Emral's Fan Reviews (Closed)

[Emral]

Major change that you won't do but: For my money, just end the level after the elevator ride down and it's a short and sweet package.

Considering the level's length and how the second half is really different I might actually do that and use the later half for something else in the future.

Once again thank you for the overrall feedback.

Just a small extra piece of caution on this one.. if you lower the difficulty significantly AND shorten the level, it could run the risk of becoming a bit too short/straightforward in the eyes of the contest judges. Part of the appeal of the shorter length for me is in the difficulty of the second half of the first section.
Some thoughts which may be worth considering:
- First half of first section has a lot of hidden areas. Second half of first section doesn't really have them. If you keep any extra powerups you add contained to areas off the main path it could maintain the intensity while being more forgiving and continuing that theme from the first area.
- The elevator ride could be extended a few seconds to extend its coolness. Not to the point of dragging it out, just to signal "woah this is a victory lap". You know kinda like how in the end of SMW's sunken ghost ship you have a section where you fall a lot while getting coins and stuff. I wouldn't suggest spamming enemies there like SMW does, though, lol. Just some bonus stuff to enjoy.

[Emral]

Friendly reminder that this review thread closes in a bit under 23 hours. If you want my opinion on your submission, please submit it before then.

[Alagirez]

Hope I still have time to review mine haha
https://drive.google.com/file/d/16FK3MY ... sp=sharing
Edit: updated to v1.2

[KurttheKing]

Playthrough video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qejOUPVfeXw

Review:

Spoiler: show

It's a bit of a 50/50 mix of fun setups about getting pushed around (spikes, bumpties), and slow setups with a lot of waiting (chomp balls, boss). The enemies struggle to synergize with each other, which makes individual obstacles in the level feel fairly disconnected from each other, and the boss doesn't involve anything the level previously taught, either.
Concept: 5/10: I think a level based around getting bumped around would've been really fun. Everything involving the chomps and boss on the other hand I don't like. How about 10/10 for the first of these, 0/10 for the other, and divide by 2.
Execution: 3/10: A lack of synergy and clear direction for the level, plus the boredom factor drag this score down for me.
Flavour: 4/10: There is some whimsy in this level which I enjoyed. The boss's hurt frame, being able to see its icon before the door (I thought that'd be the boss door!) and cases where enemies take each other out were fun to see. Some counterbalancing by everything in the level being cyan making things hard to see (especially the semisolids!)
Verdict: 3.4/9
I think there's a kernel of a really silly and fun level concept hidden in here that sometimes shines through. When bumpties throw you all around, snow balls kill bumpties, you have to redirect a snowball (shoutouts to star coin 3). I wish the level leaned more into that angle and embraced the whimsy. As it stands, it's a pretty middle-of-the-line level.

Advice:

Spoiler: show

1. My main advice is to reduce the amount of waiting in the level. The second star coin and boss stand out negatively in this regard, as do sections where you are blocked by a brick wall.
I wonder if the chomps cause turn blocks to turn. If they do, you can build bridges over spike pits out of that to create a dynamic obstacle involving brick destruction without causing waiting.

2. I noticed it was easy to run past enemies at thimes. Use of spawnzones.lua would ensure that enemies on generators spawn further off-screen and the screen is ready for action when you get there.

Unfeasible idea:
A whimsical version of this level would super hard lean into the bumpties and spikes. Consider spikes that vomit up bumpties and throw them like curling stones. Or spikes that very painfully vomit up those chomp stones (if they were a tad faster and thus scarier). Use of bumpers in a large vertical corridor to create a pinball-like ascent with bumpties and snowballs bouncing all over. Spikes vomiting up spikes vomiting up spikes...
I digress.

Thanks for sending in your level! Enjoy the contest and make sure to have others play as well.

Thanks for the detailed review! I reduced waiting in a number of areas, as well as utilized spawnzones.lua more to ensure generators were difficult, if not impossible to skip (I actually already had spawnzones.lua in the level, but only for a few moments near the very end). I also added some additional decoration to make the level feel a little more "whimsical." The level has been updated with the link if you would like to try it again and see if the changes help make it more enjoyable. Thanks again!

