Sealtower

[IntimFuchtler]

Hello Guys, this is an old level of mine I created under my old nickname, Ruffy, back in 2011.
I want to post this again to hear some new opinions/critism in order to improve my level design (because its a long time since i created some levels).

This level is long (15 sections) and hard but everything is possible without taking damage wether your'e small or big.
I created this level to be a tribute to one of my favourite rpgs, Lufia, were you have to conquer three towers near the end of the game.

Some screenshots:

Spoiler: show

It's meant to be played as Mario or Luigi.
I hope you guys enjoy this level^^

Download link:

Spoiler: show

https://www.mediafire.com/?whjl341fptlstbz
Credits are inside the level folder

[underFlo]

Dang this looks pretty cool actually.

I'll review this once I'm done with my CC10 level which is hopefully tomorrow.

[Superiorstar]

This level is nice, but is SO unfair is some places: Fireballs that are placed in annoying areas, annoyingly placed thwimps, Koopatroopas in tight spaces, and to top it of its a freakin' "send you to a clusterfuck of an area" maze.
I can see this as a world 6 castle level if you tone down the kaizo-esque traps.

[IntimFuchtler]

That is one of my problems I think. I like hard levels but sometimes I make it too hard. The original version of this level was even harder, I already tuned it down a bit.

[KateBulka]

I review it when play it (i not lying).
Edit: I make Unoffical Review

[Imaynotbehere4long]

My review of Sealtower:

This level...ugh, there's so much wrong with it, I don't really know where to begin.

Well, I guess I'll start at the beginning. In the first section, there's a tower not long after the start. First time players will think that this is where they're supposed to go, but no, the player actually has to go past the first tower and get an ax in another tower later in the section in order to go through the first tower. If the player climbs the first tower without getting the ax in the second tower, he/she won't be able to progress past some blocks. When I first got to the blockade, I thought that I had to collect all of the coins in the tower to progress (since I didn't know about the second tower at the time), but I soon found out that that was a waste of time. After the blockade is removed and the player passes the first tower, the path splits in two, and this is where the level's biggest flaw (aside from maybe its length) makes itself clear: the level is way too cramped way too often:

Spoiler: show

The biggest example of how cramped the level is would be that there are way too many areas where the Thwimps are placed in indentations in the ceiling, but the path forward is only about two or three units high, forcing the player to wait, and in case you didn't know, waiting = boring = not fun.



The Thwimp on the top left of this screenshot also falls into this category since there isn't enough time for the player to jump up from the bottom path before the Thwimp gets there.

It's a shame, too, because other than all of the cramped corridors, your NPC placement wasn't too bad.

Another annoying part of the level would be here:

Spoiler: show

The blocks in the screenshot are invisible at first, and the pipes only lead down, not up. In other words, you force the player to backtrack through this section twice before being able to proceed, and making the player go though literally the exact same obstacles multiple times is something you should avoid doing.

This is the part of the level (before the midway point) that caused me to give up and start cheating:

Spoiler: show

Okay, so the entire point of this tower is to climb up here, stomp one of the Koopas that gets generated from the pipe on the left, then go back to an earlier part of the section to break a wall...

However, if the player activates both of these invisible blocks, which all first-time players will do, there is absolutely no way to get out of this part of the section, rendering the level unbeatable and forcing the player to kill himself/herself, and yes, I looked in the editor to make absolutely sure that I wasn't missing anything.

Now, on to the second tower in this split path:

Spoiler: show

I am yet to find a pipe maze that isn't incredibly tedious and boring; yours is no exception.

Now, this tower also has its own split path, but the problem is if you go to the right first (where the pipe maze is), you'll fall past these invisible blocks and end up on the second floor. If you go left, you'll end up on the second floor no matter what, so if you go right first, you'll have to go through the pipe maze again, which is extremely annoying.

