CC9 45th Place: 1-1 Regengefüllte Ebene

[MECHDRAGON777]

This is 1-1 of the project I am making! although this has the "Deutsch/German" level name, it is infact the "Englisch/ENglish" Version!

I will upload theother language translations after I get a few more levels done, and send my "Translaters" the level, but meh.

1-1 Regengefüllte Ebene
1-1 Rain filled Plains

As one can see, LunaDll is used in this level, but under no means is it required to play, the only thing LunaDll usesis the: Timer, and Custom Sector names

Other then that, the Custom hud is not completly done yet until DarkShadeX helps with the Script for that! (I can only get it to work for Mario, and There is no Reserve Box, or Health Count when I do this) So, that is the only flaw I know of! This is slightly differnt from my "CC9" level as this is the version I am alowed "three Stars" in!

Video

Spoiler: show

Link
https://www.mediafire.com/?jvwvu1mieh395au

Results of the Original level:

Spoiler: show

45. MECHDRAGON777 - Regen Gefüllt Plains Regengefüllte Ebene - 5.43/10
Bomber57 (4.25/10)
While the atmosphere for this level is rather nice, the gameplay is rather lacking. The section with the checkpoint is horribly cramped, both with enemy placement and block placement. The secret is really oddly handled. Some of the moon coins are impossible to get. The sign after the first star is also confusing, as no path seemed to have opened after you got it. I also don't understand the random secret exit. I assume that, because of that secret exit requiring a Tanooki Suit that was never in the level to begin with, that this level was pulled from a project not yet revealed.
Chad (5.5/10)
An okay level. It's a short and easy run with some standard platforming, as well as secrets to be found if you're inclined to look. It's a decent setup with some nice atmosphere and detail, and the design matches the theme of the level rather well. The layout of the checkpoint area's sort of squished, though. I kept hitting my head on the tiny alcove where the red shell is because there's little room to move, and I had difficulty telling what's a warp and what isn't (as well as getting caught between them because of entrances/exits in the same spot). Other than that, the main route's decent. However, the methods that you chose for the secrets are a little broken. The Moon Coin halfway through the first section is completely inaccessible, there's no indication to the player that the coin in the (ambiguous) slope pit is accessible later, and the star is already there whether you get the coins or not. There's also a keyhole exit, which is both irrelevant to a hub setup and blocked off by Tanooki/Hammer bricks that you aren't given a suit to break. The second star's good, though. It's gently hinted at and easily missable if you're not paying attention, which is good for a secret. Overall, it's a small standard level with some decent platforming and a few odd design/secret choices, but the basic gameplay works for what it is.
Quill (6.5/10)
This level was surprisingly interesting. It's somewhat generic, but adds in several creative elements are a pleasant surprise for a 1-1 level. The terrain is constructed in an odd but interesting way too, although sometimes it was difficult to land especially with the one tile wide ground. Advancing beyond Section 1 was a little confusing as it wasn't obvious that there was an instant warp in the gap. A pipe would have worked better there. The super long checkpoint isn't really needed and it doesn't look good at all. This section also suffers from the odd instant warps too. Not sure what the Moon Coins actually do as all the stars seem to be enabled. It's also difficult to understand how you actually get some of them too.
TNTtimelord (5.5/10)
I'm really not sure at all how I'm supposed to get all the luna coins since there's giant unpassable holes to most of them. Also, the star at the end is possible to get anyways so the luna coins are completely unnecessary. Enemy placement is fine, but get rid of the 2x2 spaces because that's near impossible to avoid an enemy on. I do think everything lookd nice as well, and the atmosphere is played out pretty decently with the SMW remix of a DKC song (sounds very nice) and someone dull, gray, rainy tileset and background.
zlakerboy357 (5.4/10)
Cool grassland level. The BGOs and the BG blended perfect together and the power ups inside the tileset was a cool touch. The level was sad-looking in my opinion and the music made it sound sad as well. The SMW Blocks though wasn't a great choice though. They were SMW styled and I felt they didn't fit there. Same with the waterfall background, but the The Moon Coin thingy you did though was a cool addition, though some of them were inaccessible and I had trouble reaching them. And the part where you were suppose to get through the Hammer Blocks (the blocks that can only get destroyed by hammers or by running into it with the Tanooki Suit while being a statue) was inaccessible
as well since there wasn't any Tanooki Suit or Hammer Suit available. Moving onto the design of the level; it was okay, though it had some flaws like the small tall size tables. The level also had a lack of enemy variety. There were Goombas, Koopas and Piranha Plants, however I expected more enmies to be in the level. The only And lastly the pipe in the start of the level can confuse the player since it looks identical like the solid pipes.