[Emral]

Thanks for the detailed review! I reduced waiting in a number of areas, as well as utilized spawnzones.lua more to ensure generators were difficult, if not impossible to skip (I actually already had spawnzones.lua in the level, but only for a few moments near the very end). I also added some additional decoration to make the level feel a little more "whimsical." The level has been updated with the link if you would like to try it again and see if the changes help make it more enjoyable. Thanks again!

Thanks for letting me know. I gave it another whirl and just have a few notes.
- If you enter the star coin 2 pipe, it would be nice if the pipes spawned straight away, so that if you go there accidentally you aren't forced to do the starcoin.
- I still think the semisolids should still have foreground colors, and not background colors:

[KurttheKing]

Thanks for letting me know. I gave it another whirl and just have a few notes.
- If you enter the star coin 2 pipe, it would be nice if the pipes spawned straight away, so that if you go there accidentally you aren't forced to do the starcoin.
- I still think the semisolids should still have foreground colors, and not background colors:

I'll do those both right away!

Edit: Version 7 now live

[Emral]

Hope I still have time to review mine haha
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1myh3cG ... sp=sharing
Edit: updated to v1.1

Playthrough video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nyyacOPd664

I might be playing on the older version. I flew through the level on the new version though and didn't see any notable changes, but please let me know if there's something I missed.
I'm playing the level twice in this video. The second playthrough alters the level mechanics a bit. I go into the reasons for this decision in the review.

Review:

Spoiler: show

For a level named after the most stormy of storms, or alternatively a song that goes really really fast, the content in this level is very slow paced and calm. Not complaining, just a weird disconnect between name and level. There are some creative ideas with the fences here, but the execution is pretty glitchy and weird. My climb momentum kept janking out in bad ways, sometimes I flew into the ceiling, and there are camera zones strewn about that struggle to catch up with the player and could cause you to take blind hits. It's messy, and by the end I wondered if it would be a more fun level if all the bells and whistles were removed. And lo and behold, it is.
Concept: 3/10: This is a 7/10 if it's just vanilla fences, but the addition of fastclimb and the design constraints brought about in order to make the 2 types of fences work just make the level less fun in my opinion.
Execution: 2/10: Average execution of a fence level if the gimmicks are removed (6/10). With the gimmicks instact, the execution is poor due to the abundance of glitches. Most egregious I think is the fact that there is no telegraph. Sure, the fences flicker a bit, but this is literally done by hiding the layer and then showing it again, so if you're not holding up or down, you're falling.
Flavour: 4/10: The vibe is alright, but brings with it a set of visual issues. I had trouble seeing the lava on the ceiling in the interior sections. If it were a more prominent color it would help. There is also no clear sense of progression. The level starts, it just kinda goes, and it just kinda ends, without anything that makes you go "oh, that's really neat". This area could be improved greatly, it feels pretty rushed.
Verdict: 2.6/9 up to a potential 5/9 by simply cutting some code.
Sometimes we wonder if we could without stopping to ask ourselves if we should. That's how I feel about the fences.

Advice:

Spoiler: show

1. Play the level yourself with the gimmicks removed, including all the camera zones and antizip (which I think causes the ladder death bug) and fastclimb (which I think is what causes climbing to feel terrible) and see if you have more fun. Should you do have more fun in the current iteration than the gimmickless iteration, that is perfectly valid. All advice below is stuff that is irrespective of my opinion toward the fences.

1a. If you do keep the flickering fences, I think it is mandatory to give it a visual cue that lasts over a second (65+ frames) and gradually gets more intense as the falloff point is approached. This could be done by making the fences approach 50% opacity and then get fully invisible, by drawing them with lua. And for the appearing ones, go from 0% to 25% opacity and then shoot up to 100% at the same time the other set goes fully invisible. With this telegraph, every moment a fence is not fully invisible, it should beclimbable. This creates some overlap between the two states which also helps leniency. Even if this is something out of scope for you, the flicker is bad and I think it is necessary to come up with something better for this idea to stick around.

2. It would be helpful if all powerups are leaves, because there is no use for a fire flower in this level.

3. I got a bug when whacking a skeleton with a tail in the first section. Something about waterleaper being unable to spawn more effects. Basegame bug? Unknown. Annoying.

