Level Contest Japan

[Joseph Staleknight]

Merry 25th of December, raocow. May your fireworks be Santa-flavored.

[Lockirby2]

As you might guess, I really like the flavour of the first level. It looks like just a flat plain level, but some of the Waddle Dees are placed in ways that can get you if you're careless.

I feel like I spent the entirety of the second level in a state of confusion. Nothing did quite what I was expecting it to, and I was constantly changing my mind about what was going on. For example, I expected the "bonus" room to be a shortcut beyond the "house within a house" room (because that's what bonus rooms typically are), not the exit. Then I saw the flagpole and thought it was an exit. Then I passed the flagpole and thought it was a bonus room. Then I saw the exit and knew it was an exit. I feel like patterns like this were repeated all over the level, but I didn't feel like I was ever punished for failing to figure the level out. IDK what to make of it all?

I didn't want to find the third secret exit, so I let raocow do it for me.

[Crow]

in the second level with the part in the house, you kept throwing the shell to the right and killing all the enemies that were supposed to be on the spikes lol

granted, it is pretty bad level design if you can do that and pretty much ruin your chances of clearing the section, but

[Ashan]

The second level today was a fairly good demonstration of the issues I have with SMBX over SMW. Since the engine allows people to do basically anything, people will do anything. It makes for an overall really unpredictable experience since it's quite easy to make weird tweaks that the author may have thought was a good idea, but then you have situations like near the end of that level where the shell hitting one block magically makes a bunch of other blocks poof out of existence? Anyone with an understanding of Mario mechanics would be just as puzzled as raocow was if you kill the shell too early and go see what's ahead. There's not any kind of puzzle solving, you're just supposed to fall into the expectations of the author and hope all the specific movements they planned you'd do actually happen.

in the second level with the part in the house, you kept throwing the shell to the right and killing all the enemies that were supposed to be on the spikes lol

granted, it is pretty bad level design if you can do that and pretty much ruin your chances of clearing the section, but

That whole area looked clearly set up for you to throw that shell and kill all the enemies. There was a whole parade of enemies on a giant fun physics slope basically saying "hey throw that shell at us for a good time!" Which leads to another weird quirk about the SMBX engine, that apparently stuff is being simulated outside of what's on the screen, if I'm understanding the issue here.

[SAJewers]

The second level today was a fairly good demonstration of the issues I have with SMBX over SMW. Since the engine allows people to do basically anything, people will do anything. It makes for an overall really unpredictable experience since it's quite easy to make weird tweaks that the author may have thought was a good idea, but then you have situations like near the end of that level where the shell hitting one block magically makes a bunch of other blocks poof out of existence? Anyone with an understanding of Mario mechanics would be just as puzzled as raocow was if you kill the shell too early and go see what's ahead. There's not any kind of puzzle solving, you're just supposed to fall into the expectations of the author and hope all the specific movements they planned you'd do actually happen.

in the second level with the part in the house, you kept throwing the shell to the right and killing all the enemies that were supposed to be on the spikes lol

granted, it is pretty bad level design if you can do that and pretty much ruin your chances of clearing the section, but

That whole area looked clearly set up for you to throw that shell and kill all the enemies. There was a whole parade of enemies on a giant fun physics slope basically saying "hey throw that shell at us for a good time!" Which leads to another weird quirk about the SMBX engine, that apparently stuff is being simulated outside of what's on the screen, if I'm understanding the issue here.

Yeah, definitely a lot easier to make dumb/stupid design decisions in smbx.

[Money]

To be fair it's not really fair to judge an engine that allows for greater variety in events and triggers for its users not utilizing them well. The "stuff keeps happening offscreen but you dont get any indication" thing is a weird quirk, tho.

[Ivy]

I like kirby as much or more than the next guy, but how did that level get a favorite?

[Dragon Fogel]

in the second level with the part in the house, you kept throwing the shell to the right and killing all the enemies that were supposed to be on the spikes lol

granted, it is pretty bad level design if you can do that and pretty much ruin your chances of clearing the section, but

I'm pretty sure shells don't kill enemies that far offscreen. Looked to me like there just weren't enemies after the initial Dry Bones pair, which did get killed the first time. Everything after that was several screens away - enemies at that distance shouldn't have died to one stray shell.

If I'm misremembering and they do kill enemies that far offscreen, then I'd put SMBX itself as the primary culprit for behaving that ridiculously. Then the level designer for not accounting for that issue.

[Crow]

If it's not enemies being killed off screen then it's that there were no enemies to begin with and thus the section is impossible to complete without taking hits

...which is worse

[Mineyl]

These days, if I were going to hide something important (read: not anything like a 1-up, 3-up moon, or coins) in a random pit like that, there'd be an indicator. It may be a subtle indicator, but testing the player's observation skills is much more conducive to good level design than testing sheer patience and stubbornness.

I feel like I spent the entirety of the second level in a state of confusion.

IDK what to make of it all?

Typical mid to high-popularity Super Mario Maker level design in a nutshell, basically.

[Alice]

I'm pretty sure shells don't kill enemies that far offscreen. Looked to me like there just weren't enemies after the initial Dry Bones pair, which did get killed the first time. Everything after that was several screens away - enemies at that distance shouldn't have died to one stray shell.

If I'm misremembering and they do kill enemies that far offscreen, then I'd put SMBX itself as the primary culprit for behaving that ridiculously. Then the level designer for not accounting for that issue.

I don't know whether there were actually supposed to be other enemies or not but I'm pretty sure the reason those two dry bones survived is because of the slope right before them. The shell would've launched over their heads.

[Mata Hari]

idk about this level fams

[Super Maks 64]

the true potential of smbx 2.0

[Reb]

wow

[Leet]

let's all keep a look out for the first post or comment about how joke levels are a crime

[Grounder]

this was a bad joke level

[Lockirby2]

When I saw the level title, I was hoping maybe it was going to be about bad ideas used in good ways. Or at least a level that is technically bad, but funny and not really terrible to play if you look closer (something like A2XT's "AUS-26th place 'Winter City'"). It's pretty clear that Horikawa went for the "intentionally aggravating" route though. Oh well, at least it's short.

For a while I was trying to deek out the Big Boo while in the clown car. It is possible if you get some momentum and turn around at the right time. I wouldn't have put it past the level to be that nasty, but thankfully it's not quite that bad.

[Emral]

This level didn't get last.

[Grounder]

This level didn't get last.

Have we seen the last place level yet?

If not, will we know it when we see it?

[raocow]

I believe it's the first level in the middle path

[Veruchai]

Slightly inaccurate yet relevant to making a bad ideas level:

Jokes aside, it's weird how imo garbage level design > really bad design.
Admittedly it's more like the joke > bad design; but still.

[Ashan]

Reasons I don't like SMBX, exhibit B

[Grounder]

Reasons I don't like SMBX, exhibit B

Because you can't possibly make something similar in SMW with ASM?

[Ashan]

You could, but it would take way more time/effort and a more advanced skillset. And most of the people who'd be willing to put that much time into a level would probably just make a good level.

See: the fact that you never see levels like this in SMW collab hacks but you're guaranteed several of them in SMBX collab hacks.

[Leet]

redigit invented jokes