MARIO & LUIGI's MARATHON: ACROSS THE WORLD AND BEYOND
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I'm back with a second episode! This episode is about traversing the world. Like a Marathon, I wanted there to be a constant sense of forward progression. So I decided to settle for linear levels, and against a world map or hub. Instead, you instantly go from one level to the next with no breaks (Maybe similar to a Classic Sonic game).
A big focus of this episode was coming up with unique gimmicks and then developing and twisting those gimmicks in interesting ways as much as possible:
-FEATURES-
>Pretty much exclusively custom music and graphics!
>Creative custom boss battles!
>Clever Level Design! (According to me)
>Unique levels and ideas!
>An actual storyline!
>Over 20 levels worth a content!
-PLEASE NOTE-
>Episode was created using Super Mario Bros. X 1.3.0.1. Also playable in 2.0, of course.
>2-player is not tested and not recommended, and probably doesn't work.
>Graphics & music credits in the "Credits.txt" file in the game files.
>Any kind of feedback is greatly appreciated!
I absolutely loved this episode, the aesthetics kept it fresh the entire way through. The gimmicks were fun and inventive. I loved the whole checkpoints no breaks deal. For some reason world maps really take me out of the experience. I LOVED the boss fights, each one was unique and fun in its own way. Looking forward to more stuff from you.
Added in 2 minutes 15 seconds:
Oh, and yes, I have played super mario miracle and I loved that too.
I absolutely loved this episode, the aesthetics kept it fresh the entire way through. The gimmicks were fun and inventive. I loved the whole checkpoints no breaks deal. For some reason world maps really take me out of the experience. I LOVED the boss fights, each one was unique and fun in its own way. Looking forward to more stuff from you.
Added in 2 minutes 15 seconds:
Oh, and yes, I have played super mario miracle and I loved that too.
I'm really glad you enjoyed your time with it! Thanks for your reply, it means a lot to me and I really appreciate it.
I'm sorry to say though, I don't have any plans to do a third episode. Well, maybe I'll try Beta 4 when it releases, but no promises!
Eri7 wrote:
Alright i am downloading the episode, i will provide a review of it once i finish it.
So i played your episode. I must say that i was impressed. Most of your levels contained decent level design and few of them contained excellent level design which is great! Of course few levels felt a bit too repetitive with their usage of the gimmick such as the bowser statues in the volcano level. My favorite levels were the level where its all dark expect some spots which are shown through light and how the level introduces more and more interactions with the gimmick which was amazing btw. My second favorite level was the toxic waste level where you have to solve puzzles by teleporting through using certain switch blocks, it was an excellent level and my third favorite level is the factory level where all of the previous gimmicks in the episode are used and combined to create a very memorable experience, i felt it like it was a way to thank the player for playing the episode and make him not forget about the previous levels which was also great. My fourth favorite level was where you have to escape a pyramid guarded by these spiky balls, it was a unique experience and i wished it was longer. The Bosses also were cool outside of the mario boss fight... Also i think a lot of stuff could be polished such as aesthetics and some other details including the levels. Don't get me wrong, i enjoyed most of your levels and their level design was good but the levels could be even better if they included more details and polish of the aesthetics. I liked the paintings, but it got to a point where i had over 30 lives and the 1-ups just lost their purpose in the episode. I liked the plot twist where you defeat Bowser, you think the game is over but then poof, king boo creates a whole separate adventure for luigi and wario and waluigi get involved as well. You have subverted my expectations like this so kudos to you. Also i liked how the castle contained a heroic theme like you know you are going to beat Bowser and the music makes you feel confident while playing the level, its a great touch tbh. One thing i dislike about the episode is how suddenly the difficulty ramped up after the bowser fight, i think it could have been handled better because later on, few levels just made me frustrated while playing them to a point where i had to use cheats during the mario boss fight because i couldn't beat it and the ice factory level with the blocks which moved at a very high speed and can easily crush you, i really dislike that level. I also loved how you handled the king boo's castle level, it also scared me for a moment. Overall, this was a great episode to play, i hope it gets featured as well, it's something simple but the levels are good, well most of them and both bros get their share of adventures. Also i am not going to review extra content yet like the challenges after you beat the main game but i might do it once i beat them. I also haven't played your first episode so this episode makes me want to play it. So thank you for creating such a wonderful experience for me, it has been long since i played a decent smbx episode so this really means a lot to me. I wish you good luck with your next episode if you are going to create one.
Thank you for the detailed review! This was a great read! Your favorite levels were the ones I was the proudest of, haha.
In hindsight I can agree with most if not all of your criticism. I can certainly see how a gimmick like the Bowser Statues can get old too quickly, or how some of the levels might look a little too simple aesthetically.
I actually think it's really difficult to estimate the difficulty of a level. Of course I wanted Luigi's part to be a bit more difficult, but apparently I went a bit too far. I still think it's easier than most SMBX episodes I've played, but that's probably just because I made it.
As for the 1-Ups... If it was possible I wouldn't put game overs in my game at all. Especially in this episode, because you would have to redo more than one level. In my first episode I legit just gave the player 50 1-Ups in the intro, but that came of as amateur-ish (in my opinion). This time I thought they might at least make a good collectible, though I don't actually want anyone to Game Over, so I put in a lot. It's true, they don't really have much value. Even so, someone who played it on Youtube only had 1 1-Up left after the final boss... So that makes me think, it's important to think of players of all different skill levels and play styles, and I certainly don't want my game to get harder specifically for those who die a lot, if that makes any sense.
It's also really nice to hear about your thoughts on vibe, subverted expectations, etc... Often times I'm not sure if people catch that kind of thing at all because they don't talk about it, but it's great when it gets appreciated.
The extra content is mostly unreleased levels I made back in 2015. I don't really consider it to be an important part of the episode. Might still be worth playing though.
Thank you so much for playing it and sharing your feedback with me!
Hey, i finished the whole game, yei for me. Here is a small review if you could call it that to the extra content of your episode.
The levels were old, i don't really know why did you include them considering how old they were.
Also the levels were decent but not at the same quality of the levels in the main story. Two levels were quite nice, the smw castle ones where entering through a door changes the level to a upside version of it and the quiz level was also fun. The others were a bit frustrating and a bit too short(the quiz level also short lol) but they weren't terrible. The secret boss was frustrating to beat and i think you could have included something else which would be easier and more unique. The reward also could have been better like allowing to replay the episode with waluigi and wario. Well the extra content was decent but not on the same level as the main story. I liked your game and i am excited for your future work.
...In a way, I'm honestly kind of glad that the old extra levels in the post-game were not as good as the new ones. As I said I consider the episode to already be complete without them, including them was just a "why not?" kinda thing.
The secret boss was frustrating to beat and i think you could have included something else which would be easier and more unique.
I dunno about "more unique", but having a super frustrating, borderline unfairly difficult final challenge is kind of the norm for Mario games at this point, isn't it? I don't really think there's anything wrong with a secret boss being brutal...
The reward also could have been better like allowing to replay the episode with waluigi and wario.
Well... There's not really that much you can do for a 100% reward after a secret final boss, is there? I couldn't allow Wario and Waluigi into normal levels, Waluigi specifically because he can't spin jump which is necessary at times. Even if I did, the player would expect another even bigger reward for bothering to play through the whole game again... I think at that point it would be really difficult to live up to their expectations... So I think leaving it at a secret boss wasn't such a bad decision honestly.
I want to thank you again for making such an in-depth review. It was very constructive and helpful. I'm glad you enjoyed the main game as much as you did.
