A Second Mario Thing: free alex

[limepie20]

Man, I had an affinity for really weird obstacles back when I made A Beach. The whole key-throw thing is strange and the platforms that make you bounce are weird. Also the thing with the midpoint and having to find the blocks and then even blocking you out so it's harder to use the bullet bill, which the bullet bill itself is weird. It feels like I was making a puzzle level rather than an action level!
And the thing with the chest not working was weird. I have no idea why there were teleport blocks there. You were supposed to enter the boss through a pipe, and there was an NPC before the pipe you were supposed to talk to too. Also I mentioned earlier in this thread that originally the level had no boss, but flameofdoubt suggested it because he felt the level ended too inconclusively. The boss seems pretty pointless now.

But yeah this was the second level I made for this hack. I made it right after THUMP was cleared. I clearly had more fun with the technical aspects of the level (water phanto, changing water color) than the actual level design. I have more faith in my other two levels which were made a lot later iirc, but they'll probably be not so good either. Whatever, it's still pretty fun to watch someone play my stuff as you would expect!

[Rixithechao]

Oh ye gods, what have I done!?
Rocky for most likely to derail or abort a thread just by posting 2014
Left my thoughts in the video comments, wish I had more to contribute. Kinda feel like I'm failing as a game designer/rao fan if that's all I can bring to the table after following all y'all for as long as I've been

[Saturn Moriya]

Today's video description says important things. It's great to give alot of new designers a chance to make a level for a collab, but that does mean there's gonna be ALOT of work refining their levels. Or at least there should've been. With both this and the ASM-heavyness of A2MT, there's alot that can go wrong. And with all the management troubleys and biggeset ASMT peeps being tired, there's not enough power to make it all happen.

A beach is pretty well done, though it does have alot of questionable non-obstacles. It could've been very good, but as it stands it's just sorta almost okay. I liked the overall style, it's just unpolished to a degree where it stands in the way of enjoyment. The amount of empty room and singlerouted empty section jumps stand in the way of it feeling like an actual level.

[raocow]

Honestly those teleport blocks make no sense when you can clearly see the red goopa afterwards.

You know what I said in the description? It goes without saying that 'refinement' has to make sense and not break things!!!

[Willhart]

Those koopas had tiny mustaches.

[Sebby19]

Man, I have no idea what show you guys are talking about. It sounds like an anime.

I have never seen that colour changing water before, that was really neat!

[Septentrion Pleiades]

So, I guess the boss count of this game is up to two. This was supposed to be a boss heavy hack. We had Rising with Autoscroll Guy, and then this.

[Grounder]

Pily's boss fight was at the very least near complete.

Dunno if it ever made it in, though.

[Xirix]

Man, so much raocow to catch up on, just got my internet back after moving house... had no idea the A2mt base rom would be ready to LP this quickly.

Really enjoying what I've seen so far, shame it had a bucketload of technical issues.

[Cup]

The Phanto jump section would have been a lot of fun as its own level and with a "save at every room" kind of set up. I don't mind trial and error difficulty at all, but it needs frequent checkpoints.


Also

...ALOT...

...ALOT...

Saturn pls

[anonymousbl00dlust]

Regarding the laissez-faire vs quality control thing- I think there is merit to both approaches. I mean, you're certainly going to get better quality with the smwcp2 approach, but there is going to be a lot less individual "voice".

I guess it just comes down to what the goal of the project is supposed to be. Personally, I think colab hacks should be regarded more as an opportunity for members of the community to express themselves. Sometimes that means really crappy levels. If all you want is a polished game, then yeah, quality control is essential.

That being said, if you do just want a polished game, why format the development as an open collaboration in the first place?

[pholtos]

What I think should happen from now on is to let people make levels, to put in their own "voice" so to speak. Then we evaluate said level and apply a polish to said level.

The thing with this method is that people who submit levels need to be ok with their level being polished and possibly changed slightly.

Although that's just my thought on the matter.

[S.N.N.]

I mean, you're certainly going to get better quality with the smwcp2 approach, but there is going to be a lot less individual "voice".

What I don't understand is why people have compared (and will continue to compare) the two hacks. ASMT and SMWCP were comparable in that they both were run pretty much the same way, but A2MT and SMWCP2 had very, very different goals in mind. I'm also not sure if SMWCP2 has a -lot- less individual voice - yes, it's more cohesive, and yes, it's more "predictable" in what you can expect in terms of progression, but the actual levels themselves will have more than enough going for them and have enough personality to be memorable.

[anonymousbl00dlust]

What I think should happen from now on is to let people make levels, to put in their own "voice" so to speak. Then we evaluate said level and apply a polish to said level.

The thing with this method is that people who submit levels need to be ok with their level being polished and possibly changed slightly.

Although that's just my thought on the matter.

Thats exactly what quality control is.

