the other was what people called epic since the custom music for the second (long) level was a lyric-less SMW-port of Hatsune Miku's song "Happy Loop!!" (which does "happily loop").

... See it what you like, but if we DO, I MAY do this (excluding the SMW-Port of Happy Loop!! since I'm not a music composer whatsoever).

Originally posted by S.N.N.
Thing is, these people submitting levels should really already HAVE someone to do the testing for them.

..different idea, though. While I'll be leading SMWCP2, it's no surprise that I have a couple of co-leaders in mind as well. Perhaps I could get someone reliable to do things such as level testing + sending "good to go" levels to me, whereas I'd basically handle the organization/base ROM/etc. Dunno. We'll see.


This is sounding more and more like the a2mt project organisation, what with the two layers of 'approval'.

You know, jus' sayin'~
Palace Acropolis (The level RIGHT before World 5's Castle) has excellent music.
Although I have not finished this hack (I am in W8) I think I will give some opinions on it.

I am enjoying this hack immensely, as it combines the great level design, long length, and general feel of completion of hacks like The Second Reality Project Reloaded, with the creative gimmicks of hacks like EVW, Brutal Mario, and A Super Mario Thing (All of which have problems with level design.)

The graphics and music are overall excellent for this hack, I especially loved the star music. The levels with the best graphics so far are:
Unearthly Hollow
Sanctuary Fortress
The Counterfort
Wild Wet Castle
Toxic Utilities

Although I like these the most, this is probably the only hack where there wasn't a single level which had graphics and music that I truely didn't like.

The overworld is absolutely amazing, definitely the best I have ever seen. It is so far the only one that I think is really better than SMW's original overworld (Which is amazing).

The level design is overall very good, although the hack is very difficult from the start and has an unusual difficulty curve. However, this is to be expected from collab hacks, and the difficulty curve is still better than in hacks like the VIP series and ASMT. The levels that I like the most so far are:

Sanctuary Fortress- Great level design, good difficulty for a W5 Castle, amazing graphics and music (I love the use of the PM2 X Naut Fortress Theme, a great song from a great game that suits a hi-tech castle perfectly), and good use of ASM. This was only the second level that I have seen that uses a level specific power up. The boss could be a little annoying, but it is one of the most creative ones that I have seen, as you have to hat an On/Off switch instead of the thing itself.

The Counterfort- The graphics and music are great, and they give the feeling of a well armed, dangerous fortress. The level design is interesting and the difficulty suits a W6 fortress. I thought the fact that it was completely vertical was interesting.

LuluBoo's Mansion- The only Ghost House in the hack that I really love, this has little in terms of special graphics but uses the original SMW Ghost House graphics very well, and also has a great, haunting song. The level design was overall very well done, and the use of water made it a good Island World Ghost House. I even liked the part with the moving floor and the mechanical Boss Bass. I especially liked the "subtle" hints on where the blue P-Door was located.

Wild Wet Castle- Great graphics and music, and very good level design. The part where you had to throw shells to destroy the blocks was very creative, although it was hard not to kill the shell with fireballs if you were Fire Mario. The level was a bit more linear than some of the other castles, but was well designed and had good difficulty. The boss was long, had a lot of attacks, was interesting an didn't have any real glitches.

As is to be expected, there were a few levels that I thought had some problems that could be addressed. I found most of the Ghost Houses to be annoying; on the other hand, I find Ghost Houses in general to be annoying, and I know that they are very hard to design. Here are the problems that I faced within the hack. Please note that the levels listed were not necessarily ones that I didn't like, they are just ones that have problems that I want to address.

Grinder Castle: The difficulty was way too high for W2, and the palate for the first part was kind of ugly. I had no problems with the second part, but the third part wasn't very fun. Because the fact that the koopa moved on his own in the top screen, it was hard to stop him from turning around of falling in the lava. Also, as there was a delay after you hit the On/Off blocks, even with perfect timing a lot of it was still luck. On the other hand, I liked the boss a lot.