This is slightly diffenrt from the contest level I submited, So do not place it in "Pretty Good" or "Average" just yet, but actualy, I would like a re-review of this, since I have actualy made a MAJOR change and some of the judges said it was impossible to actualy get the moon coins, well, this is thereal intended level! the Video shows all three stars, and the secret exit!

[Imaynotbehere4long]

The download link is broken (if you copy the link too early, it will be "undefined"). PM a level judge the working download link to unlock the topic.

[underFlo]

DL link provided unlocked.

[MECHDRAGON777]

Am I allowed to request a specific judge?

[underFlo]

Am I allowed to request a specific judge?

You could PM him, but it's no guarantee.

[Imaynotbehere4long]

Well, this is certainly a neat level, but it still has its problems. First of all, having a fire flower as a background image, even though it's recolored the same as the other background images, is unintuitive. If you want to have a flower graphic as a background image, don't use a recolored fire flower because first-time players will think it's a normal power-up. Another unintuitive thing you did with power-ups was having the mushrooms and racoon leaves appear instantly after the block is hit. I know you're trying to build this level around the 2 player option, but there are better ways you could have done this. Perhaps you could have a warp-generator appear when the block is hit, then have it disappear once two mushrooms have been generated. You could also have the block sprite-swap a brick, then have it trigger a different event on its death that hides the mushroom generator and activates a racoon leaf generator instead.

Moving on: the instant warps between the first and second sections, as well as the ones between the second and sixth section were not only difficult to activate when I was trying to move to the next section, but would also trigger again when I didn't want them to, thus sending me back to the previous section. I recommend moving the exit unit of the warps completely on screen (and half a unit down) for their respective sections instead of partially off screen as they are now. Also, it's unintuitive how the player is supposed to get the second moon coin and survive; by having the ledge there, it implies that the player can land there safely and still be able to make it back to the main level, but in reality, if the player stops on that ledge, or loses flight before making it back to the main level, he/she is dead no matter what. I recommend adding a pipe on that ledge which leads back to the main part of the level, or at least removing the ledge and adding a sign letting the player know that he/she has to collect the coin and make it back all in one flight. Adding a sign in Section 5 hinting that the star there can't be collected until after the star in Section 6 is collected would also be a wise decision.

By the way, the random vanilla waterfall clashes with the more muted recolors in the rest of the level; I recommend just removing the waterfall entirely. Also, there's a Venus Fire Trap in the second section that, since it's partially off-screen, doesn't spawn. Because of this, it appears that the pipe it would come out of is vacant, and may make the player think that the pipe contains a secret when it's actually unreachable. Finally, the timer is completely pointless; not only does it not give the player enough time to collect all of the stars and beat the level in one life(much less, time for the player to figure out HOW to get the stars), but running out of time has absolutely no repercussions. Not only that, but the timer doesn't stop when the player gets the goal tape, nor is there any reward for beating the level in time. Speaking of pointless, having an inaccessible secret exit in a stand-alone level is completely pointless; either add the necessary items to make it accessible, change the level a bit to make it accessible, or remove it entirely.

Summary:
GOOD:
-Block placement made up for the lack of NPC variety.
-Graphic choices aren't terrible for the most part.
-Music choice fits the level nicely.
-Having stars in the level means the player can get more out of the level than the average linear level.

BAD:
-Multiple unintuitive design choices (2nd moon coin, power-ups, etc.)
-Pointless secret exit
-Pointless timer.
-Poorly done warp transitions.

In conclusion: this level has a lot of neat ideas, but they could definitely be executed much better. If it weren't for the poorly done instant warp transitions and the various unintuitive design choices, this would be a Pretty Good level. I'd say this deserves a 5.5/10.

There, I played your level. Now you may stop bugging me about it (unless you fix the level's problems and want another re-review).

[MECHDRAGON777]

Well, this is certainly a neat level, but it still has its problems. First of all, having a fire flower as a background image, even though it's recolored the same as the other background images, is unintuitive. If you want to have a flower graphic as a background image, don't use a recolored fire flower because first-time players will think it's a normal power-up. Another unintuitive thing you did with power-ups was having the mushrooms and racoon leaves appear instantly after the block is hit. I know you're trying to build this level around the 2 player option, but there are better ways you could have done this. Perhaps you could have a warp-generator appear when the block is hit, then have it disappear once two mushrooms have been generated. You could also have the block sprite-swap a brick, then have it trigger a different event on its death that hides the mushroom generator and activates a racoon leaf generator instead.

