SVLC 2016

[Superiorstar]

I didn't think I would see more zeroes than a coding contest lmao.

[ShadowStarX]

I have 44+ levels to deal with

Well, I'd just like to tell you that Chad and Zipper were a lot sooner done than you and yet they still seem to have written fair reviews. Also, Zipper isn't even a level judge yet he only made one mistake and it 1) it wasn't about his judging skills 2) it didn't even matter that much. (I'm talking about the fact that he actually reviewed a stolen level and gave it an avg. score)

And onwards I'd only be able to repeat what Sanct said.

[JupiHornet]

Look, Wraith, I've liked you and your videos ever since I started playing SMBX, but I'm not a fan of how you went about this contest. I honestly don't have an issue with your scores as much as your reviews themselves, Wraith. So...

As for "why don't you give constructive criticism", I have a valid reason. I have 44+ levels to deal with. One was stolen, one was by Mech and worthless, and like 10 others were just meant for submission purposes or difficult for no reason. I honestly believe that if a designer submits a level of this quality then they surely know that they are not trying their hardest and thus not worth my time. When a level either puts effort, tries to experiment or really surprises me, that is when I will put the effort to write half a page of comments. Until someone hits one of these three elements, they are not worth the time to even toss aside in the trashcan in my eyes.

1. There are a lot of newcomers in this contest. You can't expect everyone to really know what they're doing if it's only their first level.
2. If a level is bad (as long as it isn't a joke level) I don't see why people shouldn't be allowed to post it to a contest. Like I said, not everyone is going to be a good designer at first. Maybe they think it's good! The point of entering contests (in my opinion) is to have the judges review your level so they can tell you where you can improve in that level/future levels. Just telling people to "uninstall SMBX" isn't doing anyone any favors.

As for the curse word thing, I find that incredibly inappropriate. Don't forget some people are either incredibly young or too immature to really handle the "big kid words." There is absolutely no reason to use profanity in a level.

Says the person that curses in all of his videos >__>

[as303298]

I have 44+ levels to deal with

Well, I'd just like to tell you that Chad and Zipper were a lot sooner done than you and yet they still seem to have written fair reviews. Also, Zipper isn't even a level judge yet he only made one mistake and it 1) it wasn't about his judging skills 2) it didn't even matter that much. (I'm talking about the fact that he actually reviewed a stolen level and gave it an avg. score)

And onwards I'd only be able to repeat what Sanct said.

I didn't say Zipper was a level judge. I referred to him as just a judge.
As for those other two being faster, doesn't really matter how fast anyone is.
They have experience in wasting so much time into SMBX and contests, whereas I only have so much patience or attention span to deal with the same monotonous tasks.

As for trying out not being too strict, why should I lower my standards? Just because someone else doesn't agree with me, or vice versa, does not, in itself, validate a complete overhaul in expectations or standards. Just because the community always picks judges who are going to hold their hand and tell them they did a good job, even if inapplicable, doesn't mean I need to conform to this method as well.

My methodology is giving the utmost real representation of my thoughts on your level, whether rude or not. If I say to uninstall this program, I legitimately never want to see a level like this by this person ever again. Political correctness or mannerisms are fine, but I will not sit idly by and pretend to be someone I am not once you piss me off. Which, of course, a lot of levels did whether in playing it or through design inexperience.

Don't get me wrong, even I consider these reviews to be incredibly harsh. However, I will not go against my own words and try to say something other than what I truly felt for a level.

[Marina]

In an ironic twist of events, today's

is actually Wraith Adamknight. Congratulations!

[as303298]

Spoiler: show

Look, Wraith, I've liked you and your videos ever since I started playing SMBX, but I'm not a fan of how you went about this contest. I honestly don't have an issue with your scores as much as your reviews themselves, Wraith. So...

As for "why don't you give constructive criticism", I have a valid reason. I have 44+ levels to deal with. One was stolen, one was by Mech and worthless, and like 10 others were just meant for submission purposes or difficult for no reason. I honestly believe that if a designer submits a level of this quality then they surely know that they are not trying their hardest and thus not worth my time. When a level either puts effort, tries to experiment or really surprises me, that is when I will put the effort to write half a page of comments. Until someone hits one of these three elements, they are not worth the time to even toss aside in the trashcan in my eyes.

