First of all, I'd like to say thanks for making the paths between levels concise (though you should only use one song per level transition instead of two like you did with The Ultimate Challenge); most of the time, even in featured episodes, they're unnecessarily long and make backtracking (or even just progressing normally) take much longer than it should (looking at you, LFftMK).
Anyway, my review:
This episode isn't very good, honestly. All the levels are super-short with predominantly flat block placements and low NPC variety (with some levels having only one type of enemy, if that), and there isn't really anything to distinguish levels between worlds besides the graphics and music; there was no noticeable difference in difficulty as I progressed. It's as though these levels were designed for a randomized endless runner for phones rather than a sequential platformer like Mario. Seriously, the closest the episode got to being an actual platformer were the last two levels. Don't worry, though: none of us were able to make good levels on our first try; you just need more experience. I recommend checking out some of the levels in
the Pretty Good section of the Levels sub-forum to get some ideas.
Also, regarding your boss fights, all you did was put the boss by itself in an empty room. This is bad level design, but you're not the only one guilty of it. It happens so often, I made a tutorial on how to properly use SMBX's boss AI to make good boss fights, even if you don't feel like putting forth much effort:
http://www.smbxgame.com/forums/v ... =81&t=8890
On top of that, you give the player a hammer suit in World 2, making the boss fights even easier. The hammer suit is quite game-breaking, since it can kill Boos, Podobos, and many other NPCs that are invulnerable to other power-ups, so you should only use it if you design the episode around it (so that the hammer suit doesn't become game-breaking).
On to minor complaints:
When I exited Mario's Castle, I was placed right on top of The Ultimate Challenge. This is because that level has "Game Start" checked, and it's further to the left than Mario's Castle is. You should uncheck "Game Start" from The Ultimate Challenge. Speaking of Mario's Castle, it's unintuitive that the player has to enter the top of the castle to exit the level; I was still exploring the castle, when suddenly, I was on the world map and had to go back in the level to finish exploring (it's not that large, but still). Just add another room for the top of the castle and have "Offscreen Exit" On. Also, I recommend adding "floor" after each number on the sign since I thought that it was referring to the doors at first. You should also change the "Mario out here..." text to read "Mario! Come out here!" to make it more obvious what that message is supposed to represent.
Now, the levels' minor flaws:
- In Lv 1, the first couple of Goombas fall right into a pit, making them pointless. There's also some cutoff in this level and Lv 3.
- In Lv 2, you have a pipe with neither a Piranha Plant nor warp to go with it, making it seem out of place. Also, it's unintuitive to have swim-able waterfalls.
- In Lv 3, you have one giant square of water for each of the bubbles instead of arranging single-unit large water units into the shape of a ♦ for more accurate water collision.
Example (in case I didn't explain it well enough):
- In Lv 4, you have an invisible block above a large Bullet Bill cannon. First of all, it's invisible, so nobody will know that it's there (this is true for all invisible blocks unless you indicate them with coins or something), but if someone does think to jump up there and ends up falling off the right side of the cannon, he/she will get stuck and the only way to escape would be to exit out of SMBX completely. I recommend extending the section to the right a bit, moving the invisible block down to the right side of the cannon, making it visible, and adding a way back over the Bullet Bill cannon.
- In Lv 7, the rocks are slippery...why? Sure, there's no vanilla-graphics tile-set with snowy slopes, but it's still a bit unintuitive to make what appear to be obviously non-slippery tiles slippery.
- Lv 8 is a good example of this episode's lack of a difficulty curve; it's no harder than Lv 1, even if the player doesn't have the hammer suit.
- In Lv 9, you have a toad say "estalished" when it's spelled "established." Either way, replacing that word with "found out" would make more sense.
- In Lv 10, you have a pipe at the beginning that warps past the pipe that leads to secret exit, which is the strangest way I've seen anyone try to hide a secret exit. I'm not saying it's a bad idea, I'm just saying that the way you implemented it just makes it seem strange. Also, since the SMB3 Bowser triggers the credits and sends the player back to SMBX's title screen when "Legacy Boss" is set to "Yes," the only way to make it to Mario's Victory is by finding the secret exit. Again, I'm not saying that having the secret exit lead off somewhere while having the main exit end the game is a bad idea; I'm just saying it seems like you didn't intend for it to happen this way since the level is called "Mario's Victory," but the player doesn't have to fight Bowser to access it (and, furthermore, can't access it by defeating Bowser).
- I'm 99% sure that The Ultimate Challenge cannot be beaten without a Tanooki suit, mainly because the Racoon Leaf isn't available in this episode. The level isn't even that hard for the most part, but the part where the player has to jump from one pool of water to the next is nearly impossible, if not completely impossible (at least as small Mario). Not only does the jump have to be incredibly precise (assuming it can be made at all), you make the player do the same thing three times in a row, which is just repetitive and lazy design. Also, if the player does come to the level with a Tanooki suit, he/she can get a decent-enough running start with the blocks that are one unit apart from each other and fly over everything else in the level. Plus, there's this:
Since the background you use wasn't coded properly (not your fault), the background and graphics on the right side of the section will glitch. I recommend moving the right-boundary of the section to the left until it's one unit to the right of the invisible 1-up.
In conclusion:
This is the most amateurish episode I've played, but like I wrote earlier, you just need more practice. The more you practice, the better you'll get at making levels, and before you know it, you'll be able to make Pretty Good levels yourself.