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Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

would you like to participate in some fun contests? would you like to create some fun contests? well ^_^
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by Truckeeben »

(oh man an old internet handle I don't use much anymore)

I've never made a level before so my goal is "better than garbage sewer town". Let's see if I can do it
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Juanbro
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by Juanbro »

I would like to try my hand and make a level for this engine, but I don't know how hard or easy to use are Lunar Magic and the other tools.

Compared to the WOHL Engine (or whatever is called) used for SMBX, how "user friendly" are Lunar Magic and tools?
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by idol »

Njord_Nytilflytter wrote:Never used any of these programs before. Anyone know if there are any advantages between GPS and Block tool super deluxe?
i think it's a replacement for BTSD since the latter is quite old. i've been using GPS (which didnt exist when i used to romhack) for this and it's worked really well. very easy to use.
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by S.N.N. »

Juanbro wrote:Compared to the WOHL Engine (or whatever is called) used for SMBX, how "user friendly" are Lunar Magic and tools?
People who use the SMBX editor more frequently tend to find Lunar Magic more difficult to use, but I think it's one of the easiest WYSIWYG editors out there (whereas I think the SMBX editor is a complete pain in the ass to use, so I guess it depends on which you're more accustomed to). Delving into non-vanilla stuff can be a bit tricky, but the game is so absurdly well documented that there is bound to be a resource available for any question you may have.
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by snoruntpyro »

Honestly, once you get the hang of it Lunar Magic is pretty easy to use. At some times I find it more fun to use than SMBX, in fact.
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by TaviTurnip »

I finally got the hang of graphics importing and Map16 and figuring out which buttons to press when, and honestly now the future looks a lot more fun, so yeah, I'd agree that it's enjoyable once you get the ball rolling!

Until said ball gets rolling though, this can happen to you if you poke too many wrong buttons (tiny one-screen spoiler of my level, probably).
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by Juanbro »

S.N.N. wrote:
Juanbro wrote:Compared to the WOHL Engine (or whatever is called) used for SMBX, how "user friendly" are Lunar Magic and tools?
People who use the SMBX editor more frequently tend to find Lunar Magic more difficult to use, but I think it's one of the easiest WYSIWYG editors out there (whereas I think the SMBX editor is a complete pain in the ass to use, so I guess it depends on which you're more accustomed to). Delving into non-vanilla stuff can be a bit tricky, but the game is so absurdly well documented that there is bound to be a resource available for any question you may have.
By the way, I know that there is a tool to put whatever custom music you want for your level, but here is the question...

Do I need to use a program to make the music in the SNES sound format, or does the tool "magically" transforms the music to the format needed?

Of course, I am asking this without investigating mostly due to now having much time right now to investigate and I would really like to put custom music just in case I manage to make a level, but if it is a painful and long process to do that, then I'd avoid that unless I get loads of free time.
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by Coryman »

Juanbro wrote: By the way, I know that there is a tool to put whatever custom music you want for your level, but here is the question...

Do I need to use a program to make the music in the SNES sound format, or does the tool "magically" transforms the music to the format needed?

Of course, I am asking this without investigating mostly due to now having much time right now to investigate and I would really like to put custom music just in case I manage to make a level, but if it is a painful and long process to do that, then I'd avoid that unless I get loads of free time.
To start from scratch with a custom MIDI takes around 5 hours if you don't know what you're doing (from my experience anyways).
You can download a song to put in, in .txt format, and that should take very little effort. If you wanna make a song, you've gotta convert it to a .mml, then to a .txt, and use a program to format it to work with SMW.
If all goes well, it shouldn't take much longer to insert the song than it takes to write.
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by idol »

also, smwcentral has a huge area for songs, so getting something from there and importing it is a lot easier than creating something yourself (plus what youre looking for may already b there)
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by SAJewers »

Juanbro wrote:I would like to try my hand and make a level for this engine, but I don't know how hard or easy to use are Lunar Magic and the other tools.

