Language…
8 users online: cozyduck, Dark Mario Bros, Firstnamebutt, Golden Yoshi, Isikoro, krizeth, qantuum,  Ringo - Guests: 243 - Bots: 336
Users: 64,795 (2,376 active)
Latest user: mathew

124: Shivering Cinders - MrDeePay

Complete

Claimed by: MrDeePay

World: 8
Exits: 1
Theme: Fire/Ice Mix
Music Options: 1, 2, or compose your own.

Briefing: This level should incorporate both fire and ice in a creative way of your choice. Note that it may help to converse with the other two users who have chosen the fire/ice theme and collaborate ideas.

Extras



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

Advertising Space

Hello.

Extras



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

Advertising Space

Alright, let's see.

For GFX, I will (most likely) be using Pikerchu's Fire/Ice GFX, with some planned palette changes, mostly so I won't need to deal with black dirt. The level will incorporate the slippery blocks already in the ROM with me seriously entertaining the idea of having ON/OFF blocks that're slippery as well. Being located on the northern (fire) end of the map, the level will lean slightly towards fire elements, dealing with things that can quickly deplete Mario's supply of 1up Mushrooms if he's careless.

Making a return from the previous SMWCP, the level will feature the ability to have different routes depeneding on Yoshi/Switch Palace status, but is now expanded upon to include Mario's status as well. I have plans to include ways for Mario to go through the level if he has an Ice Flower, but no special power-ups are in the ROM yet, so I'll push that specific one to the side until further notice. And of course again, Switch status will "readjust" the level difficulty as well, making some segments easier and others more difficult.

SMWC Coin placement will veer towards the player having at least two ways to each one. The first way would be (much?) quicker to obtain but the risk factor is (much?) greater, while the second method would be safer, but it will take even longer to get.

As for a name, I haven't settled on one yet, but it will most likely use some variant of Tsundere in the title (ie: Tsun-Tsun Tundra, Tsundere Sub-terrain, Tsundere Sanctum if I had the castle). Please don't change the topic title yet, however.

First off, Tsundere Sub-terrain is too long to fit the level names without using the ILLUSIYELLOW tiles. And why "Tsundere" anyway? Tundra I can understand but Tsundere? I mean, I know the general idea of what it means but it doesn't make me think of fire right away. I can make the association a little bit now after thinking for a few minutes, but I think a different word may be in your better interests.

Next, i loved what you did with Palace Acropolis in SMWCP and its multiple paths, so i can't wait to see what more you do here. One suggestion right off the bat though, please don't use a time limit in your level (That is, if we haven't removed time limits entirely already). If it's going to be as big and fun to explore as you say it is, the player shouldn't have to worry about the time like I did in Palace Acropolis when I played it for the first time.

Third, while there is the possibility that all the switch palaces will have been pressed by this point, you probably shouldn't place much in the way of red ! paths unless they're for nice bonuses since you can't guarantee that the player has that switch yet like you can more reliably guarantee the blue ! blocks.

I can't wait to see screens of the level in action.
Tsundere means cold on the outside and hot on the inside.
It's usually meant less figuratively, though.

Extras



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

Advertising Space

Originally posted by FirePhoenix
First off, Tsundere Sub-terrain is too long to fit the level names without using the ILLUSIYELLOW tiles. And why "Tsundere" anyway?


A Tsundere (can) run/s between hot and cold. (Further Reading. Yes, I used an anime character archtype.) And I'm aware of the length of the name and read what you were talking to YCZ about with his naming conflict in his level thread, which is why I just used a couple examples.


Quote
Tundra I can understand but Tsundere? I mean, I know the general idea of what it means but it doesn't make me think of fire right away. I can make the association a little bit now after thinking for a few minutes, but I think a different word may be in your better interests.


My naming methods tend not to be the best that they could be and I am no stranger to asking people to give me names to work with. I mean, I could go with something like Bipolar Boundary, but that specific name seems more fitting for the penultimate level in W7 as opposed to the second. I'll see about any other fitting alternatives in the level ideas topic.