Who evaluates the levels though? If you give that power to some small group of people, their personal taste is going to spread through the entire game. Then you might as well have let that group make a colab by themselves. On the other hand, if you have the evaluation be more democratic, you're going to get a single, mob voice consisting of average to sub-par level designers (see smwcp1).

EDIT: To be clear, I'm not saying your approach is necessarily wrong. I just don't see how it could be done.

[Willhart]

One group can focus on finding problems to fix and another will focus on fixing them. If the changes are only difficulty related or bugs, fixing those should not effect the meat of that level. Larger problems should be avoided in the process of getting those levels aproved to the game before large scale testing.

[MrDeePay]

Regarding the laissez-faire vs quality control thing- I think there is merit to both approaches. I mean, you're certainly going to get better quality with the smwcp2 approach, but there is going to be a lot less individual "voice".

How so?

I guess it just comes down to what the goal of the project is supposed to be. Personally, I think colab hacks should be regarded more as an opportunity for members of the community to express themselves. Sometimes that means really crappy levels. If all you want is a polished game, then yeah, quality control is essential.

QA is essential for all games, whether they are single efforts or collaborations. The only type of game should get a free pass because of poor/no QA are contest compilations.

That being said, if you do just want a polished game, why format the development as an open collaboration in the first place?

So your product can be taken more seriously the further you drift away from the "inner circle" of people that's putting forth the effort.

Thats exactly what quality control is.

Who evaluates the levels though?

People that know what they're talking about and are not afraid to say no.

If you give that power to some small group of people, their personal taste is going to spread through the entire game. Then you might as well have let that group make a colab by themselves.

It won't if these people know what not to touch and to only take care of issues that fall under "common sense problems and solutions"

On the other hand, if you have the evaluation be more democratic, you're going to get a single, mob voice consisting of average to sub-par level designers (see smwcp1).

SMWCP1's QA was minimal, which ironically enough was still better than A2MT's.

[S.N.N.]

On the other hand, if you have the evaluation be more democratic, you're going to get a single, mob voice consisting of average to sub-par level designers (see smwcp1).

SMWCP1 had very little testing done before its release. The problem was a lack of evaluation, not a "democracy".

[The Doctor]

Who evaluates the levels though? If you give that power to some small group of people, their personal taste is going to spread through the entire game.

That's a good thing. Every group project needs a leader. A television series has a group of writers, but one head writer who controls the direction of the show and has the absolute authority to rewrite scripts from other writers as much or as little as he wants or even reject the scripts entirely. That's the only way you can get a good TV show. Games need to be run the same way.

[Willhart]

Anything story related should be done by the minority, but the original authors should be able to effect how their levels are altered. They should be allowed to make changes if they want to.

[anonymousbl00dlust]

What I don't understand is why people have compared (and will continue to compare) the two hacks. ASMT and SMWCP were comparable in that they both were run pretty much the same way, but A2MT and SMWCP2 had very, very different goals in mind.

That's sort of my entire point. Both approaches are ok, but you have to stick to one. Problems arise when people disagree about those goals.

I'm also not sure if SMWCP2 has a -lot- less individual voice - yes, it's more cohesive, and yes, it's more "predictable" in what you can expect in terms of progression, but the actual levels themselves will have more than enough going for them and have enough personality to be memorable.

Oh, I'm sure it will have personality. It's just a different kind of personality.

EDIT: it's good to see I picked my avatar well

[MrDeePay]

Anything story related should be done by the minority, but the original authors should be able to effect how their levels are altered. They should be allowed to make changes if they want to.

Sometimes the author isn't available.

Sometimes the changes do not or should not require their approval.

[pholtos]

Ok well what about this. Peeps who submit levels who actually stick around will get advice on how to make their level less... *insert word here* and then make changes to overall improve whatever's wrong, whether it's aesthetically or otherwise.

Meanwhile peeps who made levels but vanish off the face of the earth can have their levels changed based off of a given consensus over a large number of people... maybe.

[Bwarch]

BAD, HORRIBLE, AWFUL, LESS THAN STELLAR.

~These are the words and phrases Pholtos doesn't like to uuuuuuse~

[Willhart]

Anything story related should be done by the minority, but the original authors should be able to effect how their levels are altered. They should be allowed to make changes if they want to.

Sometimes the author isn't available.

Sometimes the changes do not or should not require their approval.

They don't need to approve the changes, but they should have the right to complain.

[anonymousbl00dlust]

On the other hand, if you have the evaluation be more democratic, you're going to get a single, mob voice consisting of average to sub-par level designers (see smwcp1).

SMWCP1 had very little testing done before its release. The problem was a lack of evaluation, not a "democracy".

Fair enough, its not a great example. But you can't deny that level design philosophy at smwc during that time period was incredibly homogeneic. There wasn't direct quality control, but the general forum culture shaped people to make levels in a very specific way. That kind of mob mentality was more what I was referencing.