Weeaboo Manor: The difficulty was way too high for the first Ghost House, even for a secret house. With the narrow passageways, it is easy to get hit by a Boo while waiting for your chance to get past a Ghost Ring or line of Boos. Also, the puzzle was much harder then the next few Ghost Houses.

Sinister Dungeon: Actually a good level in general, but the control switching made a few hard jumps nearly impossible, and it could have switched a little less often.

Unearthly Hollow: As I mentioned before, I LOVE the music and graphics in this level. However, the level design was a bit weird, and I wasn't sure what to do all of the time. There didn't seem to be a whole lot of purpose to the level, just wandering around and getting a few springboards. Still, it wasn't all that bad. Also, the level name is absolutely awesome.

Zephyr Manor: The level had some good ideas, but was very frustrating. The wind made getting past the enemies very annoying, and it was not at all obvious how to break those blocks. The wind cloud was the real problem, as the passageways of spikes were too narrow, there were way too many Boos chasing you, and that area just wasn't very interesting in terms of its design.

To Land Much Below: I actually liked this level a lot, but I would like to point out that the part with the 20 second blocks was really tough, as I had to run through the area, taking hits constantly to make it in time. Perhaps it could be extended to 25 or 30 seconds? Anyway, that part was short, and didn't take that much away from a really well designed level.

Arbiter's Grounds: The first part of this level wasn't bad, but the passages were too narrow and dodging some enemies was very hard. There were a few really nasty jumps, the worst being where you had to hit a blue P-Switch block on a grating and get past a Thowmp. As far as I saw, there was literally no way to make it without taking a hit from the Thwomp. Also, the Squwakers part was too hard to control, even though it was a cool idea (although it was taken from Brutal Mario). Still, the Tutankoopa boss fight was awesome and very accurate to the original. Also, I don't know why you call it Arbiter's Ground when it is nothing alike from the original. It would have been kind of cool to have a Stallord battle, as that was the best boss from LoZ TP.

Into the Water: The level in the hack that was the most frustrating for me, although it had some good ideas. Also, there were a lot of different graphical and musical styles that were dissimilar. The first part with the "wild water" was cool but annoying, as there was no time to react to the munchers without using savestates or taking the hit. The part based off of Cave Story wasn't bad, but some jumps were a little awkward and there was little room to avoid the fish. The third room was the real problem, and I probably disliked it more that any room in SMWCP. It is an auto-scroll area, with medium speed scrolling and lava lotuses and fish where you have almost no room to avoid either getting hit or squashed. I only barely managed to make it to the pipe, losing all my power ups. Thankfully, that room was very short. Still, the level definitely had some interesting ideas, if a bit badly executed.

All in all, if I had to review this hack right now, it would get
Level Design- 9/10
Overworld- 10/10
Graphics- 9.5/10
Music- 10/10
ASM- 9/10
Difficulty- 8/10
Bugs- 9.5/10
Total- A well deserved 9.3
Another suggestion I have for SMWCP2 is that we put all of our custom blocks on the same Map16 page (or two if necessary). We should also decide how we want to use the extra ExAnimation features in Lunar Magic 1.71, and if necessary, have a signup list for custom objects (1.80) as well.

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I'm working on a hack! Check it out here. Progress: 64/95 levels.
It's a beautiful game, the music owns, everything's perfect except the difficulty. Not even very hard to remedy, just turn down the number of enemies a little.
Originally posted by SMWKing12
Sanctuary Fortress- Great level design, good difficulty for a W5 Castle, amazing graphics and music (I love the use of the PM2 X Naut Fortress Theme, a great song from a great game that suits a hi-tech castle perfectly), and good use of ASM. This was only the second level that I have seen that uses a level specific power up. The boss could be a little annoying, but it is one of the most creative ones that I have seen, as you have to hat an On/Off switch instead of the thing itself.

Funny, you say this, Sanctuary Fortress has absolutely no ASM involved for its "power-up". It's all just clever use of map16 tiles and duplicate rooms. Glad you liked the level though!