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VLDC9 - vanilla level design contest 9

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Re: VLDC9 - vociferous loveliness dusty commons 9

Post by Nimono »

-whoop can't delete anymore ignore this-
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Re: VLDC9 - vociferous loveliness dusty commons 9

Post by Lockirby2 »

There were a lot of things that were great about this level. The throwbacks to Hostel were pretty great. When I first saw the entrance, I started debating back and forth to myself for a while whether this level was a Hostel reference (I didn't remember who the author was, and I didn't find the entrance to the secret exit until after I completed the normal exit). Finding that entrance at that point was pretty cool, and it didn't disappoint on the creepy factor. The level also looked really nice and had some cool gameplay ideas.

All that being said though, I enjoyed this level a lot less than I could have. Placing finicky obstacles that kill you instantly and have little room for error *after* a ton of slow paced obstacles where you have to take your time (especially if the level is long) is one of my least favourite things in SMW level design (incidentally, this is a large reason why I dislike VIP 1). I understand that the author introduced the wall triangles in safe areas and made them more dangerous later, but the level ramped up way too quickly and suddenly in a level that was too long to handle it. I died half as many times as raocow did on that one obstacle, and I was still annoyed. And the buildup to the secret exit falls flat on every subsequent attempt. That part really should have been skipped with a 1-up mushroom midpoint, IMO. I guess it helps that the secret exit took me 3-4 times as many attempts as raocow needed.

I would probably give this level a decently high score, but it would definitely not approach 50.
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Re: VLDC9 - vociferous loveliness dusty commons 9

Post by ft029 »

This level aside, I'm super looking forward to some of the other levels in this world for various reasons.

Also, the cable car thing. It's weird.

I immediately died upon entering the top-left station due to Mario being in a weird position on the screen.

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Re: VLDC9 - vociferous loveliness dusty commons 9

Post by Grounder »

ft029 wrote:This level aside, I'm super looking forward to some of the other levels in this world for various reasons.

Also, the cable car thing. It's weird.

I immediately died upon entering the top-left station due to Mario being in a weird position on the screen.

What happened after that?

I didn't think something like that could happen in SMW.
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Re: VLDC9 - vociferous loveliness dusty commons 9

Post by Zephyr_DragonLord »

Nimono wrote:jesus why am I so hated on youtube now

EDIT: ALSO raocow IF YOU SEE THE DISCUSSIONS REGARDING ME ON THE YOUTUBE COMMENTS PLEASE DO NOT CALL THEM OUT AT ALL, THANK YOU :> I'd much rather it just blow over and hopefully be forgotten than attention be brought to it, and if for some reason you were to take my side, hate might get directed toward you and I don't wanna see that
Hey, I completely understand why you feel this way. Triangle blocks are nonsense to the highest caliber. Despite that....

Hotel does quite a lot of things right. First of all, the atmosphere is good. Secondly, the music is nice. And most importantly... the gameplay is (mostly) really solid. The birds are hilarious, and then the inexplicably have munchers under them...

One other small grip I have is that there's no real indication that the birds have different properties besides their movement, but changing that would make it non-vanilla.

Also, those repeated deaths from hitting the ceiling were incredibly silly. raocow manages to find some of the most amusing/sad demos out there, and completely by accident...

Also,

nice

.
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Re: VLDC9 - vociferous loveliness dusty commons 9

Post by ft029 »

I think it was just raocow who didn't notice that it was just a reskinned porcupuffer, lol
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Re: VLDC9 - vociferous loveliness dusty commons 9

Post by Lockirby2 »

Zephyr_DragonLord wrote: Hotel does quite a lot of things right. First of all, the atmosphere is good. Secondly, the music is nice. And most importantly... the gameplay is (mostly) really solid. The birds are hilarious, and then the inexplicably have munchers under them...
I'm pretty sure that the birds are supposed to be holding the munchers as weapons to attack Mario. Which is also pretty hilarious.

