Ends 12/22/2010 12:00 AM

You would have the 1up at the end exist on its own layer (say, A), and the checkpoint NPC on its own layer (B). You also have an event called Erase A that hides layer A. When placing the checkpoint NPC, open the NPC-event window, and on the No More Objects in this Layer trigger, call the Erase A event.

So when the player nabs the checkpoint, the 1-up disappears.

EDIT:
Like so: http://rpgmaker.net/users/kentona/locker/1updisappear.png (big image)
http://rpgmaker.net/users/kentona/locker/1updisappear.rar

Also, I use the keyboard to play.

I still argue that checkpoints aren't necessary all the time. Did World 1-1 of the first SMB have one? Yes. Did it need one? Was it unbeatable without one? No and no.

Using a checkpoint when it isn't entirely needed is just courteous. There's certainly nothing wrong with being courteous to the player, but it shouldn't be an absolute.

Just sayin'.

Does anyone know how I would get rid of my other crystal cave submission?

Also, I agree that all levels should have checkpoints.

Ratty: I played your level. Here are some criticisms:

1) The pipe that spits never-ending bob-ombs is lame. Really really really lame. You fall through a trap floor and immediately get a bob-omb thrown in your face unless you know it's coming. And then you have to jump/avoid a never-ending stream of them to get to the switch... and then crawl BACK through them. I'd get rid of it entirely. And god forbid you be next to them when one of them explode, because they will ALLLL explode. It's not challenging, it's stupid.

2) The room immediately after the bob-omb-spitting pipe has two vertical rows of blocks with sparkies rolling around them. The columns are exactly one square away from the floor/celing, and the sparkies end up running on the floor/celing respectively. I'd suggest making it so the columns aren't so close to the floor/celing, so the sparkies just continue to revolve around the columns.

3) There's a checkpoint after all the hardest parts in the level. I'd put one right before the trap floor that sends you to the bob-omb-spitting pipe room. I don't know for sure if SMBX supports two separate checkpoints, but your level is kind of long! Might be wise to have two.

4) Your boss level is kind of lame. :\ I'm not sure how to fix it, but I would suggest trying something else. Too many rings are flying at you at any given moment. You get hit alot, but that doesn't really matter because you get infinite hammer bros suits. It's just kind of annoying.

Otherwise, I thought it was cool!

post=Desmo360
Does anyone know how I would get rid of my other crystal cave submission?

Also, I agree that all levels should have checkpoints.

You have to go into your locker and delete the file, and then resubmit.

I just played every level and here are my thoughts. Behold my wall of text!

If you don't want to read it all I would suggest reading the last paragraph as I found a glitch of the engine in one of levels. It involves the conveyer belt.


- Bouncy Bouncy -
Nice, that was fun! I can see why you had to slow down those bullets. You should remove all blocks with 1ups though, I got 2 of those and collected coins (not even all of them) and ended up with a total of 6 extra lives at the end of one run. Maybe even reduce the number of coins. A player could just run that level a few times to build up their lives. Giving the player too many lives is a bad thing. For balance, it's best for a level to give 1, maybe 2 extra lives. Over inflation of "free men" will diminish their value.

That idea, of not giving too many lives, was something I read on the SMBX forums. It was a list of tips for making levels that was VERY helpful and spoke many truths. I am currently trying to find that list and will post it at a later time(if I find it). Everyone should give it a read.



- Toadstool Palace -
.....welp, uhhhh, yeah. It was interesting. It has some cool things. But your use of tiles is very inconsistant. If the floor is all grey blocks, there shouldn't be random lines of blue blocks all over the place. The black/white checkboard floor is not supposed to go on top of another floor type. That clashes horribly. The 3up moons shouldn't be out in the open like that in any level. There were too many power-ups at the boss. Then I couldn't jump the gap to get the star. This needs much work. Why did that NPC say Link wasn't being help captive here? I have no idea what the "story" of this level is about, apparantly bowser stormed the castle, but I don't need to know that Link is not here.



- Underground-we-go-

Simple and effective. Nothing really bad here. A few blocks were in awkard places. Why only 1 yoshi coin? One thing I did like is the fact that doing a speed run on this level works great in that you can actually do it. The enemies aren't in places that prevent you completely from trying to rush the level. The look and feel of the levels was genuine Mario. I think a lot of levels suffer from trying to put too many things on the screen. The name looks weird all together like you typed it though, maybe it should be at least hyphonated?



- Crystal Cave -
That yoshi graphic looks so terrible u.u I found the music to be too loud but it could just be my PC. It starts off quiet but when it swells up it seemed to drown out the sound effects. I didn't care for that underground song either. In the underground part, I fell in the water and was unable to jump out. Some of the blocks that are edited need to have a more solid black outline. In the part with no floor, some of the turtles that are moving down disappear off the bottom of the screen. I was slowly descending to hit it and it disappeared and I died. I don't know how I feel about the whole graphics scheme...some of it looks ok but things like the turtle shells look gross. The puzzle is good though.

