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A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 31 Jan 2020, 21:04
by Hoeloe
Hey there everyone!

Wow it's been a heck of a road to get to this point. Lots of changing tech, huge overhauls in how various communities are structured, all sorts of stuff. It's become a bit of a meme that A2XT is perpetually on hold.

The truth is, it's never been on hold, there's just been a TON of work going on quietly to keep pace with changing technology, and give it some serious production values. And now, it's finally time to enter the next stage:

The A2XT2 Devkit is ready to roll!

Before we get to the download links, just a quick rundown of how this will work. There's been a lot of planning done for worlds, towns, bosses, themes, and even the entire story has been planned out. The majority of the levels have been in place for a long time, there are just a few left over that need to be made, and there are a few guidelines for that.

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I want to make a new level
Great! Because of all the planning we've done, there are a few slots available with specific themes, but we can't just accommodate the "make anything and we'll find space" attitude that we did before. These slots aren't hard-and-fast, but they are places where the game currently has "gaps" that we'd like to see filled. There is a spreadsheet of current levels, but if you would rather avoid spoilers, you would be best to talk to the core devteam about reserving a slot. Should you wish to look at the available slots, though, the spreadsheet is here:
When making a new level in the editor, to ensure you're working within the devkit, you should save the level as soon as possible into your devkit episode folder, and then reload PGE's configuration pack (just restarting PGE will work). This ties your level to the episode and activates all of the episode code for it.

I made a level a million years ago and I want to revisit it
This is fine, but because of some changes to technology and other structures, even if you still have a copy of your level we can't guarantee that the "current" version we have is the same. If you want to revisit your old level, let someone on the core devteam know, and we'll see about sending the currently "up to date" copy.

I want to make a town/boss/story scene
Please refer to the relevant handbook:
Town Guide
Boss Guide
Message System Guide
Cutscene Guide
Testing and Debugging Guide


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And with that, all that's left is the download links! There are two links available, one for the devkit itself, and one containing several levels, including the game's opening. These levels can be used for reference, but should be avoided if you are intending to experience the game spoiler-free.


DEVKIT
LEVEL PACK

Re: A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 11 Feb 2020, 06:17
by TiKi
I'm asking in the devkit thread because it's asset-related and I'm not sure if this deserves its own thread, so here I go...

So the devkit is replacing all of the Nintendo assets, right? Does that mean that A2XT will be a "copyright-free game" or will there still be graphics and music from Nintendo games allowed?

Re: A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 11 Feb 2020, 15:01
by Hoeloe
Not quite. The devkit replaces most nintendo assets but there are still a few left in there.

The aim is for episode 3 to hopefully remove all nintendo assets so the game can stand on its own.

Re: A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 15 Feb 2020, 11:02
by ztarwuff
I'll definitely need to go over my levels again, and especially the World 6 Castle level I was working on. The latter is a retread of every World 6 level, so when you're done with qqqqqq, I need a copy to see what can be incorporated into it.

One question, though: How does this Devkit work? Do I download a copy of SMBX2 and overwrite the files with this? Also, I put some levels into a World folder to see what changes you've made, but none of the assets would load.

Re: A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 15 Feb 2020, 12:14
by Emral
ztarwuff wrote: 4 years ago I'll definitely need to go over my levels again, and especially the World 6 Castle level I was working on. The latter is a retread of every World 6 level, so when you're done with qqqqqq, I need a copy to see what can be incorporated into it.

One question, though: How does this Devkit work? Do I download a copy of SMBX2 and overwrite the files with this? Also, I put some levels into a World folder to see what changes you've made, but none of the assets would load.
I believe it's just an episode folder for A2XT2. No replacements of basegame assets necessary.

Re: A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 15 Feb 2020, 18:50
by SAJewers
Ye\ah, just chuck everything in the worlds folder, and throw your levels inside.

Re: A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 16 Feb 2020, 05:10
by Isrieri
I just got word of this and I had a nostalgia shock. I completely forgot all about this.

I love the new graphics and assets for the devkit. The Demo crew in particular have lovely new sprites that make them pop off the screen more, and my favorite thing about these ASMT-themed things is the amazing spritework. Some of the new stuff is kind of perplexing like the NPCs in the actors tab, but this is a tremendous amount of work and its just kinda being plopped here so I want to say thanks for this impressive overhaul.

I only made one stage and I still think its pretty alright even with old & busted autoscroll.

Re: A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 16 Feb 2020, 13:16
by ztarwuff
SAJewers wrote: 4 years ago Ye\ah, just chuck everything in the worlds folder, and throw your levels inside.
Well, I must be doing something incredibly wrong, because all the configuration luas keep returning a nil value error.

Image

I'm using SMBX 2.0 Beta 4 and I've tried putting it into an A2XT folder within Worlds and directly into the Worlds folder. I get nil value error both times. I've tried installing it in a folder that isn't Onedrive, and I still get them.

Re: A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 16 Feb 2020, 13:57
by SAJewers
Isrieri wrote: 4 years ago I just got word of this and I had a nostalgia shock. I completely forgot all about this.