Also, I'm pretty sure that the judges can't consider music since it is not vanilla. I feel like the music is for the benefit of the players of the compilation and the judges' sanity. So even if it is nice, I don't think it should affect the rankings.
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Re: VLDC9 - vociferous loveliness dusty commons 9

Post by S.N.N. »

Nimono wrote:jesus why am I so hated on youtube now
Nimono wrote:EDIT: ALSO raocow IF YOU SEE THE DISCUSSIONS REGARDING ME ON THE YOUTUBE COMMENTS PLEASE DO NOT CALL THEM OUT AT ALL, THANK YOU :>
I mean, you continue to paint a really dramatic target on yourself with the constant caps lock retaliations at people (not just here, on YT as well). Maybe learn to ignore these things/MrDeePay's jabs at you and you'd be a little better off. It has worked for most other people in your situation.
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Re: VLDC9 - vociferous loveliness dusty commons 9

Post by Nimono »

S.N.N. wrote:I mean, you continue to paint a really dramatic target on yourself with the constant caps lock retaliations at people (not just here, on YT as well). Maybe learn to ignore these things/MrDeePay's jabs at you and you'd be a little better off. It has worked for most other people in your situation.
........You know, you have a point there. I should really stop that.

:oops: Sorry! I just get caught in my depression sometimes.
Zephyr_DragonLord wrote:ey, I completely understand why you feel this way. Triangle blocks are nonsense to the highest caliber. Despite that....

Hotel does quite a lot of things right. First of all, the atmosphere is good. Secondly, the music is nice. And most importantly... the gameplay is (mostly) really solid. The birds are hilarious, and then the inexplicably have munchers under them...

One other small grip I have is that there's no real indication that the birds have different properties besides their movement, but changing that would make it non-vanilla.

Also, those repeated deaths from hitting the ceiling were incredibly silly. raocow manages to find some of the most amusing/sad demos out there, and completely by accident...

Also,

nice

.
Mm. Personally, I really liked the first half of the level, but the second half...uggghh. It's not about the triangle blocks, it's possible to use those in a great way. See: first half. But then it just got ridiculous with little room for error, so I felt it deserved its low score after that. Also, while the music was nice, we were explicitly told that it could not count for score because the contest is vanilla, and custom music is not vanilla. (The notion baffles me, since music DOES change a person's thoughts on a level, but what can ya do!) The secret exit path, I didn't like, either. Like, sure, it's a funny call-back to Hostel 1 and 2, and gives a good few mushrooms to tank hits with, but I still don't think it's very well-designed. Go slow at all on the ropes (which most people will do since you can't see ahead of you without the spotlight), you're either dead if you don't have a mushroom, or you have to take a forced hit if you do because the swooper ceiling descends on you in a way that makes it near-impossible to jump to the next spot safely.

Overall, great ideas, marred by not-so-good execution, in my opinion.
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Re: VLDC9 - vociferous loveliness dusty commons 9

Post by raocow »

haha, I just saw that comment thread

don't worry yo I won't mention anything, but yeah. just let it simmer.
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Re: VLDC9 - vociferous loveliness dusty commons 9

Post by Mata Hari »

I suspect you weren't supposed to be smishable in the boat level but nobody noticed it could happen except you

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Re: VLDC9 - veneered liners diverse coasts 9

Post by FrozenQuills »

Maple Island is pretty nice. I like how diverse it got with its environments (beaches, water, and forests) even if it felt a bit too typical in its design. Aesthetics is definitely its main selling point.

Speaking of which, Triangle Ship blew me away with its aesthetics. I only found the design and creativity to be alright though; it had some sorta interesting nonlinear design and some (extremely easy) puzzles, but not much else. I can see it getting a 10 in aesthetics, but I personally felt like it got high scores in other categories because of how nice it looks.
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Re: VLDC9 - veneered liners diverse coasts 9

Post by Zephyr_DragonLord »

raocow will forever continue to find inexplicable ways to die right before the end. This is a known fact of the universe.

