I have not touched Mario Maker in a while, sadly. I regret that too. I logged in today to find some people actually played some of my courses I uploaded when the game first came out.
I replayed this one and I thought it was actually kinda fun so - enjoy. XD
This course absolutely nailed the "hard but fair" theme. It reminded me of Dark Souls in all the best ways, punishing your errors but you know that it's pretty much always your fault when you fail. And every failure leads to improvement, not in the sense of mere rote memorization, but rather in figuring out the best way to solve each challenge. The choice of four coins was perfect given the escalating difficulty, and the challenges surrounding each one were varied, creative, and delightful.
I didn't really figure out any alternate ways to collect the coins, though of course the bomb area has many possible solutions depending on what feels more natural to you (I used the first note block and dropped bombs carefully to time them to explode at the apex of a single bounce, but I noticed a throw to the right worked as well). That segment was ridiculously difficult and absolutely genius. I failed to get the final coin with the star still active, but managed it during invincibility afterward in a very close call that led to a triumphant victory where I shouted aloud, just like after vanquishing a difficult Souls boss.
My only thought for improvement would be to adjust the layout so you can more freely get the coins in any order. Backtracking is possible, but it's cumbersome due to the linear layout; if you want to head straight for the muncher coin to practice, you still have to clear quite a bit of the level, then on success go back and repeat a few harrowing elements. Despite this minor quibble, this course was excellent and easily my favorite work by TelMarine to date.
This course features a really great concept -- a looping auto-scroller where you have to repeat several times in order to collect all the coins to finally exit. The method to collect each coin was unique; some required care, others clever thinking, and one or two some hectic action to avoid getting crushed. Djiem can always be counted on for new and clever ideas for courses, and this one's no different.
The difficulty was quite reasonable for all the loops -- I never died despite a couple close calls -- but I did nearly run out of time. This was a result of the "hidden" coin, which took forever and a dose of pure luck to find. By the time I finally found it the looping had lost its enchantment. Excellent design with the other four coins, though.
This course featured four boss battles of varying types that would grant keys or red coins. You only have to get one key to complete the course, but collecting more gives you more rewards at the end and, of course, bragging rights. I didn't attempt to beat all four in a single run, but I did give each of them a go across several attempts.
Some of the boss battles were excellent. Giant Bowser Jr. is something we've all dealt with in Mario Maker, but the environment is what made this one special. I'm torn on the element of using Jr. to break the wall for the extra red coin; this wound up making the fight much easier when you guide Jr. over there instead of fighting atop the crazy blue beetle platforms, but there was a sense of accomplishment from figuring out this method and getting the coin.
The helmet goomba was excellent design as well. The battle was a little short but hectic, which is perfect for a boss rush course like this one.
The two track-based bosses were less successful. They looked amazing, but in play it mostly came down to memorizing patterns so that you don't get yourself lodged in a death corner that is impossible to escape from. A few tweaks to the layout could have saved these bosses and made them something really special. As is, I just mushroom face-planted the fire wheel for a rapid kill and gave up trying to get the coins after a few tries with the fire snake.
Visually the course was pretty consistently striking. I always love a hub area and enjoy what you did with this one, and the reward tiers were a nice touch.
Oh hey, a traditional platformer! That's a nice change of pace. Okay, so I got the key, and now I can g- wait what. Really? Well I probably should have seen that coming, but somehow I thought I'd get a quick warp out!
This course was visually striking, and the platforming elements were familiar and well-executed. The need to complete the course in reverse was appreciated; some parts were especially successful here, being much harder in reverse than going forward. The implicit storytelling was well-done; I loved the attention to detail and the ending bit.
The boss was pretty disappointing as it was pulled directly from SM3 but made easier thanks to the fire flower and a broader area to battle. It's sensible to have an easy boss with the nature of this course, but this one was uninspired.
Very reasonable difficulty for the length - I completed this course on my first attempt (and somehow set a record despite not hurrying; I'm guessing our expert players haven't gotten around to this one yet).
A puzzler course that was incomplete when I started it and remains so upon giving up. The opening bit is bizarre - a coin message with no real context that will go crazy if you wait around or jump or whatever - and having to run through it every time to get to the puzzles is a bit awkward.
I figured out the solution to the first puzzle (all the way to the P-door), but actually executing it eluded me. The positioning of everything was just so to be frustrating, and it wasn't something that was enjoyable in repetition. Once I had everything positioned perfectly, only to find that the POW-block that I'd set aside for the munchers had disappeared because of scrolling. Getting the bob-ombs to reappear every time you fail to knock out the wall was a hassle, and the thwomp really didn't help matters.
Puzzles that require restarting the map because you get "stuck" -- and making that stuck condition very easy to reach (in this case it's the default thing that happens just from moving forward) -- is not good design.
I can't really speak to the rest of the course because I ragequit before I could make it through the first door.
It's meant to be kinda hard, but I don't really know how hard it is yet.