4. You could use spawnzones to ensure podoboos are a threat before coming to a screen.

5. There is one part at the last checkpoint where the lava is flush with the ground and standing at the edge is really weird and glitchy.

6. Tanooki leaf flying down to the lava can cause a glitch where you don't die. This is visible in the video.

7. Lava colors, as I mentioned above, should probably be more visible at a glance.

Thanks for sending in your level! Sorry for kinda disassembling it! Good luck with the contest and remember to get other testers.

[Mal8rk]

Here's my level! Please review it honestly and look for bugs:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GXCT7g ... sp=sharing

Playthrough video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TgO00krl9g
I play the level twice in this review. The first playthrough is using normal human mashing speed. The second playthrough is using maniac mashing speed. Mashing is very physically straining, so please understand that not everyone can mash at the ideal rate.

Review:

Spoiler: show

At the core of this level is a conflict between the wish to create interesting obstacles for a variant of Blue Yoshi's flight ability, and the presence of a time limit, and I think that, were the time limit heavily reduced and the obstacles fleshed out to reap all the benefits of Blue Yoshi 2.0, I would enjoy the level a lot more. As it stands, the level struggles to commit to a significant variety in challenge, as it stretches 2 enemies and a bottomless pit out over 6 minutes to reach a contest level-length runtime, while every screen is constrained by the time you have left to fly. I have a lot of thoughts on the design in the advice section. Sorry for the bummer opening...
Concept: 4/10: I think Blue Yoshi is a decent concept, but I have to factor in the mashing and the time limit, which drag it down for me. I would prefer to just fly anywhere.
Execution: 5/10: It's more of an 8/10 if this were a contest review, but I have some "complete overhaul maniac" ideas in the advice section. I don't expect you to take them seriously, but maybe they can give some perspective on this score.
Flavour: 3/10: The level has a nice palette, but it looks pretty empty in its presentation. It might help to have some visual variety, like caves from BGOs or moving parallax clouds during the autoscroller to amp up the feeling of speed.
I don't give extra credits score in my reviews.
Verdict: 3.7/9
It's a common pitfall in a Chocolate Contest to just forego Mario gameplay entirely and instead focus on a new mechanic dreamt up from nothing. It's a really tricky balance to get right, and I'm a big stinker when it comes to these kinds of things. Like I said above, I think the execution is about as good as it gets with the current set of mechanics, so it's likely your scores in the actual contest will end up much higher without any major changes, but this thread is my advice corner, so I always review with what I think would be the "theoretical ideal" in mind. So keep that in mind when examining this feedback.

Advice:

Spoiler: show

I will start with the simple and impactful, and then dive further and further into the ridiciulously-high-effort and maybe-best-kept-for-a-future-level-using-this-mechanic tier stuff. Novel mechanics like this (it's basically Blue Yoshi but nobody ever uses Blue Yoshi so I'll call it novel) get the idea-gears turning rapidly, and the first run is always a bit of a prototype. Doesn't mean the idea should be ticked off as done-and-dusted afterwards :p

A1. If not remove, reduce timer by 50%. The level will not be significantly more difficult by letting the player ascend twice as high as they can on their current charge. This change is especially nice if #3 is impossible.
A2. Allow holding the button instead of mashing. This is mostly just to spare people's fingers.
A3. Change the 2nd screen so that players are forced to land before diving into a bottomless pit. This seriously got me on both of my runs, no joke.
A4. Give the player their regular jump when jumping from the ground first, then start flapping once the player's 0x11C offset has reached 0. Starting with a flap just feels kinda janky.
A5. GameData the reverse death event to auto-skip it on subsequent runs.

Cool, that's the easy stuff. Let's get into effortville.

B1. Embrace a more open structure. This gameplay mechanic does best in open areas, but all sections are a screen tall or a screen wide. You saw me try to go the wrong way in many places in the video, because I thought it'd be rad if I went there and there was something there.
An easy way to add openness to the level without impeding on existing design would be to have a suspicious hole in the ceiling of a horizontal section that leads to an optional area. What would the reward be? That's always the tricky thing, isn't it... It doesn't have to be tangibly useful in the level, it can just be an acknowledgement of the player's cleverness. A 1-up, an NPC, or a scenic shot of the landscape would do just fine.
I keep suggesting optional areas in these reviews and it really makes me disappointed that the SMB3 Chest NPC didn't win in the head-to-head for Beta 5. Dang!