Once the player gets the axes in both of these towers, he/she can go inside the top-center tower in the fourth section, where the music finally changes. Oh, that reminds me: throughout the majority of the level, Watchtowers of the Seal is playing; that may not seem like a big deal, but the song is only 48 seconds long! Remember how, in the first post, it is mentioned that this is a long level? That is an understatement. If you're going to make a level this long, the least you could do is use a song that isn't this short.

Anyway, inside the top-center tower is an SMB1 Bowser that the player has to fight with shells. Now, on top of being a pre-programmed AI in an empty room with a generator that you have to use as your weapon (which is its own category of bad level design), once the first SMB1 Bowser is killed, the player has to fight a second one, which just adds to the annoyance factor. After both SMB1 Bowsers are defeated, the player FINALLY gets the checkpoint. That means that if the player dies ONCE during anything listed above, he/she has to go through all of it again, listening to Watchtowers of the Seal (seriously, I got sick of the song by this point). When I got the checkpoint, I turned off God Mode since I thought that, maybe, the level would get better.

Anyway, after the checkpoint, the player has to go back to Section 4, jump down, then climb to the center of the center tower to proceed. That part is moderately annoying since the player still has to go through a section traversed countless times before, and it would be better if the door by the midpoint went straight to Section 9. Oh, and Watchtowers of the Seal begins playing again.

So after Section 9, the path splits once again, but not before the player comes across this obstacle:

Spoiler: show

The enemies are generated too quickly for the player to be able to run past one without getting hit by the next one, and the only way to get past is to jump on one under the ? blocks, which can be annoying since these enemies bounce.

For the tower on the left, the player can see the ? block before the Podobos are spawned, and first-time players will hold left to go to the ? block and end up getting hit by the Podobo. I recommend removing the pipe so that the player can see that there are Podobos there without taking a hit.

Remembering what happened with the Podobos, I decided to stay still when I fell to this part, and ended up falling into the lava and dying.

That's another major problem with your level: all of the blind jumps. The player has no way of knowing whether or not he/she is about to fall into lava until after he/she has been killed by it, and your coin placements aren't enough of an indication. It was around here that I activated God Mode because I was getting tired of this level's blind jumps and your song choice.

By the way, the above screenshot is from the second tower in the post-midpoint split path. Like one of the towers before it, this also has a split path, and this one also isn't beneficial. You see, once the player makes it here, he/she can either go left or right. One path leads back to the beginning of the section, and the other path leads to the necessary ax.

If the player goes left, not only does he/she encounter the blind jump I commented on above, but he/she will also be sent back to the beginning of the section! There's no indication which path leads where, so it's a total guessing game for the player and a bad design choice for the level's creator.

If the player goes right, he/she will come across this part. First-time players probably won't think that they're supposed to just jump up the platform, but spin-jump on the Podobo instead. However, that just gets the player killed.

Further along that path, the player will encounter this off-center Piranha Plant:

You should really do something about it, since the player can spin-jump on Piranha Plants' spawn points:

So, what happens once the player gets the ax? He/she is sent back to the split path, of course!

To avoid confusion for this tower, I recommend blocking off the left path from the main path, then have the door by the ax warp to the left path.

After all of that, the player finally makes it to the boss of the level, and what is it? An SMB3 Bowser in an empty room with a generator that you have to use as your weapon. Not only is it boring, but the boss can be broken if the player just stays above one of the generator pipes, making it one of the easiest bosses ever:

Spoiler: show

By the way, do you know that SMB3 Bowsers take TWENTY HITS to be killed by projectiles? It is rarely, if ever, fun to fight SMB3 Bowsers with projectiles, and I've never encountered one that is fun. This fight is no exception, and since it can be broken as shown above, the fight is just extremely boring.

In conclusion

The level is too long, the song choice is too short, there is too much waiting and too many blind jumps, and the bosses are just pre-programmed AIs in an empty room with a weapon generator. There are a few areas that don't have anything wrong with them, but they are so few and far between, it hardly makes any difference. I'd say this deserves a 3/10.

