8th VLDC: RIP Ningamer

[Alice]

Also, MrDeePay is probably my favorite judge. He's like the Simon Cowell of the group.

I don't know that I'd compare him to Simon Cowell here. Normally I would (and would probably consider him the worst of the two actually) but here it feels like he's being extremely fair and avoids being too inflammatory and negative.

[raekuul]

I'm tempted to make a Jump Over Enemies level for the next VLDC and call it Joe's House.

[raocow]

really expected the judges to be harsher in their score for this one!

[S.N.N.]

Well, we weren't focused on getting the Dragon Coins. We were focused on beating the level and seeing as much of it as possible (and if that meant leaving a few behind, so be it). Personally, had I went for the coins, I probably would have knocked it down to 40-50/100.

[Losoall]

Oh, btw; just posting this to address that one thing with raocow claiming the tree tops to be the triangle block (?), thus calling it "glitchy blocks".


they are the bottom section of the mid-slope tiles. Sure I designed this to a difficulty that I'm actually fine with (regardless of others), but I can assure you that I did playtest this aggressively.


Might as well throw out the story now:

The original tileset of this level was from an intro to my 2012 vanilla contest entry (Which is right here, and is actually designed to be a normal level). It was the last 5 days to submit a level, and I simply went back into my old .IPS of my 2012 entry and ripped the map16, the BG, and the Palette of the level and decided to reuse it for a quick level.

I guess the idea behind going for this insane difficulty was riding off of me speed running Dark souls 2 previously before making this, and the main thought in my mind was of overly difficult design with having the player being more dependent on memory of enemies patterns and of the player movement itself. You can look at my thread in the contest section on SMWCentral, My intention was dead set on this pretty much from the start.

I can assure everyone that I'll probably make a more reasonable level next year (unless i'm bored and want to laugh at people who make comments suggesting that I'm not aware of what i'm doing, acting as if I have no idea that I made an overly difficult level). I'm leaning on a Limbo style level with layer 3 clouds as an aesthetic or a desert level where the timer is used to indicate the time it takes for the player to die of dehydration and the level will have various "oasis" checkpoints where the timer resets or berries are given to increase the timer.

Videos of the level progress for those who care: first, second, third, Normal playthrough along with Yoshi Coin playthrough, walking only run

[DrTapeworm]

Let us draw the curtain on this sordid scene and turn to more pleasant surroundings.

[Grounder]

all we need to add to the second level is the i wanna be the boshy spider scream

[Miyuron]

Today's German lesson: "Verlassen" means "abandoned".

PS.: Very manly scream. I read the description but it still surprised me.

[anonymousbl00dlust]

all these levels that spammed mole tiles everywhere make "how does mole" that much funnier

[FrozenQuills]

Oh man Goal Hunt was such a good puzzle level; not really sure why it got 49th. Probably because of unfair enemy or obstacle placement? Or maybe the puzzles were too obtuse...
Verlassen looked good too even if it did get 54th. And at least Bright Forest got some fun points for that weird glitchy thing out of nowhere.
Nice breather levels today.

[S.N.N.]

To beat YCZ to the punch, here's my own personal reasons for why I ranked Goal Hunt lower than some of the other entries:

CREATIVE USE OF VANILLA RESOURCES: 20/25
APPROPRIATE DIFFICULTY CURVE: 15/25
OVERALL LEVEL QUALITY: 14/25
AESTHETICS: 20/25

OVERALL: 69/100

COMMENTS: I really liked the idea behind this level (and the Koopa at the start was cute), but between a) the extreme length with no midpoint, and b) constant ambushes from behind the trees, I just couldn't have fun with it.

The midpoint was an addition that occurred after it was placed in the ROM. It did not exist in the original entry.

[raocow]

oh wow, no yeah the midpoint is kind of crucial in making the level good

[10204307]

The random falling glitched sprite in Bright Forest is probably, hands down, the best moment in the entire hack. It just comes out of nowhere with no explanation as to why it's there. Just... a random glitchy mess falling diagonally out of the sky. For no reason.

[anonymousbl00dlust]

It seems like there is a general trend for designers to spam priority-enabled foreground tiles (trees, canopies, etc) whenever they make a forest level. A lot of them seen to think it's just an aesthetic, but really it's adding an entire layer of difficulty. And what's worse is that visibility gimmicks are probably the easiest kind of difficulty to screw up-- to do it right you have to design the whole level to accommodate it.

It's like this perfect storm of unintended difficulty coming in the worst possible form.

[yoshicookiezeus]

Seeing Goal Hunt again, something about its level design makes me think of Super Marisa World. I don't have the slightest clue what, though.