Moving on: the instant warps between the first and second sections, as well as the ones between the second and sixth section were not only difficult to activate when I was trying to move to the next section, but would also trigger again when I didn't want them to, thus sending me back to the previous section. I recommend moving the exit unit of the warps completely on screen (and half a unit down) for their respective sections instead of partially off screen as they are now. Also, it's unintuitive how the player is supposed to get the second moon coin and survive; by having the ledge there, it implies that the player can land there safely and still be able to make it back to the main level, but in reality, if the player stops on that ledge, or loses flight before making it back to the main level, he/she is dead no matter what. I recommend adding a pipe on that ledge which leads back to the main part of the level, or at least removing the ledge and adding a sign letting the player know that he/she has to collect the coin and make it back all in one flight. Adding a sign in Section 5 hinting that the star there can't be collected until after the star in Section 6 is collected would also be a wise decision.

By the way, the random vanilla waterfall clashes with the more muted recolors in the rest of the level; I recommend just removing the waterfall entirely. Also, there's a Venus Fire Trap in the second section that, since it's partially off-screen, doesn't spawn. Because of this, it appears that the pipe it would come out of is vacant, and may make the player think that the pipe contains a secret when it's actually unreachable. Finally, the timer is completely pointless; not only does it not give the player enough time to collect all of the stars and beat the level in one life(much less, time for the player to figure out HOW to get the stars), but running out of time has absolutely no repercussions. Not only that, but the timer doesn't stop when the player gets the goal tape, nor is there any reward for beating the level in time. Speaking of pointless, having an inaccessible secret exit in a stand-alone level is completely pointless; either add the necessary items to make it accessible, change the level a bit to make it accessible, or remove it entirely.

Summary:
GOOD:
-Block placement made up for the lack of NPC variety.
-Graphic choices aren't terrible for the most part.
-Music choice fits the level nicely.
-Having stars in the level means the player can get more out of the level than the average linear level.

BAD:
-Multiple unintuitive design choices (2nd moon coin, power-ups, etc.)
-Pointless secret exit
-Pointless timer.
-Poorly done warp transitions.

In conclusion: this level has a lot of neat ideas, but they could definitely be executed much better. If it weren't for the poorly done instant warp transitions and the various unintuitive design choices, this would be a Pretty Good level. I'd say this deserves a 5.5/10.

There, I played your level. Now you may stop bugging me about it (unless you fix the level's problems and want another re-review).

Timer is technicaly stoped by going to the sector with the goal!

The secret exit is for my project, sorry

The second moon coin is supposed to be hard to get! All of them are actualy!

I also got all three stars in one life in the video I did of this level!

[Imaynotbehere4long]

Timer is technicaly stoped by going to the sector with the goal!

I don't know what you're trying to say with this. The timer only stops when it reaches 0 and disappears; nothing else stops the timer.

The second moon coin is supposed to be hard to get! All of them are actualy!

First of all, the other two moon coins are not difficult to get. Second of all, I wasn't complaining about the second moon coin being difficult to get; I was complaining about the fact that you had a ledge for the player to stand on right beside it and the fact that it's impossible to get back to the main level if the player stops on that ledge. Like I wrote earlier: either remove the ledge and let the player know that he/she has to get the moon coin and make it back in one flight, or add a pipe by the ledge that leads back to the main level.

I also got all three stars in one life in the video I did of this level!

Here's my point: you made the level; you know the layout of the level as well as how to get each star and what each star does. A first-time player of your level will not know those things, and because of this, it will take him/her longer to get each star. Even in your play-though, despite the fact that you already know everything about your level, you barely had enough time to get all of the stars and beat the level, so there's no way that a first-time player will be able to collect all of the stars and beat the level in time, especially with the relative lack of hints you provided. I recommend adding about 100 seconds to the timer and moving the hint sign about the stars showing layers down to the hallway that actually contains the first star, as well as adding the other hints I mentioned in my review.

[MECHDRAGON777]

Timer is technicaly stoped by going to the sector with the goal!

I don't know what you're trying to say with this. The timer only stops when it reaches 0 and disappears; nothing else stops the timer.

The second moon coin is supposed to be hard to get! All of them are actualy!

First of all, the other two moon coins are not difficult to get. Second of all, I wasn't complaining about the second moon coin being difficult to get; I was complaining about the fact that you had a ledge for the player to stand on right beside it and the fact that it's impossible to get back to the main level if the player stops on that ledge. Like I wrote earlier: either remove the ledge and let the player know that he/she has to get the moon coin and make it back in one flight, or add a pipe by the ledge that leads back to the main level.

I also got all three stars in one life in the video I did of this level!

Here's my point: you made the level; you know the layout of the level as well as how to get each star and what each star does. A first-time player of your level will not know those things, and because of this, it will take him/her longer to get each star. Even in your play-though, despite the fact that you already know everything about your level, you barely had enough time to get all of the stars and beat the level, so there's no way that a first-time player will be able to collect all of the stars and beat the level in time, especially with the relative lack of hints you provided. I recommend adding about 100 seconds to the timer and moving the hint sign about the stars showing layers down to the hallway that actually contains the first star, as well as adding the other hints I mentioned in my review.