[AirSeus]

I would add a 1 onto your score, you dont judge music, we never have done because its too unfair.

[HeroOfRhyme]

I would add a 1 onto your score, you dont judge music, we never have done because its too unfair.

You're nothing official so i don't believe you to be in a position to tell anyone anything a bout judging. At least I was a judge myself, I always judged music myself and it never hurt anyone. Still do, and I'm sure I'd be a judge again if they were hiring but yeah... I only left cause of life.

I agree with the 3/10.

[Imaynotbehere4long]

I only judge music when it actually hurts the experience, like this one. When I first heard the song, I thought it was pretty good and fitting despite only being 48 seconds, but the level is just soooo long and cheap that I got sick of it before the midpoint. It should be a given to use fitting and enjoyable music, so when the song doesn't do its job, something's wrong.

[underFlo]

I only judge music when it actually hurts the experience, like this one. When I first heard the song, I thought it was pretty good and fitting despite only being 48 seconds, but the level is just soooo long and cheap that I got sick of it before the midpoint. It should be a given to use fitting and enjoyable music, so when the song doesn't do its job, something's wrong.

I haven't tried the level yet, but I wouldn't take 1 point from it just for the music. For comparison, GMarinaX found a few game-breaking glitches in one of zlaker's level and only took off one point.

I generally feel like your review style is a little bit untransparent, but that's just me. I read your review, and the score doesn't reaply seem to fit with what you said about it. But after all, it's just subjective, so I might be wrong.

Though I didn't play it yet, so I might as well be completely wrong.

Edit: Just tried it, and I agree with you mostly. I'd given it the ine or the other extra point though since it'd deserver more of a 4.5/10 imo.

[Waddle]

I would add a 1 onto your score, you dont judge music, we never have done because its too unfair.

You're nothing official so i don't believe you to be in a position to tell anyone anything a bout judging. At least I was a judge myself, I always judged music myself and it never hurt anyone. Still do, and I'm sure I'd be a judge again if they were hiring but yeah... I only left cause of life.

I agree with the 3/10.

He was just giving his opinion on the review, and I think he's aware he's "nothing official". I mentioned this in a topic once; judging music is fine, as long as it doesn't affect the score too much. I wrote this before, but okay:
"Random Review"
-design
Blablabla
3/10
-atmosphere
Blablabla
3/10
-Music
Jadajadajada
10/10
This is clearly a bad level, but because the Music apperantly fit well, it ends up with a 5.2/10 instead of a (more logical) 3/10. In this case, the score remained relatively balanced, looking at all the flaws IMNBH4L pointed out.

[IntimFuchtler]

My review of Sealtower:

This level...ugh, there's so much wrong with it, I don't really know where to begin.

Well, I guess I'll start at the beginning. In the first section, there's a tower not long after the start. First time players will think that this is where they're supposed to go, but no, the player actually has to go past the first tower and get an ax in another tower later in the section in order to go through the first tower. If the player climbs the first tower without getting the ax in the second tower, he/she won't be able to progress past some blocks. When I first got to the blockade, I thought that I had to collect all of the coins in the tower to progress (since I didn't know about the second tower at the time), but I soon found out that that was a waste of time. After the blockade is removed and the player passes the first tower, the path splits in two, and this is where the level's biggest flaw (aside from maybe its length) makes itself clear: the level is way too cramped way too often:

Spoiler: show

The biggest example of how cramped the level is would be that there are way too many areas where the Thwimps are placed in indentations in the ceiling, but the path forward is only about two or three units high, forcing the player to wait, and in case you didn't know, waiting = boring = not fun.



The Thwimp on the top left of this screenshot also falls into this category since there isn't enough time for the player to jump up from the bottom path before the Thwimp gets there.

