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ASMBXT Level Review Thread

an SMBX collaboration hack!
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derjet
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by derjet »

Since I have some time, I'm going to review some levels:

Lava Clouds - Dangtater
I really... don't get this level.

After playing with God Mode on and looking in the editor, I think I got what I was supposed to do here.

But yeah, there are some kaizo-ish traps in this level (but they aren't that Kaizo, maybe What The Hell?)

Also there's a section where you need to use Bowser's Clown Car, which insta-kills you whenever you touch lava.
I don't think that's a good idea in a level where you need to... well, this:

Image
Stormy Ascent - Kashkabald

Removed because there already was a better review

Lusco Fusco - Kashkabald
- The message with the bubbles is hard to get, maybe you should explain what the P does with some NPC? (The lakitus can burst the bubbles)
- Was the giant wall of blocks necessary?
- Other than that, I think this level is good to go.
- The only problem I think this level has is that the level just has one Dragon Coin, I think it should have 0 or 5, nothing in between
LUNATOWER by kil

Wow, this is the best level I've played so far! Would work perfectly as the last castle, and it has a very interesting workaround for the lack of multiple midpoints. Just some minor problems:
- One of the messages says Didst, it should be Doesn't
- When you hop on a bullet, they show the normal bullet GFX
- Maybe it should be... a little less hard?
Are those reviews... enough?
I'm just looking for things that break the guidelines.
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LaularuKyrumo
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by LaularuKyrumo »

I don't know how much Link testing is going on, and so I have decided to test every single level with link.

Brb while I do such.
"Excuse me, I should be allowed to play Kaizo of my own volition and then spend every episode complaining and asking "why did I play this???" while savescumming."
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Paralars
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by Paralars »

GlitchedGhost wrote:Bastion of Cold and Death by Paralars:
See, that is me, thinking ~world. I completely forgot to add a 2P start.
Then I forgot how spikes don't hurt on the sides and I didn't even realize the blue coins were worth 5.
The coins have been changed, but I think I'll leave the spikes considering how hard it is to safely navigate around them - and they look scarier this way, which is pretty much the point.

The doors are like this on purpose, the red doors are the ones you can't re-enter, because they look somewhat locked.
The glitch probably has to do with the wrapping, I'm not really into that, so I don't know what exactly to change, gonna have to try.

Thanks for the review, I guess there weren't any other major bugs, so that's good.
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shaman
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by shaman »

LaularuKyrumo wrote:I don't know how much Link testing is going on, and so I have decided to test every single level with link.

Brb while I do such.
that's not very useful, since "link" won't be a default playable character, only available for specific levels and after finishing the game
is this videogames?
derjet
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by derjet »

Only One Screen by 8flight
- You can kinda see the color of other levels when you're at the bottom of the next level. Don't know if that's fixable without breaking the secret gimmick
- If the player gets to level 7 with a tanooki it can break the level (don't think it's a big deal though)
- Maybe there should be a way to restart levels like 17? Or maybe make the door descend slower. It's easy to fail that one if the player doesn't know the gimmick beforehand, and since it's one of the last levels, failing it requires the player to restart the whole level.
- The secret room has nothing in common with the starting one.
But yeah, the level works perfectly and could be inserted in its current state.

Life Lift by Docopoper
- Haha, loved the totally smooth transition between cave and bonus :lol:
- Yeah, a pretty good level overall, maybe a bit too hard, but I really enjoyed it, nothing breaks it, could be inserted.
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Paralars
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by Paralars »

8flight:
Only One Screen:
The level starts out interestingly, neat concept, understandable. Simple design, and I thought "there's gonna be more and more features added substantially"
I liked that.
Now this is my journey through playtesting your level:

Room 1-10:
general fun, I'm liking these gimmicks.
You can get stuck left of the grey lock, though, and have to kill yourself.
Room 11:
I'm just gonna jump on this Ninji.. oh, it killed me. Damn, I forgot about the ceiling.
Now I'll just have to do those whole 10 rooms again and, oh, just read the sign, I guess.
Now to press this switch.
I tried about 5 times, then I just put my starting location there, because the first 10 rooms are so easy but take long to redo.
At that point I tried about 30 times to press the switch without dying, I almost came to the conclusion that it was impossible. Then, i did it once and after about 10 more tries I did it again.
It's insanely hard though, all of a sudden.
Room 12:
Why not make the bombs drop from the ceiling? The generator totally freaks out when you let one bomb explode on it.
Room 13:
Fairly easy, if you understand the reference. If not, I guess you'll have to try.
Room 14:
Understood that reference too, but I still fell on a coin once and I thought
"Man, if I wouldn't be cheating the level at this point, I'd have to redo all those rooms again, several times, until I got past the crazy hard Ninji room, so I could try once again"
If someone doesn't get the reference.. well, that would be worse.
Room 15:
Same as room 14, ^2... I mean, precision tile jumping? Really? And if you make one mistake, you get to redo everything again.
Room 16:
I didn't really know what to expect, I pressed the switch, I didn't make it in time, because I had no idea what to do, I saw you don't get another chance... I stopped playing.