I understand, and about that ledge: it is there for the duficulty! Does the original Mario games tell you exactly how to he the star coins? That ledge I a trap, how can I give the hint without giving up how to get it! That is what the walk through book is for!

The timer, give me the script and I will fix it!

Can ou screen shot which hallway you mean? Sorry...

If you do not get to the last sector before time reaches zero, you lose a life! I lack the knowledge of how to fix the script?

[underFlo]

Spoiler: show

Timer is technicaly stoped by going to the sector with the goal!

I don't know what you're trying to say with this. The timer only stops when it reaches 0 and disappears; nothing else stops the timer.

The second moon coin is supposed to be hard to get! All of them are actualy!

First of all, the other two moon coins are not difficult to get. Second of all, I wasn't complaining about the second moon coin being difficult to get; I was complaining about the fact that you had a ledge for the player to stand on right beside it and the fact that it's impossible to get back to the main level if the player stops on that ledge. Like I wrote earlier: either remove the ledge and let the player know that he/she has to get the moon coin and make it back in one flight, or add a pipe by the ledge that leads back to the main level.

I also got all three stars in one life in the video I did of this level!

Here's my point: you made the level; you know the layout of the level as well as how to get each star and what each star does. A first-time player of your level will not know those things, and because of this, it will take him/her longer to get each star. Even in your play-though, despite the fact that you already know everything about your level, you barely had enough time to get all of the stars and beat the level, so there's no way that a first-time player will be able to collect all of the stars and beat the level in time, especially with the relative lack of hints you provided. I recommend adding about 100 seconds to the timer and moving the hint sign about the stars showing layers down to the hallway that actually contains the first star, as well as adding the other hints I mentioned in my review.

I understand, and about that ledge: it is there for the duficulty! Does the original Mario games tell you exactly how to he the star coins? That ledge I a trap, how can I give the hint without giving up how to get it! That is what the walk through book is for!

The timer, give me the script and I will fix it!

Can ou screen shot which hallway you mean? Sorry...

If you do not get to the last sector before time reaches zero, you lose a life! I lack the knowledge of how to fix the script?

Rrgarding the ledge trap: traps with no indication whatsoever are bad design, since they kill the player without him having done anything wrong. Death traps are also not a good way to make your level difficult, it only pisses of the player. It's really important that a level doesn't have any cheap deaths, if you want to make a difficult level, you have to make sure it's fair so the player feels like it's his fault if he dies and not the level's.
Death traps are the polar opposite of that.

[MECHDRAGON777]

Rrgarding the ledge trap: traps with no indication whatsoever are bad design, since they kill the player without him having done anything wrong. Death traps are also not a good way to make your level difficult, it only pisses of the player. It's really important that a level doesn't have any cheap deaths, if you want to make a difficult level, you have to make sure it's fair so the player feels like it's his fault if he dies and not the level's.
Death traps are the polar opposite of that.

I understand, I will see if I can remove the ledge without changing the level to much! I do see your point, about te timer, how much time should every level give? What code is used to remove the timer on beating the level?

[Imaynotbehere4long]

Can ou screen shot which hallway you mean? Sorry...

Here's what I'm talking about:

Spoiler: show

Because the sign talks about what happens when the player collects a star, it should be placed closer to the star so that the player doesn't have to go out of his/her way just to read the hint about what happened.

And while I'm at it, here's a simple way to fix the problem with the ledge:

Spoiler: show

This is how it looks like right now:

All you have to do is change the block formation to this:

BOOM! PERFECT! Of course, letting the player know that he/she has to use the racoon leaf's flight ability to get it wouldn't hurt, either.

[bossedit8]

Playthrough Made:



Original Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0D29Rb38xo

[MECHDRAGON777]

Can ou screen shot which hallway you mean? Sorry...

Here's what I'm talking about:

Spoiler: show

Because the sign talks about what happens when the player collects a star, it should be placed closer to the star so that the player doesn't have to go out of his/her way just to read the hint about what happened.

And while I'm at it, here's a simple way to fix the problem with the ledge:

Spoiler: show

This is how it looks like right now:

All you have to do is change the block formation to this:

BOOM! PERFECT! Of course, letting the player know that he/she has to use the racoon leaf's flight ability to get it wouldn't hurt, either.

I have made a fixed version and fixed a few things that were bot talked about, I will upload it latter today!

Playthrough Made:



Original Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0D29Rb38xo

Thank you, this is part of why I fixed some of the error! Like in the secret exit room! And I fixed the warps, but will if them more!

[Imaynotbehere4long]

I have made a fixed version and fixed a few things that were bot talked about, I will upload it latter today!

If you want the level re-reviewed, be sure to follow the steps in the re-reviewing topic carefully before uploading it.