It's a shame, too, because other than all of the cramped corridors, your NPC placement wasn't too bad.

Another annoying part of the level would be here:

Spoiler: show

The blocks in the screenshot are invisible at first, and the pipes only lead down, not up. In other words, you force the player to backtrack through this section twice before being able to proceed, and making the player go though literally the exact same obstacles multiple times is something you should avoid doing.

This is the part of the level (before the midway point) that caused me to give up and start cheating:

Spoiler: show

Okay, so the entire point of this tower is to climb up here, stomp one of the Koopas that gets generated from the pipe on the left, then go back to an earlier part of the section to break a wall...

However, if the player activates both of these invisible blocks, which all first-time players will do, there is absolutely no way to get out of this part of the section, rendering the level unbeatable and forcing the player to kill himself/herself, and yes, I looked in the editor to make absolutely sure that I wasn't missing anything.

Now, on to the second tower in this split path:

Spoiler: show

I am yet to find a pipe maze that isn't incredibly tedious and boring; yours is no exception.

Now, this tower also has its own split path, but the problem is if you go to the right first (where the pipe maze is), you'll fall past these invisible blocks and end up on the second floor. If you go left, you'll end up on the second floor no matter what, so if you go right first, you'll have to go through the pipe maze again, which is extremely annoying.

Once the player gets the axes in both of these towers, he/she can go inside the top-center tower in the fourth section, where the music finally changes. Oh, that reminds me: throughout the majority of the level, Watchtowers of the Seal is playing; that may not seem like a big deal, but the song is only 48 seconds long! Remember how, in the first post, it is mentioned that this is a long level? That is an understatement. If you're going to make a level this long, the least you could do is use a song that isn't this short.

Anyway, inside the top-center tower is an SMB1 Bowser that the player has to fight with shells. Now, on top of being a pre-programmed AI in an empty room with a generator that you have to use as your weapon (which is its own category of bad level design), once the first SMB1 Bowser is killed, the player has to fight a second one, which just adds to the annoyance factor. After both SMB1 Bowsers are defeated, the player FINALLY gets the checkpoint. That means that if the player dies ONCE during anything listed above, he/she has to go through all of it again, listening to Watchtowers of the Seal (seriously, I got sick of the song by this point). When I got the checkpoint, I turned off God Mode since I thought that, maybe, the level would get better.

Anyway, after the checkpoint, the player has to go back to Section 4, jump down, then climb to the center of the center tower to proceed. That part is moderately annoying since the player still has to go through a section traversed countless times before, and it would be better if the door by the midpoint went straight to Section 9. Oh, and Watchtowers of the Seal begins playing again.

So after Section 9, the path splits once again, but not before the player comes across this obstacle:

Spoiler: show

The enemies are generated too quickly for the player to be able to run past one without getting hit by the next one, and the only way to get past is to jump on one under the ? blocks, which can be annoying since these enemies bounce.

For the tower on the left, the player can see the ? block before the Podobos are spawned, and first-time players will hold left to go to the ? block and end up getting hit by the Podobo. I recommend removing the pipe so that the player can see that there are Podobos there without taking a hit.

Remembering what happened with the Podobos, I decided to stay still when I fell to this part, and ended up falling into the lava and dying.

That's another major problem with your level: all of the blind jumps. The player has no way of knowing whether or not he/she is about to fall into lava until after he/she has been killed by it, and your coin placements aren't enough of an indication. It was around here that I activated God Mode because I was getting tired of this level's blind jumps and your song choice.

By the way, the above screenshot is from the second tower in the post-midpoint split path. Like one of the towers before it, this also has a split path, and this one also isn't beneficial. You see, once the player makes it here, he/she can either go left or right. One path leads back to the beginning of the section, and the other path leads to the necessary ax.

If the player goes left, not only does he/she encounter the blind jump I commented on above, but he/she will also be sent back to the beginning of the section! There's no indication which path leads where, so it's a total guessing game for the player and a bad design choice for the level's creator.