Both of the levels today looked incredibly nice. Maple Island had some of the prettiest backgrounds out there. More importantly, it also played like a longer vanilla SMW level. Very nice for something that just uses base assets. I like the Switch Blocks in the underwater section.

Also, Triangle Ship was AMAZING looking. I can't get enough of that saturation and atmosphere. Most of this level also plays nice, but I agree with Nimono when I say that the few flaws don't bring this level down at all. Given, I do understand Koopster's score. He must have disliked the obtuseness with that 4th Dragon Coin.

That was a good Switch Palace. Nice.
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Re: VLDC9 - veneered liners diverse coasts 9

Post by snoruntpyro »

Personally I really dislike Triangle Ship. It looks great but has some pretty nonsensical and weird design. It's kind of all over the place and the whole level is basically about lugging items around. Plus the "puzzles" are very breakable, suggesting a lack of testing. Also random pointless star run at the end?? It's kind of a mess. I don't think it should have gotten 13th.
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Re: VLDC9 - veneered liners diverse coasts 9

Post by morsel/morceau »

Triangle Ship looks ridiculous. The ghost ship in smw uses the tiles that look like wood, thereby giving the feeling that it is in fact a ship. Triangle Ship uses bricks and the giant monolithic castle stones, which means it looks, with all respect to raocow and others, nothing like a fucking ship.

I also feel a vehement need to moan about adding decorations to dirt. Maple Island is one of the more obnoxious in this regard, with its tiresome mole mindgames, but it seems to be a general fad that people are choosing random graphics they don't remember having been added to dirt before and then adding them to dirt. As well as the ubiquitous mole holes, we will see: bones; rocks; stars that are sky-stars; stars that are power-ups (with other sorts of power-ups); berries (both static and dancing); even overworld level icons -- and possibly many other things I have obliterated from memory. Pray let the practice end.
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Re: VLDC9 - veneered liners diverse coasts 9

Post by Grounder »

morsel/morceau wrote:Triangle Ship looks ridiculous. The ghost ship in smw uses the tiles that look like wood, thereby giving the feeling that it is in fact a ship. Triangle Ship uses bricks and the giant monolithic castle stones, which means it looks, with all respect to raocow and others, nothing like a fucking ship.

I also feel a vehement need to moan about adding decorations to dirt. Maple Island is one of the more obnoxious in this regard, with its tiresome mole mindgames, but it seems to be a general fad that people are choosing random graphics they don't remember having been added to dirt before and then adding them to dirt. As well as the ubiquitous mole holes, we will see: bones; rocks; stars that are sky-stars; stars that are power-ups (with other sorts of power-ups); berries (both static and dancing); even overworld level icons -- and possibly many other things I have obliterated from memory. Pray let the practice end.
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Re: VLDC9 - veneered liners diverse coasts 9

Post by lolyoshi »

Grounder wrote:
morsel/morceau wrote:Triangle Ship looks ridiculous. The ghost ship in smw uses the tiles that look like wood, thereby giving the feeling that it is in fact a ship. Triangle Ship uses bricks and the giant monolithic castle stones, which means it looks, with all respect to raocow and others, nothing like a fucking ship.

I also feel a vehement need to moan about adding decorations to dirt. Maple Island is one of the more obnoxious in this regard, with its tiresome mole mindgames, but it seems to be a general fad that people are choosing random graphics they don't remember having been added to dirt before and then adding them to dirt. As well as the ubiquitous mole holes, we will see: bones; rocks; stars that are sky-stars; stars that are power-ups (with other sorts of power-ups); berries (both static and dancing); even overworld level icons -- and possibly many other things I have obliterated from memory. Pray let the practice end.
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I agree, can we end this "adding random mario-related objects" inside the ground which makes no logical "mario sense" either.
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Re: VLDC9 - veneered liners diverse coasts 9