Quote
Next, i loved what you did with Palace Acropolis in SMWCP and its multiple paths, so i can't wait to see what more you do here. One suggestion right off the bat though, please don't use a time limit in your level (That is, if we haven't removed time limits entirely already). If it's going to be as big and fun to explore as you say it is, the player shouldn't have to worry about the time like I did in Palace Acropolis when I played it for the first time.


Setting the level time to 500 initially was a mistake on my part (whoops, though it was later increased to 750), but the timer this time around will be disabled. Then again, the timer's disabled for most of the levels this time around anyway.

Quote
Third, while there is the possibility that all the switch palaces will have been pressed by this point, you probably shouldn't place much in the way of red ! paths unless they're for nice bonuses since you can't guarantee that the player has that switch yet like you can more reliably guarantee the blue ! blocks.

I can't wait to see screens of the level in action.



I'm aware that the player may skip W5 altogether before they get to the northern/fire side of W7, so I'll plan around that. I mean, I very likely will utilize Red Switch Blocks, but not to the point of the player will outright need them.

Extras



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

Advertising Space



The SP3-4 that I plan on using for the level, though obviously not with all of those enemies. Some notes.
- There's plenty of space in both sets to allow more enemies to be compatible, not to mention make it possible for the Bro enemies to have their tilemaps increased to 16x32, since all of these Bro graphics make Chuck incompatible with them. (They're currently 16x24)
- The fire graphics in the pillar are used for the lava pillar sprite, which I'll send an update to because I messed up on editing the Y speed.
- Since no levels use Frostee yet, I'm gonna see about asking to have its tilemap changed so it can be fit in one of the slots. Currently it conflicts with Lakitu and Spiny.
- Because of the method I used to make the graphics for it, the Firebar will need to be changed to use Palette A, which I feel suits fire graphics much better than C does anyway.
- Might consider adding Imamelia's Panser from SMWCP into as well (though I might not use it myself), assuming that he released the sprite at C3 last November.
- Rabble rabble rabble.


I made progress on designing the actual level itself, but I'll hold out on screens of that until later or Pikerchu finishes up his Fire/Ice FG; depending on my mood and progress.

Extras



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

Advertising Space

A Sub-level

Semi-rough draft of the second room. More notes.

I'm still waiting for Pikerchu to finish up the Fire/Ice FG GFX, allowing me to add slippery ground into the sublevel and to drastically change the look of the level.
- ON/OFF Slippery Blocks (thanks to Ramp202) are inserted to the base, they probably won't appear in this sub-level anyway.
- Green Spotted blocks are solid for Yoshi, allowing Mario to take an alternate route. Unless a much earlier level does it (and I freakin' hope someone does), I'll readjust the first encounter of the blocks to where Mario is forced to touch them)
- I'm hoping for Frostee to be remapped to some free GFX space I have set up for situations like those. (see previous post). Since its ASM file is freely available, I may just do that myself.
- Lava pillars have this odd issue where if Mario is a certain number of blocks above him, it will still affect him somehow. To work around this until further notice, they largely appear under parts of the level where Mario can't be too far above them. Also I need to see about disabling the ability to spin jump from them.
- I may consider adding Podoboos (the one on screen 00 needs to be removed) if the Non-Dynamic Podoboo patch is applied.

Oh, because I forgot to note this before; feel free to remap the Frostee to whatever you want. I'll make a note of it and start up a "tilemap list", which I'll include with the base ROM. The less GFX files we have to sacrifice for sprite graphics, the better.

(also, I'll refrain from commenting for now since I know you're still waiting for Pikerchu's set.)

Extras



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

Advertising Space

In that case, just go into Frostee.asm and change

Originally posted by Before
Tiles:
db $80,$FE

to
Originally posted by After
Tiles:
db $85,$87


Also switch Sprite 13 (Firebar) to use Palette A instead of C because of the reasons I mentioned in my last post.