If the player goes right, he/she will come across this part. First-time players probably won't think that they're supposed to just jump up the platform, but spin-jump on the Podobo instead. However, that just gets the player killed.

Further along that path, the player will encounter this off-center Piranha Plant:

You should really do something about it, since the player can spin-jump on Piranha Plants' spawn points:

So, what happens once the player gets the ax? He/she is sent back to the split path, of course!

To avoid confusion for this tower, I recommend blocking off the left path from the main path, then have the door by the ax warp to the left path.

After all of that, the player finally makes it to the boss of the level, and what is it? An SMB3 Bowser in an empty room with a generator that you have to use as your weapon. Not only is it boring, but the boss can be broken if the player just stays above one of the generator pipes, making it one of the easiest bosses ever:

Spoiler: show

By the way, do you know that SMB3 Bowsers take TWENTY HITS to be killed by projectiles? It is rarely, if ever, fun to fight SMB3 Bowsers with projectiles, and I've never encountered one that is fun. This fight is no exception, and since it can be broken as shown above, the fight is just extremely boring.

In conclusion

The level is too long, the song choice is too short, there is too much waiting and too many blind jumps, and the bosses are just pre-programmed AIs in an empty room with a weapon generator. There are a few areas that don't have anything wrong with them, but they are so few and far between, it hardly makes any difference. I'd say this deserves a 3/10.

Well, thanks for the deep review.
First of all, you can get back down at the part with the koopa shell, use the pipe with the invisible blocks.
I used coins to guide the player if jumps aren't clear, even if its just one or two coins, like the second path in the second main section.
I really like the music and never get tired of it and since I think people design levels according to there own style this wouldn't be a problem.
Also this was one of my first levels back in 2011, at that time bosses like smb1 and 3 bowsers weren't that bad. But I understand what you're meaning.
Anyway thanks for the critism, sadly it only got 3 out of 10

[KateBulka]

-design
Blablabla
3/10
-atmosphere
Blablabla
3/10
-Music
Jadajadajada
10/10

No? I give him 4/10
DESIGN
I like BGOs in begin BUT i not like something inside castle. I am do not like Puzzles, they are down your score. I am do not like bricks because we can just take koopa and break bricks, ya know? I hope "Yes" and if wanna make it better just make update.
GRAPHICS
Oh well, Do not think what they the greatest ever. No, No! This isn't bad just... Not so great... Anyways Good Job (Oh wait they can made by other peoples).
ABOUT NPCs
Oh man is worst point, but really, i do not like Mini Thwomps and Where Koopas. I do not like More! Just... Not Great, sorry...

Design - 2/10
Graphics - 2/10
About NPCs - 0/10

MAIN POINT
4/10 (Oh wait i say score) - Not So Great this average level.
Average

[Waddle]

-design
Blablabla
3/10
-atmosphere
Blablabla
3/10
-Music
Jadajadajada
10/10

No? I give him 4.1/10
DESIGN
I like BGOs in begin BUT i not like something inside castle. I am do not like Puzzles, they are down your score. I am do not like bricks because we can just take koopa and break bricks, ya know? I hope "Yes" and if wanna make it better just make update.
GRAPHICS
Oh well, Do not think what they the greatest ever. No, No! This isn't bad just... Not so great... Anyways Good Job (Oh wait they can made by other peoples).
ABOUT NPCs
Oh man is worst point, but really, i do not like Mini Thwomps and Where Koopas. I do not like More! Just... Not Great, sorry...

Design - 2/10
Graphics - 3/10
About NPCs - 1/10

MAIN POINT
4.1/10 (Oh wait i say score) - Not So Great this average level.
Average

That was an example.
Average score should be 1+2+3:3= 3/10, not 4.1 . Also, please listen to other people when they critisise you. Your review (again) is short and doesn't contribute that much since it's already in average. Also, your review stated YOUR OPINION, not information about the level itself. "I don't like bricks." "I don't like puzzles, they down your score." Please.