Compared to the WOHL Engine (or whatever is called) used for SMBX, how "user friendly" are Lunar Magic and tools?
For vanilla stuff, Lunar Magic is vastly better than SMBX's level editor. Compared to PGE Editor, it's about even, though I'd probably give the edge to LM (everything being a resizable is so much better then SMBX's block by block thing)

Where SMBX largely wins is custom resources (especially creating your own), as well has reduced technical limitations.
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by Njord_Nytilflytter »

idol wrote:
Njord_Nytilflytter wrote:Never used any of these programs before. Anyone know if there are any advantages between GPS and Block tool super deluxe?
i think it's a replacement for BTSD since the latter is quite old. i've been using GPS (which didnt exist when i used to romhack) for this and it's worked really well. very easy to use.
Alright thank you Idol. Now I just have to hope the ease of GPS helps with how much trouble LM is giving me so far.

This is going to be one heck of a work period, I can already tell!
I really need to be more active here.
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by Lazy_ »

question: are we allowed to use the MSU-1 patch? mostly just asking because it forces you to use bsnes which is a bit inconvenient
is there an integer overflow when you become 256 years old
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by Diggertron »

I'd forgotten how little of the screen you actually see in SMW
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by FrozenQuills »

If anyone needs help with how to design levels, I highly suggest watching this video.
I find this method very effective in showing off a gimmick.


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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by Slimeman01 »

Question: Can Our Level have a secret exit?
:iris: :demo:
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by raocow »

Lazy_ wrote:question: are we allowed to use the MSU-1 patch? mostly just asking because it forces you to use bsnes which is a bit inconvenient
PERSONALLY I'd rather the level be playable in snes9x for filming purposes, but technically that's not a rule or anything
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by TaviTurnip »

You can always play just that one level in bsnes.
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by S.N.N. »

Slimeman01 wrote:Question: Can Our Level have a secret exit?
Yes it can.
Lazy_ wrote:question: are we allowed to use the MSU-1 patch? mostly just asking because it forces you to use bsnes which is a bit inconvenient
I always judge levels in SNES9X since it's a good all-around emulator, but if you want to use MSU-1, you can do so.

Might be worth having a failsafe/fallback though, just in case (i.e. a non-MSU-1 version).
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by Truckeeben »

I put down a text box and it's still showing the normal 105-1 text even though when I go to the text box editor, 105-1 has what I wrote. What did I do wrong?

EDIT: nvm I figured it out. Lunar Magic is kind of exploding my brain not gonna lie
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by TaviTurnip »

Truckeeben wrote:I put down a text box and it's still showing the normal 105-1 text even though when I go to the text box editor, 105-1 has what I wrote. What did I do wrong?
Did you save the overworld?

Also, uh, I think SMW has a thing where only the "base" (starting) level can have message boxes, but I might be wrong. It's been a super long time since I had to remember what the starting level quirks were (like midpoints).
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by LucasRCD »

Unless you're using a certain custom sprite, it'll only display the 2 messages in the level you entered from. For example: if you entered on level 105 and went to level 25, instead of displaying the messages from that level, it'll instead display the ones from the level you've entered first. In other words: yes, you are correct.
Ugh...
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by Coryman »

All my motivation died with the realisation that my song is only 40 seconds and I need to remake it at least twice as long...
But I've got a month so it's okay!
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by Sturg »

Is anyone here familiar with the Effects tool enough to know whether or not it'll break a custom background when used?
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by Mandew »

Question: Should I declare resources before submitting a level?

Like, beyond just "being allowed" - what's prefferable?
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Re: Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

Post by Truckeeben »

Another noob question which probably just amounts to me missing something obvious, but where are just regular question blocks? I can only find flying and invisible ones

I also can't find the guide line things or the platforms that move on them but I haven't looked around on the internet for where those are yet because I'm kinda trying to take this one map at a time
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