B2. If you can come up with a better obstacle type to weave into the level (like a bramble maze for instance), I would suggest removing every red arrow, at least in the autoscroller. That's just functionally equivalent to an instakill block, so why even give mushrooms if those arrows will kill you anyway, right?

B3. More obstacle types in general. I'm not a fan of this "use as few enemies as possible" type design. SMBX comes with like 600 enemies out of the box, and I can't believe none of these would be interesting to dodge in this mode. WARNING: This point is HEAVILY biased toward what I like. Take it with a TABLESPOON OF SALT.

And the stupid and unworkable, the "save it for the sequel" stuff:

C1. Metroidvania
This is a continuation of B1, but if you stretch the open areas out to their natural extreme, you literally get the videogame Owlboy. It actually works pretty well to just dump the player in an open area, show them a locked gate with 2 un-lit towers beside, and give them cables leading left and right and tell them to figure it out. They can fly all over the place, still constrained by the timer, and they just need to figure out how to get to the endpoint of the cable by weaving around a nonlinear area. It's a kind of emergent fun that's sadly absent in more room-by-room level structures, but one which I can see this mechanic, especially with the timer intact, excel at. Something for the sequel, perhaps?

C2. Blue Yoshi.
Near the start of the review I kept referring to this owl as Blue Yoshi. They are pretty similar in how they work, aren't they? I guess you don't get the benefits of Yoshi's tongue. But maybe having that would allow for a more interesting design? This is far outside the scope of this level, especially with the deadline encroaching so soon, but you caaaan get an auto-infinite-flight Blue Yoshi that cannot be dismounted and will not flee when hurt with maybe a dozen lines of lua, by manipulating the player's memory in certain ways (setting mount, cancelling onPlayerHarm, disabling spinjump, forcing yoshi wings active). If you want to make a level like this in the future that also features a "weapon" in the form of Yoshi's tongue, consider this an easy cheat code to get that, lol.

I know I come off as a downer across large chunks of this review, but don't let my extreme harshness of original mechanics introduced in a really tight timeline overwhelm you. Thank you very much for sending in, and I hope this is helpful. Make sure to get others' opinions as well, as usual.

Just to let you know, I made a second revision of my level, which is now final. I would like for you to try it and see how it looks

I reworked a TON of stuff

[Alagirez]

Thank you for the review and the advices.

Spoiler: show

I mostly agree with your points, mainly the flickering fence complaints and the lava color. I already have an alternate solution to replace the whole gimmick, but it will take a while).
For the camera thingy, I used the camera controls so you can memorize the whole pattern when the illusion fence appears in one screen to avoid offscreen invincible gimmicks. I just need to adjust things a lot to make the transition clearer. I probably will keep it (and the "memorize the fence pattern" gimmick) in the next update. Everything else will be removed/replaced (mainly the FastClimb lib, sorry FNC).
...and yea I rushed the level at the end, I won't have much time at December so yea.

[Emral]

Thank you for the review and the advices.

Spoiler: show

I mostly agree with your points, mainly the flickering fence complaints and the lava color. I already have an alternate solution to replace the whole gimmick, but it will take a while).
For the camera thingy, I used the camera controls so you can memorize the whole pattern when the illusion fence appears in one screen to avoid offscreen invincible gimmicks. I just need to adjust things a lot to make the transition clearer. I probably will keep it (and the "memorize the fence pattern" gimmick) in the next update. Everything else will be removed/replaced (mainly the FastClimb lib, sorry FNC).
...and yea I rushed the level at the end, I won't have much time at December so yea.

Yeah, I think the camera zones work well for their intended purpose. They just take a long time to catch up with the player, and sometimes that causes either the player taking damage, or the camera jumping when the player enters the next zone too early. If there's a way to speed up the return-to-normal speed of the camera that would solve it.

Added in 7 minutes 2 seconds:

I reworked a TON of stuff

Thanks for letting me know! I played the new version and think it's a big improvement. Holding to fly makes the flight controls really pleasant and I like how it enables more extreme obstacles, especially with the Draglet enemies. YI fuzzy is also an inspired inclusion near the end, providing an unusual but effective threat in such an open area where it's not easy to intuit the exact level grid at a glance.