So yeah, that's basically that. The problem is, as soon as you make any mistake, you have to restart, and then you get to face this level's difficulty curve, which is basically a 89° angle at room 11.
Also, restarting this level is really boring, at least to me, because it's a mix of knowing what to do and high precision platforming. The first few rooms are basically a nice one-time joke, the late rooms are basically mini-kaizo.
Suicidal boss rush:
I'm sorry, but, seriously?
Well, i liked the idea of a little sequence such as this, but it gets REALLY annoying really fast if you have to restart. Also, tiles just appear out of nowhere without warning, on my first few tries I just died because of lava appearing or something, because I had no idea I just had to stand still on the pipes.
Then the dialogue.. sorry, but I don't get it at all, I found it really dumb honestly, and why the whole raocow thing? I skipped most of the text...
The plant duder boss man guy:
I honestly felt like the object of pure level-designer hate at that point.
I mean, you don't die if you're somewhat cautious, but why does it take like half a minute until a block spawns? What am I supposed to do during that time? Eat a billion radishes so I don't die? I understand having to dodge an attack sequence, but come on.
Then, when you finally get a block and you dare try and pick it up, it just breaks because of all the stuff flying around, I didn't even get to destroy the 3 shield blocks, and I've been playing for a good 10 minutes (without dying, notably)
I don't know if there is anything beyong this point, but that boss completely drained my motivation to play this level..
Well, nothing personal, but did you really test these in their current states and say to yourself
"Well, this is good to go"?
Maybe I'm just terrible at this game, but it was really frustrating to see these good concepts and ideas be annihilated by that unreasonable difficulty.
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Paralars
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by Paralars »

Welcome to River City:
Oh wow, I loved the arcade touch, the gameplay is pretty unique and interesting.
But it gets redundant really fast.
You know, I just killed 6 guys that didn't do any effort to hurt me, why do I have to kill another 4 or so?
And then the enemy type changes and it goes on.
I mean, I never played as Link before, and I beat the level on my second try.
That, and it's pretty short, which both makes it feel a little empty, it's kind of a mini level, because it really just breaks down to:
Kill hammer bros
Kill koopas
Kill mechs
Kill fat shy guys
Kill rabbits
Kill bouncing goopas
And only two of those really hurt you.
I don't know, I like the vibe and detail of your level, but it's somewhat boring to play, as the only challenges are the rifle dudes and the jumping dudes.
Didn't find anything broken, though.
derjet
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by derjet »

Paralars wrote:8flight:
Only One Screen:
The level starts out interestingly, neat concept, understandable. Simple design, and I thought "there's gonna be more and more features added substantially"
I liked that.
Now this is my journey through playtesting your level:

Room 1-10:
general fun, I'm liking these gimmicks.
You can get stuck left of the grey lock, though, and have to kill yourself.
Room 11:
I'm just gonna jump on this Ninji.. oh, it killed me. Damn, I forgot about the ceiling.
Now I'll just have to do those whole 10 rooms again and, oh, just read the sign, I guess.
Now to press this switch.
I tried about 5 times, then I just put my starting location there, because the first 10 rooms are so easy but take long to redo.
At that point I tried about 30 times to press the switch without dying, I almost came to the conclusion that it was impossible. Then, i did it once and after about 10 more tries I did it again.
It's insanely hard though, all of a sudden.
Room 12:
Why not make the bombs drop from the ceiling? The generator totally freaks out when you let one bomb explode on it.
Room 13:
Fairly easy, if you understand the reference. If not, I guess you'll have to try.
Room 14:
Understood that reference too, but I still fell on a coin once and I thought
"Man, if I wouldn't be cheating the level at this point, I'd have to redo all those rooms again, several times, until I got past the crazy hard Ninji room, so I could try once again"
If someone doesn't get the reference.. well, that would be worse.
Room 15:
Same as room 14, ^2... I mean, precision tile jumping? Really? And if you make one mistake, you get to redo everything again.
Room 16:
I didn't really know what to expect, I pressed the switch, I didn't make it in time, because I had no idea what to do, I saw you don't get another chance... I stopped playing.