1. There are a lot of newcomers in this contest. You can't expect everyone to really know what they're doing if it's only their first level.
2. If a level is bad (as long as it isn't a joke level) I don't see why people shouldn't be allowed to post it to a contest. Like I said, not everyone is going to be a good designer at first. Maybe they think it's good! The point of entering contests (in my opinion) is to have the judges review your level so they can tell you where you can improve in that level/future levels. Just telling people to "uninstall SMBX" isn't doing anyone any favors.

As for the curse word thing, I find that incredibly inappropriate. Don't forget some people are either incredibly young or too immature to really handle the "big kid words." There is absolutely no reason to use profanity in a level.

Says the person that curses in all of his videos >__>

I curse in my videos, yes, but I don't really care what age demographic I have either. Its not like I am willingly presenting this in the hopes for little children and their baby brothers to watch. A SMBX level, however, should be shared via the family and little kids to enjoy a nice time together.
And your idea is perfectly sound, but I am very strict when it comes to contests. I firmly believe that if you are too inexperienced to do something or do not possess the time or creativity to truly convey the ideas you wanted, then do not participate in a contest.
Definition of Contest:

Spoiler: show

1. a race, conflict, or other competition between rivals, as for a prize.
2. struggle for victory or superiority.

As such, I find it hard to validate any purpose for submitting an incredibly experimental or debatable level into a contest.

[Lukas Old Account]

One is by Mech and worthless

Lol, not that your levels are any better, just look at your cc11 level.

In all seriousness, do you realise that what you wrote down there is arrogant? Jesus christ, I really tought Bomber was the worst judge.
But looks like it's not him. I am dissapointed. But yeah, what can you subspect from this community anyway...

Also you curse in your videos yourself. Get valid reasons m8.

[Waddle]

So why exactly is the definition of the word "contest" suddenly of any importance

[Emral]

I'd argue people who submitted bad levels need more constructive criticism than those who submitted good ones.
It's also not a good idea to base your reviews 100% on fun factor. Most of the levels you gave a score under 1 have some way of redeeming quality behind them. As a judge you need to view the quality of a level as objectively as possible, and denying the level its right to get a review from you and instead tossing insults at the designer because of the level's lack of quality is nothing but a dick move.

This being a contest doesn't mean that only the levels that you personally enjoy should get a decent score. Giving a level which does absolutely nothing apart from existing a score around 5/10 is legitimate. Instead of trying to differentiate this from the levels in the Levels forum, view them as one. There's no reason for your judging in a contest to be different from the judging you do in your free time.
This doesn't mean you have to write essays. This also doesn't mean you should skip levels because of their difficulty or be unreasonably "harsh" over the most minor things.

You mentioned these aren't your full reviews but rather a selection of notes out of a huge pile for each level. I have two questions: "Why did you select the insults over the feedback (especially when you said "uninstall smbx")?" and "Can you post your full list of review notes for the levels which have been revealed so far to pastebin?"

E: 5 posts while I was typing this up. Good.

[zlaker]

I curse in my videos, yes, but I don't really care what age demographic I have either. Its not like I am willingly presenting this in the hopes for little children and their baby brothers to watch. A SMBX level, however, should be shared via the family and little kids to enjoy a nice time together.

>IMPLYING SMBX VIDEOS ARE NOT BEING WATCHED KIDS
>>IMPLYING SMBX LEVELS ARE BEING PLAYED BY KIDS WHO DOESN'T SWEAR

[Ness-Wednesday]

Lol, not that your levels are any better, just look at your cc11 level.

You should have seen his older levels before CC11, like his CC4 entry.

[Lukas Old Account]

Lol, not that your levels are any better, just look at your cc11 level.

You should have seen his older levels before CC11, like his CC4 entry.

Lol, forgot to mention.

[Eternity]

They have experience in wasting so much time into SMBX and contests, whereas I only have so much patience or attention span to deal with the same monotonous tasks.

sorry but why are you judging then :v

Judging a contest isn't exactly an easy task you know, if you don't have the time or patience etc to play through all these levels and give some good feedback on them then you probably shouldn't have accepted the position in first place.

Also sorry again but you can be harsh without being rude, you just need to actually try. A few of your reviews are fairly decent so why not do the same for every level?