Post by Nimono »

FrozenQuills wrote:Speaking of which, Triangle Ship blew me away with its aesthetics. I only found the design and creativity to be alright though; it had some sorta interesting nonlinear design and some (extremely easy) puzzles, but not much else. I can see it getting a 10 in aesthetics, but I personally felt like it got high scores in other categories because of how nice it looks.
I personally thought it was a very nice level! Though...you also have to keep in mind that I didn't realize I should've judged for Yoshi Coins as well. That might've changed my opinion on the level. Maybe. i dunno. Hindsight's 20/20
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Re: VLDC9 - veneered liners diverse coasts 9

Post by snoruntpyro »

^^ so much yes morsel. There's some levels later on that get OBNOXIOUS with it

(Archaic Architecture, Hilly Desert, Aero Plains....and my own level :v)

. The same also stands for putting more ground inside ground and the all powerful amazing beautiful dirt formations .I really don't understand the logic behind people doing all this stuff. It reaeally doesn't look good at all.

i still don't know what I was thinking when I made my level

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Re: VLDC9 - veneered liners diverse coasts 9

Post by BurntTenda »

When you have the ultimate power of Dirt Formations,
it can... get out of hand.
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Re: VLDC9 - veneered liners diverse coasts 9

Post by Voltgloss »

Pyro wrote:The same also stands for putting more ground inside ground
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you were thinking it too
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Re: VLDC9 - veneered liners diverse coasts 9

Post by Zephyr_DragonLord »

The best thing about the Talkhaus is that you never really know what's going to be the next big discussion. Also, wear a helmet; we're in meme country now. (As a side note, the end of the Maple Island level was transcriped by Youtube like this: "leave me the saltwater die yeah black a great little experience" ...It's kind of hilarious.)
morsel/morceau wrote:Triangle Ship looks ridiculous. The ghost ship in smw uses the tiles that look like wood, thereby giving the feeling that it is in fact a ship. Triangle Ship uses bricks and the giant monolithic castle stones, which means it looks, with all respect to raocow and others, nothing like a fucking ship.

I also feel a vehement need to moan about adding decorations to dirt. Maple Island is one of the more obnoxious in this regard, with its tiresome mole mindgames, but it seems to be a general fad that people are choosing random graphics they don't remember having been added to dirt before and then adding them to dirt. As well as the ubiquitous mole holes, we will see: bones; rocks; stars that are sky-stars; stars that are power-ups (with other sorts of power-ups); berries (both static and dancing); even overworld level icons -- and possibly many other things I have obliterated from memory. Pray let the practice end.
I entirely disagree with Triangle Ship not looking like a ship. While the inside of the ship looks a bit different, do remember that this is using purely vanilla resources... castle stones are most likely a substitute for pillars, and it shows how flexible the SMW base tools really are.

Also, I actually really dig that you can break the small puzzle sections... they aren't much of puzzles, so keeping them open is actually really good design, and helps make it more nonlinear. Notably, the level also gives you the option of getting a cape... and the level isn't broken at all from it, which is incredibly solid design. While I wouldn't be giving Triangle Ship quite a perfect score, it looks like it belongs in a real game, and deserves high marks.

Those dirt decorations ARE silly, and I never understood their use to make dirt/soil prettier... though I feel as though they could be nice storytelling elements, when used wisely. No one thinks about that, however. I kind of want to meme, and poke fun at this practice while using them.. I have a few ideas in that regard.
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Re: VLDC9 - veneered liners diverse coasts 9

Post by Mata Hari »

I thought grass-on-logs syndrome was a SMBX thing but not even
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Re: VLDC9 - veneered liners diverse coasts 9

Post by Ivy »

Pyro wrote::v)
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Re: VLDC9 - veneered liners diverse coasts 9

Post by ft029 »

Interplanetary uses dirt formations, bones sticking out of the ground, and other A E S T H E T I C features in a non-horrible way in my opinion.
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