So yeah, that's basically that. The problem is, as soon as you make any mistake, you have to restart, and then you get to face this level's difficulty curve, which is basically a 89° angle at room 11.
Also, restarting this level is really boring, at least to me, because it's a mix of knowing what to do and high precision platforming. The first few rooms are basically a nice one-time joke, the late rooms are basically mini-kaizo.
I think adding a mid-point there would make the level a lot more bearable, but it'd kill a gimmick.
But yeah, he really should make the later rooms more bearable.


Anyway:

Beach Episode by Holy
- The music sounds... weird (it has some artifacts, if that's the correct word)
- The level seems to be made to be played with Peach, otherwise, the jumps are impossible (or very hard). So, it should have a Peach block at the start.
- What's the player supposed to do here?
Image
That's where I stopped. The level is too hard for me, and it looks hard for the sake of being hard. At least it wasn't that long, but it also wasn't fun (I didn't feel like playing some WTH level, which are Kaizo-hard, but fun). It feels empty and repetitive

I seriously would tone down the difficulty.

If you aren't happy with this review, you should ask someone else to review your level or something I guess.
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SAJewers
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by SAJewers »

Paralars wrote:Welcome to River City:
Oh wow, I loved the arcade touch, the gameplay is pretty unique and interesting.
But it gets redundant really fast.
You know, I just killed 6 guys that didn't do any effort to hurt me, why do I have to kill another 4 or so?
And then the enemy type changes and it goes on.
I mean, I never played as Link before, and I beat the level on my second try.
That, and it's pretty short, which both makes it feel a little empty, it's kind of a mini level, because it really just breaks down to:
Kill hammer bros
Kill koopas
Kill mechs
Kill fat shy guys
Kill rabbits
Kill bouncing goopas
And only two of those really hurt you.
I don't know, I like the vibe and detail of your level, but it's somewhat boring to play, as the only challenges are the rifle dudes and the jumping dudes.
Didn't find anything broken, though.
Noted. I'll see if I can make the enemies harder.

Also, does it really feel short? I didn't think so.
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Paralars
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by Paralars »

It doesn't feel short time-wise, but there's really not a lot of content to it, it just repeats.
You have to do about 5 different basic things in this level, and you learn those pretty fast.
Then you beat the last wave and it just ends, you could add a midpoint there and build a whole second half around this arcade feeling, but I think it's fine as the mini-level it is.

@8flight:
I'm sorry I meant the room with the timed door, that I stopped playing on.
i didn't really consider the reverse door room, that's kind of a no brainer.
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shaman
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by shaman »

Spin! Pierce the Heavens!
that's a very neat idea for a level, but definitely needs some fixes
if you enter the castle and leave, or go through the waterfall, the first thwomps will disappear, making it impossible to proceed without the propeler block
also the jump from the first and second thwops proved to be the hardest part of the level for me haha, I never managed to make it without taking a hit

also the "secret" inside the castle is so neat it deserves a level of it's own, do you mind if I steal the idea? hahaha
is this videogames?
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Paralars
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by Paralars »

Welcome to River City is a lot more interesting to play now.
But you should consider the generators don't spawn anything when there's a rupee lying next to it.
This sort of breaks the entire challenge.
Also, I didn't get the point of the bullets, how were they supposed to ever hit me?
Other than that, it's a lot more diversified and challenging now.
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SAJewers
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by SAJewers »

Ok, moved them 2 blocks up. Give it a try now, should be the same link. Also, is the music loud enough, or should I make it louder?
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Paralars
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by Paralars »

you can still block them.
I also noticed that a boo can persist until the last wave when the bomb generator disappears before you kill the last one.
It's not a big issue, though.
By the way, the pow-block doesn't always work, i.e. kill every enemy.
You should test it yourself and see how you can handle these issues.
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SAJewers
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by SAJewers »

Ok, I'm not sure what to do regarding the POW,as I can't find anything that I can spawn to rain on the remaining Goopas to kill them. I guess maybe give you some hearts so you can tank hits to get the star. As for the Boos. I made it so you now get 9 bombs to start with, so you shouldn't run out when the generator stops.
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Paralars
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by Paralars »

you should think about what a player that's not you would do.
So, for example, how hard would it be for someone else to play this?
Or, what would someone else do in this level if I just give him 9 bombs?
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SAJewers
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by SAJewers »