JackTheSpades - Verlassen

S.N.N.
CREATIVE USE OF VANILLA RESOURCES: 19/25
APPROPRIATE DIFFICULTY CURVE: 22/25
OVERALL LEVEL QUALITY: 21/25
AESTHETICS: 23/25

OVERALL: 85/100

COMMENTS: I like the atmosphere this level gives off (forest and treehouse-like). While I found some of your sprite placements and usage clever, I don't feel like this level did anything to really help it stand-out from a gameplay perspective. Still, nice work.

Eternity
CREATIVE USE OF VANILLA RESOURCES: 20/25
APPROPRIATE DIFFICULTY CURVE: 22/25
OVERALL LEVEL QUALITY: 20/25
AESTHETICS: 21/25

OVERALL: 83/100

COMMENTS: Not bad overall. Has some interesting sprite placements and it's great visually, but it doesn't do anything unique or stands out when comparing it to other levels.

MrDeePay
Creativity: 5/25
Curves: 10/25
Level: 10/25
Aesthetics: 20/25

Overall: 45/100

Comments: This level feels very busy and I don't mean that in a good way either. There is a crowded sense to it as it relies on palettes that feel too close in relation to the BG/FG and incohesive sprite setups. (Enemy spam, a clear lack of flow, etc.) Aesthetically it looks nice, though you missed a spot partway through the level (produces cutoff, OH NO! D:) and the layer 3 backround seems to colored in the wrong direction.

DanielGolosneanu10 - Bright Forest

S.N.N.
CREATIVE USE OF VANILLA RESOURCES: 17/25
APPROPRIATE DIFFICULTY CURVE: 15/25
OVERALL LEVEL QUALITY: 12/25
AESTHETICS: 13/25

OVERALL: 57/100

COMMENTS: I can tell there were a few good ideas here (double-ended vines with hurt blocks on either end), but the overall design of the level felt sloppy. There were very tricky jumps earlier on, and then really easy areas later (e.g. a big pit of water with one shelless Koopa on the right side).

Eternity
CREATIVE USE OF VANILLA RESOURCES: 5/25
APPROPRIATE DIFFICULTY CURVE: 0/25
OVERALL LEVEL QUALITY: 1/25
AESTHETICS: 2/25

OVERALL: 8/100

COMMENTS: This... just doesn't work. The design is very awkward and all over the place, and the level lacks any sort of consistency or anything to make it unique. Aesthetically it doesn't do much, but some things (the overly bright backround and the random Map16 work) aren't very appealing.

MrDeePay
Creativity: 12/25
Curves: 9/25
Level: 8/25
Aesthetics: 13/25

Overall: 42/100

Comments: That BG is perhaps too bright, to be honest. Level-design wise, it feels like everything was put together haphazardly and to needlessly pad an already empty level out even more- as everything feels there just to be there. There is little variety in what you're doing and frequent repetition in what you're doing, like it's needless and to pad the level out.

SyStemkraSh - Goal Hunt

S.N.N.
see above

Eternity
CREATIVE USE OF VANILLA RESOURCES: 20/25
APPROPRIATE DIFFICULTY CURVE: 18/25
OVERALL LEVEL QUALITY: 16/25
AESTHETICS: 19/25

OVERALL: 73/100

COMMENTS: This level would've been higher if not for how long it is and how some of the trees obscure too much of the level, making ambushes rather common. The koopa at the start was a neat but simple touch and the level's designed nicely overall, with some clever puzzles and interesting enemy placement, but the two points mentioned before take off some of the fun, unfortunately.

MrDeePay
Creativity: 22/25
Curves: 17/25
Level: 11/25
Aesthetics: 25/25

Overall: 75/100

Comments: Too long to have no checkpoint, too luck-based to have no checkpoint (the P-Switch Doors you need to find will end up being red herrings- wasting precious time, and too small of a time limit to have no checkpoint.) Your concept is nice- but your execution is enough to severly hamper the gameplay. The setting of a very dense is absolutely amazing, however.

[S.N.N.]

As odd as it may seem, SomeGuy712x did in fact state that the multitude of Dragon Coins was on purpose.

SHRUG.

[FrozenQuills]

Cool levels today. Second level was a bit much in terms of 'ground art' but it had a really interesting application of those eating blocks so yeah it's interesting.
(btw raocow you should've used [ \ / ] or something as the title for this one cause of the eating blocks lol.)

[Octagon]

active kindness against strangers is discouraged and scrutinized

I'm kinda sad about Goal Hunt. Eschewing a midpoint in longer levels is never a good idea, especially if they're trial and error puzzles.
I'm not sure if the atmosphere would be as nice without the annoying foreground, but it's really not worth messing up the gameplay.