I love the new graphics and assets for the devkit. The Demo crew in particular have lovely new sprites that make them pop off the screen more, and my favorite thing about these ASMT-themed things is the amazing spritework. Some of the new stuff is kind of perplexing like the NPCs in the actors tab, but this is a tremendous amount of work and its just kinda being plopped here so I want to say thanks for this impressive overhaul.

I only made one stage and I still think its pretty alright even with old & busted autoscroll.
I mean, there are I believe still levels that need to be made (though mainly things like towns afaik), and I'm sure the team could use help fixing up some older levels whose authors aren't around anymore.

Re: A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 16 Feb 2020, 15:51
by Hoeloe
I'm not convinced you're using Beta 4 if that's your error. Are you sure you aren't using MAGLX3 or PAL?

Re: A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 17 Feb 2020, 03:16
by Isrieri
SAJewers wrote: 4 years agoI mean, there are I believe still levels that need to be made (though mainly things like towns afaik), and I'm sure the team could use help fixing up some older levels whose authors aren't around anymore.
Just looking at Temporis alone I don't think I'm anywhere close to qualified to make any towns but I'm game for fixing up levels. What sort of work do you need done? When I peeked at the level list it seems to me everything's either being claimed or is complete?

Re: A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 17 Feb 2020, 03:57
by Hoeloe
Isrieri wrote: 4 years ago
SAJewers wrote: 4 years agoI mean, there are I believe still levels that need to be made (though mainly things like towns afaik), and I'm sure the team could use help fixing up some older levels whose authors aren't around anymore.
Just looking at Temporis alone I don't think I'm anywhere close to qualified to make any towns but I'm game for fixing up levels. What sort of work do you need done? When I peeked at the level list it seems to me everything's either being claimed or is complete?
There's still a few special level slots that haven't been claimed, so if you wanted to, you could work on one of those. Aside from that, it's basically building cutscenes, bosses, getting the hub sorted out, building world maps, and polishing up all the existing levels.

Also, if you do want to take a town, there's plenty of people who can help work you through it, so don't worriy if you don't feel up to the tech side.

Re: A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 17 Feb 2020, 20:14
by ztarwuff
Hoeloe wrote: 4 years ago I'm not convinced you're using Beta 4 if that's your error. Are you sure you aren't using MAGLX3 or PAL?
Finally got it to work. Turns out I still had an old copy of PGE floating around and had to break the file association with the old one and reassign lvl files to the new one.

I see the devkit is overwriting my custom NPC graphics for my old copy of the levels. Something to do with overwriting the basegame graphics with the A2XT graphics, I'm presuming.

Re: A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 17 Feb 2020, 23:17
by Hoeloe
ztarwuff wrote: 4 years ago
Hoeloe wrote: 4 years ago I'm not convinced you're using Beta 4 if that's your error. Are you sure you aren't using MAGLX3 or PAL?
Finally got it to work. Turns out I still had an old copy of PGE floating around and had to break the file association with the old one and reassign lvl files to the new one.

I see the devkit is overwriting my custom NPC graphics for my old copy of the levels. Something to do with overwriting the basegame graphics with the A2XT graphics, I'm presuming.
It... shouldn't be doing that. Custom graphics should work perfectly fine. I will say that old copies of the levels are very much NOT guaranteed to work or be at all what we have now in the current build. We did a lot of polishing and tweaking to make things work, so if you want to go back to your old levels, we can give you a copy of what we have.

Re: A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 18 Feb 2020, 07:42
by Rixithechao
Honestly the copy we have on the full game's repo is similarly broken. We haven't gotten to w6 with our technical/asset review yet, but since you asked about it here I checked and found it has both the broken graphics and leftover code and content for the boss; the latter's since been split off into its own level like the game's other boss fights.

I've started working on removing that stuff and implementing a cleaner, file structure-based setup for the main gimmick (so you'll be able to make a subfolder for each style and then just call a function to make the swap). I'll send it your way as soon as I'm done, though this week is going to be busy for me irl so it may be this weekend at the earliest.

Re: A2XT2 DEVKIT

Posted: 18 Feb 2020, 08:44
by ztarwuff
Hoeloe wrote: 4 years ago
ztarwuff wrote: 4 years ago
Hoeloe wrote: 4 years ago I'm not convinced you're using Beta 4 if that's your error. Are you sure you aren't using MAGLX3 or PAL?
Finally got it to work. Turns out I still had an old copy of PGE floating around and had to break the file association with the old one and reassign lvl files to the new one.

I see the devkit is overwriting my custom NPC graphics for my old copy of the levels. Something to do with overwriting the basegame graphics with the A2XT graphics, I'm presuming.
It... shouldn't be doing that. Custom graphics should work perfectly fine. I will say that old copies of the levels are very much NOT guaranteed to work or be at all what we have now in the current build. We did a lot of polishing and tweaking to make things work, so if you want to go back to your old levels, we can give you a copy of what we have.
Yes, I'll definitely need to review all my levels and ALL the World 6 levels. With Willhart's levels gone, I need to remove the Willhart-themed section from my castle level, and replace it with a qqqqq-themed section. Thanks.

I'll look into seeing what's causing the custom graphics thing. Perhaps I misunderstood what was meant by chucking a level into the worlds folder.