And knowing my luck, posting in this topic at 3:30 in the morning for me was probably a bad idea.

Extras



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

Advertising Space





Ignore glitched graphics and screwy palettes, those will (at least I hope) be rectified in the next base update. Pikerchu sent me his Fire/Ice set yesterday and I applied some edits to it to suit my liking. I'm not finished with the edits yet, since I'll need to use FG2 and another GFX file for these things so everything looks right. Until then, there's plenty of cutoff. Additionally, the snowy parts of the FG and the ON/OFF blocks that look shiny are slippery.


Because of some error with how the edge slippery blocks are, I'll need to request dupe blocks of the middle slippery blocks that have their tiles behave like slopes. (If you walk onto a slope after standing on some slippery blocks and jump from the slope onto some non-slippery blocks, the slippery effect will still be there until you touch some slippery blocks and jump/fall off from those.

Extras



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

Advertising Space

Unrelated, but I'ma put the level on a temporary hold since I'm (trying to) help salavge some of the graphics that will be potentially lost because of Foop's computer problem. I'm starting with Mario, then moving to Yoshi and his FG stuff. All assuming that SNN doesn't have much of that stuff already.

Feedback on the level itself is still encouraged, it's been only a couple of step above being non-existent for me.

I don't have anything of Foop's that is recent (namely, Mario, Yoshi, the bonus room BG/FG, cake tileset, etc.) I guess that incident with his computer happened before he could send them to me.

Just a minor nitpick about the level: I hope you'll add in some more fire-related decorations. The ice pillars go great with the ice side of things, but something like additional rocks made of fire (or even a lava vein) would compliment it.

Extras



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

Advertising Space

There are some rocky/fire FG pieces in the set I was sent, but I haven't gotten around to tiling them up yet. If anything, I'm considering adding even more ice elements because a good amount of the dangers in the level come from fire elements. Then again, there's plenty of ice patches that are close to (and over) lava, providing that chance of Mario slipping off into there. Time will tell what happens.

Extras



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

Advertising Space



Started some early work on a background for the level (yes I know about the palette used, I haven't selected the colors for it yet), though I probably won't finish it or my standards will want it to be even better. Currently it's set up as to allow some parallax scrolling if I want to go through with making more of this.

Extras



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

Advertising Space

While I'm still playing backup, I came up with a couple of more possible names. I still haven't settled on one yet, though.

Tsundere Cinders
Tsun-Tsun Tundra
Tsun Sub-Terrain
NEW! Shivering Cinders
NEW! Shivering Spires (playing off of SMWCP's Sizzling Spires) - Probably won't go with this after checking out spire's definition a little more.
NEW! Frostbite Furnace


Obviously, I prefer my level names to lean more towards location and gimmick rather than action.

Frostbite Furnace is so...oxymoronic! Well so is Shivering Cinders but i like that former better.
Considering the tiles for the fire ground in your set are black, I'd be more inclined to go with Shivering Cinders.
I think Icy Inferno would work as a name. Either way, this level looks well designed so far
If you want to chat some interesting people, check out my new forum at: http://bloodybalcony.forumotion.ca/
Shivering Cinders makes me smile for some reason, and it sounds more catchy than the others. I'd go with that, personally.

I also like the way that BG is coming along. I might be misinterpreting what you said, but don't treat it as a masterpiece; I'd rather see you finish it and learn something, regardless of perceived quality, rather than avoid it because you'll never be satisfied until it's perfect. That's just me, though :p

As for the level design, I was wondering whether the terrain layouts are a work in progress? They seem rather flat for me, but I've remained reticent because I assumed you were first sketching out all of the alternate pathways and such. I haven't played Palace Acropolis yet, but the level concept is obviously intriguing, if also hard to pull off.
Youtube (Main) | Youtube (Alt) | Bandcamp | DeviantART

Complete