[Ness-Wednesday]

Is there room for one more?

[Emral]

Is there room for one more?

Playthrough video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rn-9qUSOJHQ

Review:

Spoiler: show

The level has its style nailed down very well, with strong visual and auditory identity. It features a megaman-like underwater jump with slow fall that enables some wacky movement with insane verticality, at the cost of vertical sections having a lot of semi-blind jumps that need you to feel them out, and any setup where the player has to descend through a moving group of enemy being very awkward to perform. It's a bit of a mixed bag in that regard, but manages to stay fun thanks to its frequent checkpointing and overall good design.
Concept: 9/10: There are a lot of concepts here and not all of them are winners IMO. Having synergies between them is what carries this. Level progression concept also good.
Execution: 7/10: It's good but it kinda tricks you into thinking it's a short level when you blow up the ship, and then there's like 60% level left to go, and suddenly the level ends without fanfare right after you remembered that you wanted a third green star (is the impression I get). I liked the level wrap ted section the most, but unfortunately did not like other sections featuring the little springboard guy (he was annoying to deal with).
Flavour: 9/10: It nails the ambience, just at the cost of gameplay at times. Visibility issues especially around the line guides that made it hard for me to spot where a Rammerhead might move.
Verdict: 7.3/9
I must commend the synergies again. I didn't much care for any of the obstacles in isolation, but when they started teaming up is when the level turned into something special and memorable. I understand there is a lot to introduce and iterate on, but maybe some of the fat can be trimmed and the lineguide colors adjusted to fix the pacing and the visibility, and then it's standout. Great work.

Advice:

Spoiler: show

I've already talked enough about visibility and mechanics I think so let's get into a very specific pacing idea, not as a "please do this" but rather as an idea for how the level could be made to end less suddenly without much extra work.

It might be good to foreshadow the end in some way. Seeing it on the other side of a wall, or on the other side of a keypad. Imagine after the ship is destroyed seeing the chest gently float down and land on the left side of the screen past a locked door, and there is a uniquely colored pipe above you that is later used to return there with a key. Then you can give the player a key near the end of the final section and, once they go through the pipe to reach back around to the chest, make it impossible to die so you don't have to deal with spawning a key in their hands. In this idea you just gotta make sure they enter the pipe only if they have a key (like toggling the warp layer based on whether there's a held item).

Other potential ideas could be to take a screenshot of the end-of-level geometry and scale it down to put in a parallaxing background of the first post-ship section, or have a segment where the player reaches a room that looks like a treasury and all the chests turn out to be empty (only bubbles inside), but one of them maybe contains the springboard guy (who i think really should not be able to hurt you), which could be how they are initially introduced.

Yknow just something to establish the concept of treasure hunting. I'm sure there are better ideas than what I put forth but I just think it might be good to think about. Feel free to disregard if you think it'd clutter up the design or is too short-notice as this point really is high-level nitpickery.

Thanks for sending in your level! Good luck in the contest.

[Alagirez]

Hopefully I'm not too late to say this but I've updated the link and fixed major issues that you've mentioned c:

[Emral]

And that's a wrap! I am no longer accepting new submissions and don't have time to play anymore before the deadline, though I can still reply to questions or comments.
Thank you all for sending in your levels! I hope despite me being a lil stinker at times making me look like I'm gunning for a nitpicking world record that I was able to provide commentary that allowed you all to be more happy with your levels overall, or at least offer a new perspective.
I'm sorry for anyone I may have upset in the process, especially because I realized halfway through what impact this heavily advice-centered feedback system would have on the scores (a heavy downwards trend). I'd not be surprised if the judge scores across the board in the actual contest are about 2 full points higher than what I distributed. It's an area for me to improve on if I bring this thread back in a future contest.

There is still roughly a day and a half left in the contest, so if you haven't finished your level yet, it's about time! If you have, congratulations and get some rest! Then enjoy the holidays (everyone).

Thanks for having me.

[WinterSweater]

That was very useful. I discovered a bunch of new stuff to add to my level thanks to the review