- Galaxy Slide -
haha Cool. The mushroom at the start you should just enable "don't move" so it just falls down instead of bouning off the wall. Not a big deal, I know. Also, why give me a mushroom if I just get hit right off the bat? I don't see the point of the saw blade. This level is really big, it seems to lag a bit. I have a fast PC too, so that's not an issue. When I hit the P switch the game lags for a few seconds then I'm halfway down that passage way, does anybody else have this problem? The wall of blocks going up the left side is a bit unnecessary. The player never even sees that part of the map so the blocks serve no purpose but to add to the file size. I deleted several hundred unseen blocks and reduced the filesize by 100kb, which is 10%. I only deleted a small portion of the unseen blocks too. Also there's too many blue flying turtles. You should add some coins here and there, especially the spot where you fly straight up in the air near the start.

*edit, now that I think about it, if the player falls in the pit the blocks would have to be there...hmm, instead of having a super long fall just put a line of objects about 15 tiles down that will kill the player if he falls into the pit. That way you can probably cut the size of your level in half. This whole level might function better if you split things up into different sections.


- Lava Run -
Not bad. Not too much to say here. At first the moving ship type thing seems hard but you can just stand at the top and jump well over anything as long as you have the spinner block. The turtles make this hard, unless you defeat them right away. Your forced up there with a diagnal line of bullets. That's when I realized that I could just stay up there and be safe. Why have a gun in front of the ship shooting out a steady stream of bullets though? At least it didn't make me lag, so it's fine. Collect your neon star for a win.



- Crystal Forest -

Looks great. Only 2 graphic oddities. The grass on top of the 2 tile wide hills overlaps the rounded edge on the left side so the grass is growing in midair and that line of white dots going down all the tree trunks looks out of place. Good use of the ice power, its time consuming to play it safe and make those bridges! I didn't find the last yoshi coin though, but I don't think I tried all the pipes and I only ran through the level twice. I got one Y.Coin in a pipe.



-Techno Underground -

Yeah, wow. Narcodis pointed out most of the faults. This is basically a "torture" level. The player is punished for exploring. The poison mushroom near the start, the line of blocks that drop you in a pit when you hit them... The level itself is cool but there's just too many situations that try to trap you. Most of the areas have low ceilings too so that just adds to the difficulty. This is just too hard. That boss doesn't work. There's just too much in a small space. There's a safe zone if you stand in front of it but then the fireballs will hit you, so you jump to avoid and get hit by a falling set of wheels. If the wheels didn't crush you it wouldn't be so bad, but they do. So you go back for more power-ups and most likely get hit trying to make your way back. It takes over 10 hits to fully destroy it and lasting that long isn't easy.

I did notice a glitch that is not your fault but a fault of the engine. In the place with the bombs and the conveyer belt, if you walk all the way to the left on the belt and keep hold left while you try to jump onto the ledge, you can't. It's like there is an invisible block above you. I assume the converyer belt is actually pushing you inside the tile to the left. Now, in any situation where you are Super Mario(2 tiles high) and you are ducking to fit through a 1 tile space, if you stand up and your head is inside a tile the engine pushs you out in the opposite direction you are facing. So when I found the glitch in your level, I turned around and jumped and I was pushed into the wall moving left until I hit the edge of my screen. You can always face the other way and be pushed back out. This is important for everybody to know so they can avoid putting narrow spaces where you will die if you stand up. Most of the times you will die or get to an area of the level you maybe weren't supposed to.

My level is coming along, but it fells like such a horribly newb-ish attempt at creating a hill-based stage. I kinda wanted to make some kind of roller coaster effect, where the player launches from one hill, then lands on a different slope to do it all over again, but figuring out the exact physics of where to put the next hill, what angles to use for optimum speed, etc. is getting frustrating.

What I'm building is something akin to my original idea, but not at the same time. Though my mapping, if the term could be used, could probably use a bit of work. No, the mapping could probably use a lot of work!

post=kentona
Bonzai Bill

Okay, now TT is officially just trolling you guys:

post=Link_2112
...why give me a mushroom if I just get hit right off the bat? I don't see the point of the saw blade...

The mushroom was from me fighting with the engine. When I finished making the level, I realized it was only possible with Mario; Hence the player block at the beginning. Next I realized that if Mario had a power-up, he wouldn't be able to do some of the sliding in the second part; hence the saw-blade. When I tested the level, the saw-blade didn't seem to destroy Mario's momentum on the slide, but then I went back to small Mario. When small Mario went down the slide, the saw killed him. Finally, I decided Mario needed a power-up for the saw-blade to do it's job; (Which was to get rid of the power-up) hence the mushroom.

EDIT: lol on the bonzai bill screenshot. Nice pun!

Posted my stage! If you have any issues with it, just let me know. I'm open to suggestions, 'cuz I know it's a bit difficult. I'd say probably 4/5.

Oh, and you'd be hard-pressed to beat it as anyone but Mario or Luigi. Sorry...