Make A Good Level Contest (SMW) 3 - Discussion

[King of GETs]

Has anyone tried my level? I wanted to get some feedback. I hope it's better than the ones from the previous contests, but I'm not sure if I should submit one more version if that's okay. In the second room w/the chairs, some weird sprites appear for some reason, but I don't see them in Lunar Magic. I'm not sure what could be wrong, but everything else seems to be working fine.

So I went ahead and tried your level.

Screen #1: Putting the first correct answer at the start and the Time Mushrooms at the end was a bad idea. When I was playing the level, I heard the midpoint sound, so I thought they were the midpoint, so when I died and respawned at the start, I was confused. It was only when I was exploring the other paths that I saw them at the end. Considering it is called "The Long Maze", having a time limit at all is kind of silly.

Screen #2: Maverick Thowmps are fine, but why Earthquake Thwomps? Also, the lower right edges of the mace disappear when there are too many sprites on the screen.

Screen #3: Why does the box with "3 25" have a different font than the rest? The Time Mushroom box made sense because that's a bunch of letters, but those numbers should already have sprites for them.

Screen #4: When I entered the room, there was a mushroom, and when the custom enemy showed up, the mushroom became invisible. Is the coding for the custom enemy causing that much of a strain on the game that it can only handle a few sprites at once?

Screen #5: As pointed out earlier, one of your mathematical equations is wrong and can be considered a game breaker. I hope raocow is saved from some tears by getting that fixed.

By the time I got to the upward section, I stopped playing as some sprites or something didn't load at all, and I couldn't continue. A third midpoint after you solve those equations would have been really great as going through that all over again after dying to the upward section is just silly.

I loved the math concept of it all, but it was just badly executed. A lot of the problems with the game play come with the limitations of SMW itself, which is what I discussed earlier in this thread. If this was made in SMBX instead, it could have been a whole world better.

[HatKid]

I would honestly be kinda surprised if I got in to the top half, considering I am not proud of the level I cobbled together in 2 1/2 days. Plus I don't even think it is that well designed.
I don't see myself playing any of the entries, but who knows, maybe I will.

[Zephyr_DragonLord]

(I sure hope it wasn't mine that exploded the ROM...)

I had no chance to playtest my own level, given that I didn't get SNES9x up and running, so I hope mine isn't too offensive to play...
Good luck to everyone else. I know that I'm not winning any awards.

[ft029]

Your level is fine, although it does have some design issues

@King of GETs: I'm stuck on the part where there's a blue coin over each door.

@Lespna: Aside from the other math error, x*x+35 = 60 and the 5776/x -x = 0 is not a very good question. x could be plus or minus 5. If the question were sqrt(25) = x, then the only answer is 5 because principal root stuff. But yeah
Also I got hurt by the angry brothers from standing below them??
All of the invisible blocks are very rude

[Slimeman01]

I`m gonna give a bit of a Background for my level designing process.
First, I was gonna make a standard grass level, just with chargin`chucks, and some other lil`design things, like a section where you run up some Triangle blocks.
I didn`t like making that so much though, so I scrolled through the levels until I found a forst level.
``PERFECT`` I thought to myself.
I then made a forest level using a raocow meme + One of my favourite Mario Enemies- CHARLIE

[Willhart]

I'm not expecting too much from my first smw level, but I'm interested to see how it fares against the other ones. There were other first time people too I think.

[idol]

i'm just aiming 2 do better than hobz hobz if yr reading this ;)

cant wait till this series starts tho. with 70~ entries, 1 a day will take a while for the higher up people to see their place. it's a bit of a long time! but i guess what are you gonna do

[ft029]

I played through like 50 of them. There are a lot of basic ones that took under 2 minutes or even 1 minute.

[Griflion]

I played through like 50 of them. There are a lot of basic ones that took under 2 minutes or even 1 minute.

Ok, so I'm not the only one who just tried the engine out and didn't dare to get crazy with it

[King of GETs]

@King of GETs: I'm stuck on the part where there's a blue coin over each door.

Did you try "smashing your face" into every area in that room? If you really can't figure it out:

In the upper right, there's a set of transparent blocks that are flipped horizontally that you can go through. In the second text box, it says, "Most importantly, PAY ATTENTION!", which is what that last room was for. I hope it wasn't too confusing.

I'm not expecting too much from my first smw level, but I'm interested to see how it fares against the other ones. There were other first time people too I think.

This was my first time making a level specifically for SMW, and it might end up being my last. I kept running into random invisible solid block glitches with my level which made me redesign some parts of the level. I'm assuming it was due to the high block count, but I have no idea. SMBX is just so much easier to use, the graphics looks crisper, you can use better music, design more freely, etc. I can understand why people still like editing SMW since it was possible way before SMBX, but I personally like SMBX more.

[Lespna01]

Your level is fine, although it does have some design issues

@King of GETs: I'm stuck on the part where there's a blue coin over each door.

@Lespna: Aside from the other math error, x*x+35 = 60 and the 5776/x -x = 0 is not a very good question. x could be plus or minus 5. If the question were sqrt(25) = x, then the only answer is 5 because principal root stuff. But yeah
Also I got hurt by the angry brothers from standing below them??
All of the invisible blocks are very rude

I know, but in the password block section, the numbers are only positive and what invisible blocks? Are you talking about the room where the Yoshi coin is above the blocks. That wasn't meant to be in a mean way. It was to get up there to get the Yoshi coin if that's what you mean.
For the last question, should I have made it x * x = 5776? Then, that would have assumed negative numbers, but I wasn't trying to be mean by doing that. Are you talking about the thwomps that hurt you when you say angry brothers? That was intentional b/c it wasn't supposed to be the right door. I hope the judges aren't overcritical w/that? I tried my best.
Also, the time mushrooms were designed to give you enough time since you couldn't pause b/c I used the Disable Pause sprite.