There's a point where you need to put your "methodology" aside a bit and, you know, try to give some actual feedback to the authors. Not everyone is in because they want to win alone, some people do make levels for fun and submit them even though they themselves think it has no winning potential. And you know, as long as it isn't a blatant joke/troll level, that's perfectly fine. Contests do not have to be 100% super serious levels. And even if this was a serious contest, wouldn't that mean that the reviews would have to be serious/professional as well (as in, constructive criticism >>>>> insults)?

[Mario_and_Luigi_55]

guys it's official

wraith is the grim reaper for level contests

so many zeroes

Yeah, I agree. More zeroes than ever I think.

Well, let's just check. For example my level (since it's easiest to check for me).

5.75
5.8
4
5.5
Seems normal, I did this level a long while ago.

And now quoting:

Wraith Adamknight - 0.00(Original score of -1.00 was rounded up to 0.00)

OK. Maybe I wasn't the best level builder a month ago but -1 is a little... weird to say at least.

[Superiorstar]

I'm having a hard time not understanding why people don't compensate the context of bias.

[Zipper]

As for those other two being faster, doesn't really matter how fast anyone is.
They have experience in wasting so much time into SMBX and contests, whereas I only have so much patience or attention span to deal with the same monotonous tasks.

[Darkonius Mavakar]

So uh, nobody wants tier 4 bACON?

[Valentine]

I'm just gonna throw this out there

Spoiler: show

The ones i specially noted all are a 1+ point difference

[bossedit8]

So uh, nobody wants tier 4 bACON?

Tier 3's out today... tomorrow's gonna be the 4th one.

[as303298]

I'd argue people who submitted bad levels need more constructive criticism than those who submitted good ones.
It's also not a good idea to base your reviews 100% on fun factor. Most of the levels you gave a score under 1 have some way of redeeming quality behind them. As a judge you need to view the quality of a level as objectively as possible, and denying the level its right to get a review from you and instead tossing insults at the designer because of the level's lack of quality is nothing but a dick move.

This being a contest doesn't mean that only the levels that you personally enjoy should get a decent score. Giving a level which does absolutely nothing apart from existing a score around 5/10 is legitimate. Instead of trying to differentiate this from the levels in the Levels forum, view them as one. There's no reason for your judging in a contest to be different from the judging you do in your free time.
This doesn't mean you have to write essays. This also doesn't mean you should skip levels because of their difficulty or be unreasonably "harsh" over the most minor things.

You mentioned these aren't your full reviews but rather a selection of notes out of a huge pile for each level. I have two questions: "Why did you select the insults over the feedback (especially when you said "uninstall smbx")?" and "Can you post your full list of review notes for the levels which have been revealed so far to pastebin?"

E: 5 posts while I was typing this up. Good.

I didn't "select" them, Marina omitted them. While its true I am harsh, I can not say I would view these the same way as I do for normal levels. Contest levels should have more pride and soul put into them, yet why is it the exact opposite is true?
I am harsh, I will agree to that, but I find it hard to find redeeming qualities in levels that are genuinely just bad. If two people were able to make a ghost house that even I liked, then surely there is something fundamentally wrong with how a majority of people treat contests and not just me.
Plus, like I keep trying to say, it is not like I am being unreasonably harsh, it is just that Marina is omitting the portions that explains each individual categories' scores. I base every score on a collection of 6 categories. With each acting as the following: #/20, #/5, #/5, #/2, #/2 and #/1, for a total of 35 points. Points aren't handed out willy nilly, nor are they just super low because I was salty. I went through the effort for each level, save for a few (which I will explain), and got their scores that applied to each level in each category. The ones that read "don't even get a review", means that there were so few redeeming qualities that I didn't bother going into my excel sheet to calculate scores since I knew it would be 0. So my "review" itself isn't harsh, just my notes.

The notes THEMSELVES are not the review, just extra notes I had. While it is true I could've been more constructive, I still find my most immediate and truthful words to be more worthwhile than another review that four other judges are already going to cover.
As for the "full review", they are very generalized to fit within the spectrum of all of these levels. They are in no fashion as in-depth as my normal reviews; simply because I didn't expect someone to really want to read my entire reviews. I can make a screenshot of my Excel Sheet so everyone can cross-reference their numbers to it, but for a full on review they need to contact me privately.