This hack should see a dermatologist, with the emergence of moles everywhere.

After the random namedrop, the rhombs in Eating Block Ruins had me looking for Fez cube shards. And somehow I wasn't expecting Touhou music anywhere in this hack.

SomeGuy made a resource video on eating blocks years ago. It's interesting to see how that knowledge was incorporated here.

[Zygl]

re: all those dragon coins
I can't seem to find the VLDC8 discussion thread to confirm but I recall SomeGuy712x saying at one point that he always has 7 dragon coins, a moon and two exits in his levels. Or something like that.

e: Actually he mentioned in the YouTube comments that he did indeed have a moon in there so it's probably that combination, yeah.

[raocow]

hah, like in his name

okay I kinda get it now

[Imipolex G]

Clever secret exit puzzle in someguy's level. Also had two musical selections I like a lot, so I give it a thumbs up, in spite of the fact that I usually dislike those moving block snake things.

[MonkeyShrapnel]

hah, like in his name
okay I kinda get it now

like in his name

his name

name

Illuminati confirmed

[Willhart]

I feel like having more dragon coins only makes them more rewarding to get, especially when they are well placed.

Also, the first level would have looked better without those holes.

[Jesuiscontent]

It's not that uncommon to have 5+ dragon coins, even the original SMW did this a few times. And as Willhart said it's the only way to get multiple rewards for them.

[yoshicookiezeus]

Oh man, almost forgot about today's judge comments.

JaphethMario21st - Rex's Shroom Garden

S.N.N.
CREATIVE USE OF VANILLA RESOURCES: 18/25
APPROPRIATE DIFFICULTY CURVE: 18/25
OVERALL LEVEL QUALITY: 17/25
AESTHETICS: 20/25

OVERALL: 73/100

COMMENTS: While not a bad level, one key flaw that really brought it down was how cramped everything was. Most of the time I found enemies far too difficult to dodge because the roof got in the way. I liked the overall aesthetic, but I think you went a tad overboard on decorations. Also, the midpoint should have been pushed back a bit, as it came a bit early on.

Eternity
CREATIVE USE OF VANILLA RESOURCES: 19/25
APPROPRIATE DIFFICULTY CURVE: 18/25
OVERALL LEVEL QUALITY: 20/25
AESTHETICS: 17/25

OVERALL: 74/100

COMMENTS: This would be a really neat level if there was more space to navigate. For the most part it was really cramped which made a few obstacles harder than they should be.

MrDeePay
Creativity: 15/25
Curves: 25/25
Level: 20/25
Aesthetics: 23/25

Overall: 83/100

Comments: An average, basic level that plays it mostly safe. Pretty much everything in here has been done (to death) before, but it does a respectable job on it nonetheless. It doesn't mean that this level is "bad".

SomeGuy712x - Eating Block Ruins

S.N.N.
CREATIVE USE OF VANILLA RESOURCES: 25/25
APPROPRIATE DIFFICULTY CURVE: 23/25
OVERALL LEVEL QUALITY: 24/25
AESTHETICS: 19/25

OVERALL: 91/100

COMMENTS: Every year, someone decides to make a level that revolves around eating blocks, and every year it feels different and unique. Some of your set-ups were very elaborate and creative, especially towards the end. I feel like all of the floating dirt tiles hindered the level a bit, but on the whole, I really enjoyed the experience.

Eternity
CREATIVE USE OF VANILLA RESOURCES: 24/25
APPROPRIATE DIFFICULTY CURVE: 20/25
OVERALL LEVEL QUALITY: 22/25
AESTHETICS: 18/25

OVERALL: 84/100

COMMENTS: Some really great uses of eating blocks there, and I like how it's not used only with used blocks. The bones part is specially interesting, and I actually got stuck there for a while (lol). It takes a while to actually get interesting and start some of the more unique eating block setups, but it's still a pretty fun level overall. The aesthetics are very distracting, though, with the floating dirt everywhere in the outside sections.

MrDeePay
Creativity: 25/25
Curves: 20/25
Level: 25/25
Aesthetics: 22/25

Overall: 92/100

Comments: Really creative and fair use of block snakes here. The penalty for failing the quicker snakes isn't nearly as harsh as other levels- past or present; nor do any of the setups allow for bad situations because of timing. Aesthetically it looks really nice, though it does dip a little into the "distracting" territory with some of the landmasses. The curve is good, though it does kinda plateau early on. Overall you did a really good job on your execution here.
Other Notes: Death Count: A few times.