Cedur wrote:General advice, don't let yourself be influenced if you feel that something between 50 and 100 is an apropriate and rewarding amount for your episode and if you feel that you want (and can) go this far. You're on a fine track already and you're NOT a bloody beginner. There's no need to apply "start small bc you're an unknown quantity" to you.
Quantity over quality is a thing yes, but making levels for a Mario adventure episode is different from making super extravagant levels for contests or making a gimmick-centered episode. Sure, Enigmatic or WIP Boom Boom Evolution are cool in their own way and saturated with a low level count. But this is neither what you're currently doing nor what you need to do. And what would SMBX be without the fun large episodes that kept us hyped and engaged for days?
There are significant level design issues apparent in the screenshots though and an episode is only engaging for days if it's well done and enjoyable.
Saying that you shouldn't take other people's advice...is really bad advice
That is a good point. I haven't deleted my levels yet, so I may try to keep going with this project.
But I would still need to improve most of my levels since they aren't the greatest either. Thanks 4 the advice!
Cedur wrote:General advice, don't let yourself be influenced if you feel that something between 50 and 100 is an apropriate and rewarding amount for your episode and if you feel that you want (and can) go this far. You're on a fine track already and you're NOT a bloody beginner. There's no need to apply "start small bc you're an unknown quantity" to you.
Quantity over quality is a thing yes, but making levels for a Mario adventure episode is different from making super extravagant levels for contests or making a gimmick-centered episode. Sure, Enigmatic or WIP Boom Boom Evolution are cool in their own way and saturated with a low level count. But this is neither what you're currently doing nor what you need to do. And what would SMBX be without the fun large episodes that kept us hyped and engaged for days?
Been designing levels and games all my life and still can't churn out a quality project with level counts above 15 by myself before losing interest. This isn't "start small bc you're an unknown quantity", this is "satisfaction from small victories adds up" and "seeing your idea come to life before you start hating it".
As for your second paragraph... it's kind of a forest fire for several reasons. Instead of replying in a long rant displaying how little you know about what you're talking about, I'll just point to this though:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4n5sThzBTI
Remember that one time Chad won a contest with a level that, instead of having much extravagant pandering, could have been part of a standard traditional episode?
Cedur wrote:General advice, don't let yourself be influenced if you feel that something between 50 and 100 is an apropriate and rewarding amount for your episode and if you feel that you want (and can) go this far. You're on a fine track already and you're NOT a bloody beginner. There's no need to apply "start small bc you're an unknown quantity" to you.
Quantity over quality is a thing yes, but making levels for a Mario adventure episode is different from making super extravagant levels for contests or making a gimmick-centered episode. Sure, Enigmatic or WIP Boom Boom Evolution are cool in their own way and saturated with a low level count. But this is neither what you're currently doing nor what you need to do. And what would SMBX be without the fun large episodes that kept us hyped and engaged for days?
Cedur wrote:General advice, don't let yourself be influenced if you feel that something between 50 and 100 is an apropriate and rewarding amount for your episode and if you feel that you want (and can) go this far. You're on a fine track already and you're NOT a bloody beginner. There's no need to apply "start small bc you're an unknown quantity" to you.
Quantity over quality is a thing yes, but making levels for a Mario adventure episode is different from making super extravagant levels for contests or making a gimmick-centered episode. Sure, Enigmatic or WIP Boom Boom Evolution are cool in their own way and saturated with a low level count. But this is neither what you're currently doing nor what you need to do. And what would SMBX be without the fun large episodes that kept us hyped and engaged for days?
I 100% agree.
Read what Enjl and I wrote above. Cedur's views aren't very good here
Well, I don't get why I'm not a good level designer even though I enjoy making levels a lot. What do I need to improve in them? (Based on the screenshots)
Taycamgame wrote:Well, I don't get why I'm not a good level designer even though I enjoy making levels a lot. What do I need to improve in them? (Based on the screenshots)
I was able to deduce this much from the screenshots and a bunch of other people also gave you feedback earlier in the thread.
PixelPest wrote:The level in the first two screenshots looks really short. There's a lot of style mixing that doesn't work (SMB3 + SMW), especially the SMB3 and SMW coins placed together. The dragon coins and 1-up are placed relatively poorly since they are meant to be in challenging locations as they reward the player with a 1-up if all five are collected, though they are in the main path of the player. The level itself looks inconsistent as it gets less and less cluttered as the level goes on until it is basically barren. You also have way too many power-ups for a level that easy. You don't need to give the player two mushrooms at the beginning and the fire flower isn't even really needed since the level is so easy. The desert level looks interesting, but again, try not to mix styles, especially when you have an SMB3-styled ?-block to work with right in the editor that should be used instead of the SMW ones. I'm not really sure what to say about the last screenshot other than that it looks really unfinished, bare, and not very fun
Although as Enjl mentioned, It's hard to judge things from the screenshots.