[KateBulka]

OK, i edit score if wanna! Now or Later...

[Waddle]

2+2+0:3= 1.3
Really

[KateBulka]

You trolling me? 2+2+0=4 This True

[Waddle]

You trolling me? 2+2+0=4 This True

You're saying 2 OUT OF 10.
Say he got 10/10 everywhere.
He'd end up with 30/10 according to your genius calculations.

[Imaynotbehere4long]

I haven't tried the level yet, but I wouldn't take 1 point from it just for the music. For comparison, GMarinaX found a few game-breaking glitches in one of zlaker's level and only took off one point.

I'm not entirely sure what your point is with this statement; you say not to take off points for music, then compare it to another judge taking off a point for something else. Maybe it would be better if you compared it to another level where the music didn't fit, but it didn't affect the score much. Plus, the level's score wasn't hurt "just for the music," it was hurt because the music didn't work well with how long and cheap the level is. Long levels require long songs (or at least multiple songs), otherwise it hurts the experience because players will get sick of the song. Besides, the music is the least of this level's problems.

I generally feel like your review style is a little bit untransparent, but that's just me. I read your review, and the score doesn't reaply seem to fit with what you said about it.

So, do you think it's too high or too low? Also, would you be willing to elaborate on the "untransparent" claim?

Though I didn't play it yet, so I might as well be completely wrong.

...then why bother posting?

When I go to play a level, I don't read any of the reviews until after I've played the level myself. That way, I already know what I think of the level by myself before reading someone's review of it and am not influenced by what other people have said when I play the level. Let's say, hypothetically speaking, someone makes a level that requires the player to jump on a Koopa Paratroopa to progress, but the Paratroopa is placed in a way that just makes it look like an ordinary enemy. Now, let's say, hypothetically speaking, someone else (not a judge) makes an unofficial review where they point this out. If I read the review before playing the level, I'll know to look out for the Paratroopa and will probably be able to beat the level without much trouble, and that might affect my score. However, if I don't read the review, I will most likely come across the same problem mentioned in the hypothetical unofficial review and will be able to judge it myself without any prior knowledge or influence.

First of all, you can get back down at the part with the koopa shell, use the pipe with the invisible blocks.

Oh...duh...
Well, uh, that's still bad level design since it requires the same backtracking I complained about earlier, but now the player has to carefully keep the shell alive or be forced to go though the section again (on top of the fact that it's so unintuitive, I didn't even realize it was possible). If that hall were solely for the player to bring the shell through, it wouldn't be so bad, but since the player already had to go through that part multiple times when activating the invisible blocks, it would just be really tedious.

I used coins to guide the player if jumps aren't clear, even if its just one or two coins, like the second path in the second main section.

And, just like I wrote in my review, your coin placements aren't enough of an indication. Even for the part where you had enough room to make a coin arrow, it still just seemed like it was saying "keep it up!" as opposed to "hold left or you'll fall in lava!" Of course, the jumps shouldn't be unclear to begin with.

I really like the music and never get tired of it

You can't just think of yourself when making a level; you need to think of how other people will react to it, people who haven't had the same experiences as you, people who haven't played (or may not even know of) the Lufia games, people who won't instantly think that a single off-center coin indicates that the player has to move or else fall in lava.

this was one of my first levels back in 2011, at that time bosses like smb1 and 3 bowsers weren't that bad.

I'm sure that, even back then, it was considered lazy to just have the base boss AI by itself with a weapon generator. Even back then, you could add other NPCs to the boss's room to help make it unique. Sure, you had those knife-guys being generated, but that didn't really make much difference.

I am do not like Puzzles

Wait, this level has puzzles?? Where??? WHERE????

[KateBulka]

Puzzles i mean pipes, they warp me and this puzzle.