8flight wrote:
SAJewers wrote:Ok, I'm not sure what to do regarding the POW,as I can't find anything that I can spawn to rain on the remaining Goopas to kill them. I guess maybe give you some hearts so you can tank hits to get the star. As for the Boos. I made it so you now get 9 bombs to start with, so you shouldn't run out when the generator stops.
use hide layers and hide the boo and goopa layer after those waves are over
That's what the generators are on, separate layers that appear and disappear, but they don't hide enemies that are already generated, and I can't find a way to hide them.
Paralars wrote:you should think about what a player that's not you would do.
So, for example, how hard would it be for someone else to play this?
Or, what would someone else do in this level if I just give him 9 bombs?
Every time I playtested the level, I found I would end up quickly running out of bombs, and it would make the section way too hard. Having any Boos left over after the bomb generator stopped would make the Goopa wave harder then It should be, and having excess bombs at that wave shouldn't affect the difficulty at all. That's why I'm giving the player ta full set of bombs. Is there something I'm missing, or am I just misreading your post?
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Paralars
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by Paralars »

Just hide Spawned NPCs to make the enemies disappear.
I don't know how or when you give the 9 bombs, but the player might waste them on something else, making the boos completely unkillable, and I figured excess bombs would do make it easier to kill the last wave.
It's up to you.
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SAJewers
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by SAJewers »

Paralars wrote:Just hide Spawned NPCs to make the enemies disappear.
I don't know how or when you give the 9 bombs, but the player might waste them on something else, making the boos completely unkillable, and I figured excess bombs would do make it easier to kill the last wave.
It's up to you.
The bombs are given right at the start of the Boo wave, and are just to the left of where you start. The bomb generator however is still there, and I haven't found it that much easier to kill the Goopas in the next wave, so I don't foresee it being much of a problem, especially considering that I'm trying to make this around world 3 difficulty.

Also, I did not know that. I'll do that then.

EDIT: with that in mind, I don't have to worry about having bombs after wave 6 for boos left over. I'll cut down the bombs you start with to 2 (plus the the generator), since after playing this for a while I 'm starting to think that as long you don't start with just the one bomb from the generator, one should be able to manage their bombs.
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SAJewers
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by SAJewers »

Yeah, at the end of every wave, I now have it hiding the Spawned NPCs layer. Give it a try now, should be the same link.
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Paralars
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by Paralars »

Link doesn't work.
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SAJewers
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by SAJewers »

Apparently Skydrive changed the link,try it again.
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Paralars
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by Paralars »

@Welcome to River City:

Works a lot better now.
I don't see any more problems.

@8flight's Terrible Level:

You know, isn't the point of a collab to create something together?
You already threw in like a dozen of levels already, and it's not like there aren't many other ones.
Now, this isn't necessarily bad, but you really should use your time to increase quality, not quantity.
Instead of making even another level, try to make your other recent levels better, because there really is a lot you can do to them to make them better overall.
Just, you know, a good level takes more than a few hours to complete, especially if you want it to be difficult (in a reasonable way) or long - and still entertaining.
Remember, you're making levels for others to play, and you're collaborating with other level designers as well.
And if you're gonna make a level that shouts "this is the worst level ever", then put effort into it and make it sophisticatedly terrible.
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Paralars
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by Paralars »

okay, to let you in on a few simple game design basic concepts:

- Room for mistakes (powerups and not high-precision-platforming)
- Room for experimentation (Trying something that looks harmless doesn't just outright get you killed)
- Intuitive design (Stuff doesn't just appear out of nowhere and kills you)
- Clean visuals (no cutoff, consistency, ...)
- Difficulty (continuity, reasonability)

It's not just difficulty, there's so much more you can improve.


By the way, I noticed in River City

- the eerie generator can be blocked
- rocks can transfer into the next wave
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SAJewers
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Re: ASMBXT Level Review Thread

Post by SAJewers »

Paralars wrote: By the way, I noticed in River City

- the eerie generator can be blocked
- rocks can transfer into the next wave
Not much I can do about the eerie generator, as if I move it up it kinda defeats the purpose (i want to give the player an obstacle to jump over). Not too worried on the rocks, but i'll look into it.
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