[Fausthieb]

I'm not expecting too much from my first smw level, but I'm interested to see how it fares against the other ones. There were other first time people too I think.

I don't think it makes that much of a difference between first timer or not. I already made 2 complete Hacks and I still feel like a noob. I just hope I am not last place.

I played through like 50 of them. There are a lot of basic ones that took under 2 minutes or even 1 minute.

Ok, so I'm not the only one who just tried the engine out and didn't dare to get crazy with it

That is kind of the nature of Super Mario World levels. I can finish my level also in around 2 minutes I think but my friend played it for an hour before he managed to finish it. (No save states or rewinds for neither of us).
I still struggle with patching ROMs. I actually would've loved to play around with them or at least implement the multi-midpoint patch, but it always messes up everything. Without multi-midpoints you are forced to one single midpoint that can only be placed on the entry Level ... and there is nothing worse than too long sections that you have to repeat all the time. Sure you can hide shortcuts but you can't guarantee that noone finds them earlier than they're supposed to be... and there are only 2 message boxes available without patching

[SAJewers]

This was my first time making a level specifically for SMW, and it might end up being my last. I kept running into random invisible solid block glitches with my level which made me redesign some parts of the level. I'm assuming it was due to the high block count, but I have no idea. SMBX is just so much easier to use, the graphics looks crisper, you can use better music, design more freely, etc. I can understand why people still like editing SMW since it was possible way before SMBX, but I personally like SMBX more.

I had the exact opposite experience. I kinda prefer using SMW/LM now that i've actually used it.

[Valentine]

I made my level in 1 day and then waited like a month and submitted last minute for no real reason.

[MECHDRAGON777]

I wonder how well I learned from bossedit8, Enjl, and SnoruntPyro. I literally had to learn everything from placing Blocks, to placing warps and exits. Also, my level was probably made in 3 days, then tested for five.

[Zatsupachi]

I actually wanted to make a maze-like level, but I settled with a linear one-gimmick castle level.

A test of patience it is, for both halves.

[Reecer7]

I gotta say, using Lunar Magic was a lot more freeing than SMBX (in a previous iteration, I guess). SMBX felt like I could easily reach the technical ceiling of making interesting levels (although I didn't really touch on coding events too in depth), but in LM, after making a level, it definitely feels like I've barely dug into the iceberg that is editing SMW.

Especially the overworld editor. That thing is arcane. Good thing I don't need it to make levels!

[FrozenQuills]

I just wanted to make a level 105 edit lool

[Willhart]

Most of my time went for figuring out how to make things.

[TaviTurnip]

Extremely sad thing I realized by playing some of your guyses' levels: I chose not to edit my intro, my overworld, or my Yoshi's House, mostly because I forgot they were a thing, and I realize I missed plenty of opportunity to say something stupid or funny :( That's how focused I was on not being able to come up with level stuff until the last minute <_>

Y'all did good where I failed :i

[Griflion]

Extremely sad thing I realized by playing some of your guyses' levels: I chose not to edit my intro, my overworld, or my Yoshi's House, mostly because I forgot they were a thing, and I realize I missed plenty of opportunity to say something stupid or funny :( That's how focused I was on not being able to come up with level stuff until the last minute <_>

Y'all did good where I failed :i

-You can edit the overworld, but it will not be judged. Only the content from when you enter the level to when you end the level will be judged.

[cheez8]

Extremely sad thing I realized by playing some of your guyses' levels: I chose not to edit my intro, my overworld, or my Yoshi's House, mostly because I forgot they were a thing, and I realize I missed plenty of opportunity to say something stupid or funny :( That's how focused I was on not being able to come up with level stuff until the last minute <_>

Y'all did good where I failed :i

the same thing happened to me and I'm just as sad about it :<

[FPzero]

lol, I spent about a grand total of 2 or 3 minutes on the overworld for our level:



This was at like, 11:15 PM before the deadline with Tyty yelling at me that we had to submit.

[ft029]

This was my first time making a level specifically for SMW, and it might end up being my last. I kept running into random invisible solid block glitches with my level which made me redesign some parts of the level. I'm assuming it was due to the high block count, but I have no idea.

Aah, it has nothing to do with high block count. In many areas of your level, there are coin blocks directly above glass blocks. Hitting the glass block will turn the coin directly above it into an invisible solid block. It's an obscure glitch that could be used in creative ways.

[LunarRainbowShyGuy]

Since people seem to be saying which editor they like better I guess I'll give my thoughts. Currently I think I prefer making levels in SMBX. Not that I don't like Lunar Magic but there are some things about it that gave me issues. It probably doesn't help that I decided to make a vertical level for my first SMW level; apparently making vertical levels is super weird in a way I can't even describe. Fortunately, after I figured everything out it didn't take too long to make my level. (I spent one afternoon getting everything set up and figuring out how vertical levels work, and another afternoon was spent making my level.)

Also, I have a feeling my level is one of the shorter ones. I tried looking at the vertical levels that are already in SMW for length comparison but SMW doesn't really have many vertical levels to compare with. All of SMW's vertical levels are pretty short too. Some of the levels I looked at were only five screens long.