Also just because you enjoy something doesn't mean you're good at it. I would enjoy skydiving; doesn't mean I'm good at it. Likewise, just because you enjoy making levels doesn't mean you're a good level designer.
In general, your levels mostly just appear (from the screenshots) to be aesthetically unappealing in places (as I mentioned in the blurb I quoted above), including the fact that some of the recolour you've done don't fit because the palette you've used is too saturated compared to that of the game from which the style of the level is taken. The first level at least looks too short and from the screenshots all of the levels just look rompy and have no specific gimmick or mechanic that's built on (though I'm just looking at the screenshots so I could be wrong. Some of your levels also look clustered with coins. Also putting 10 coins in a ?-block is annoying as it takes so long to get them all out
So i tried uploading the demo multiple times, but it keeps failing to upload. I'm using OneDrive. I'm not sure if it's a corrupt file or my internet, but I can't see myself uploading this anytime soon.
Don't worry, in the revamped version of the project, all the levels should be much better than those in the screenshots.
So, as a summary of what i need to improve:
Aesthetics, Level Structure, Gimmicks, Difficulty Curve, making it enjoyable.
Can any of you guys send some levels for me to try, ones that could be good examples of level design? Thanks!
Taycamgame wrote:
Can any of you guys send some levels for me to try, ones that could be good examples of level design? Thanks!
Unfortunately I don't have a SMBX level for you, but you can't really go wrong with playing games from the New Super Mario Bros. series. What's important is that while playing you think not just about what the level presents, but why it presents it there. I encourage you to watch this video and then try to match what he describes to another level: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0c5Le1vGp4
Looks like this is scrapped at the moment, but I have already begun the new version of this project. Hope that is better!
Do you need audacity to use OGG files, or can I use them straight away?
Taycamgame wrote:Do you need audacity to use OGG files, or can I use them straight away?
You can use Audacity to convert files to .ogg, but if you already have ogg files you don't need to run them through audacity again before using them in SMBX2. Here's a list of compatible formats for music: http://wohlsoft.ru/pgewiki/SDL_Mixer_X#Music_Formats
Ok, thanks. Why are some of those marked as "hard-coded"? Infact, what does the term "hardcoded" mean in SMBX terms? There is a hardcoded folder included with SMBX, but I don't get why it's called that.
Taycamgame wrote:Ok, thanks. Why are some of those marked as "hard-coded"? Infact, what does the term "hardcoded" mean in SMBX terms? There is a hardcoded folder included with SMBX, but I don't get why it's called that.
Hardcoded means that something isn't flexible. I'm not sure what it means for these audio formats, but the hardcoded folder contains graphics that were hardcoded into SMBX before we ripped them out and made them changeable.
Oh, so basically "hardcoded" means it isn't easily edited?
Anyway, pretty soon I will be making a new topic for the new project (I shouldn't post about that in this topic as it is obviously a different thing). Thanks for all the advice, support and feedback I have received from you all, it has really helped!
Taycamgame wrote:Oh, so basically "hardcoded" means it isn't easily edited?
Anyway, pretty soon I will be making a new topic for the new project (I shouldn't post about that in this topic as it is obviously a different thing). Thanks for all the advice, support and feedback I have received from you all, it has really helped!
You shouldn't make a new topic when you can just continue in this one. (A mod would likely merge the new topic anyway)
Taycamgame wrote:Oh, so basically "hardcoded" means it isn't easily edited?
Anyway, pretty soon I will be making a new topic for the new project (I shouldn't post about that in this topic as it is obviously a different thing). Thanks for all the advice, support and feedback I have received from you all, it has really helped!
You shouldn't make a new topic when you can just continue in this one. (A mod would likely merge the new topic anyway)
If it's a new project, what speaks against a new topic?
Taycamgame wrote:Oh, so basically "hardcoded" means it isn't easily edited?
Anyway, pretty soon I will be making a new topic for the new project (I shouldn't post about that in this topic as it is obviously a different thing). Thanks for all the advice, support and feedback I have received from you all, it has really helped!
You shouldn't make a new topic when you can just continue in this one. (A mod would likely merge the new topic anyway)
If it's a new project, what speaks against a new topic?
I may have (incorrectly) assumed that it would be redoing this specific project
Thanks!
What would a good difficulty curve be like? Start easy then get progressively harder, but by how much?
For example, would it be wise to make a level harder than the previous one, when they don't use the same gimmick? What about between worlds; should it be a completely smooth upwards curve or should there be spikes and dips of difficulty level?
And I may come back to this, possibly as a prequel episode.