@crimsoncoyote First off, I found this quite difficult. I think you need to play test this one a bit more. There's a lot of situations where you can totally get fucked and have to start all over again from the beginning. Checkpoints won't help because they reset the red coins and considering there are the maximum 10 of them in this level, it exacerbates the issue.
1. The very beginning, you can trigger the thwomp above by jumping. I eventually figured this was intentional? Since a mushroom drops down. However, this part is re-used to get one of the red coins and if you fall trying to get that red coin under the thwomp, it sends you back to the very beginning which becomes unbeatable. You have to restart since the part with the spiked helmet can't be completed again (items that spawn from blocks don't come back or reset). This was very aggravating since I fell having 9/10 coins.
2. If the first section (after the opening sequence), you can accidentally kill the thwomp before you even know what's really going on. It's the very beginning so it's not too bad, but just annoying. Since you have 10 coins to collect here, maybe be a little bit more forgiving and allow a quick reset.
3. Second section has a non-obvious trap (in my opinion) since you are racing because of the P-switch timer and then jump in to get a key and realize you can't get out. It's unnecessary and should be removed, in my opinion.
4. The 3rd coin/spikey helmet section, I would say be a little more forgiving here and add a reset since you gotta go all the way back to the beginning if you make 1 mistake, which is easy since it's not clear what to do immediately.
5. The next section that has you jump on the blue skull platform, if you are just a smidgen off center, when it's taking you through, you can get caught on the far left flame moving up and down, causing you to go off the platform and it continues on without you. It doesn't come back and there doesn't appear to be a way to reset it, so you have to restart.
6. The section with the 2 piranha plants with wings, two things. One, if you have the fire flower or obtain it there, you can kill the piranha plants without even realizing that you are supposed to need them. I got lucky and took a guess that you were supposed to jump off them, but I can see people easily killing them and not realizing you need them to bounce up and get Yoshi. On top of that, since you need to spin jump to bounce off them, if you have the fire flower, you can accidentally kill them while spin jumping.
7. Is there a point to the POW block in the clown car section? I just used it to kill the lone chain chomp before proceeding.
This course absolutely nailed the "hard but fair" theme. It reminded me of Dark Souls in all the best ways, punishing your errors but you know that it's pretty much always your fault when you fail. And every failure leads to improvement, not in the sense of mere rote memorization, but rather in figuring out the best way to solve each challenge. The choice of four coins was perfect given the escalating difficulty, and the challenges surrounding each one were varied, creative, and delightful.
I didn't really figure out any alternate ways to collect the coins, though of course the bomb area has many possible solutions depending on what feels more natural to you (I used the first note block and dropped bombs carefully to time them to explode at the apex of a single bounce, but I noticed a throw to the right worked as well). That segment was ridiculously difficult and absolutely genius. I failed to get the final coin with the star still active, but managed it during invincibility afterward in a very close call that led to a triumphant victory where I shouted aloud, just like after vanquishing a difficult Souls boss.
My only thought for improvement would be to adjust the layout so you can more freely get the coins in any order. Backtracking is possible, but it's cumbersome due to the linear layout; if you want to head straight for the muncher coin to practice, you still have to clear quite a bit of the level, then on success go back and repeat a few harrowing elements. Despite this minor quibble, this course was excellent and easily my favorite work by TelMarine to date.
This course features a really great concept -- a looping auto-scroller where you have to repeat several times in order to collect all the coins to finally exit. The method to collect each coin was unique; some required care, others clever thinking, and one or two some hectic action to avoid getting crushed. Djiem can always be counted on for new and clever ideas for courses, and this one's no different.
The difficulty was quite reasonable for all the loops -- I never died despite a couple close calls -- but I did nearly run out of time. This was a result of the "hidden" coin, which took forever and a dose of pure luck to find. By the time I finally found it the looping had lost its enchantment. Excellent design with the other four coins, though.
This course featured four boss battles of varying types that would grant keys or red coins. You only have to get one key to complete the course, but collecting more gives you more rewards at the end and, of course, bragging rights. I didn't attempt to beat all four in a single run, but I did give each of them a go across several attempts.
Some of the boss battles were excellent. Giant Bowser Jr. is something we've all dealt with in Mario Maker, but the environment is what made this one special. I'm torn on the element of using Jr. to break the wall for the extra red coin; this wound up making the fight much easier when you guide Jr. over there instead of fighting atop the crazy blue beetle platforms, but there was a sense of accomplishment from figuring out this method and getting the coin.
The helmet goomba was excellent design as well. The battle was a little short but hectic, which is perfect for a boss rush course like this one.
The two track-based bosses were less successful. They looked amazing, but in play it mostly came down to memorizing patterns so that you don't get yourself lodged in a death corner that is impossible to escape from. A few tweaks to the layout could have saved these bosses and made them something really special. As is, I just mushroom face-planted the fire wheel for a rapid kill and gave up trying to get the coins after a few tries with the fire snake.
Visually the course was pretty consistently striking. I always love a hub area and enjoy what you did with this one, and the reward tiers were a nice touch.
Oh hey, a traditional platformer! That's a nice change of pace. Okay, so I got the key, and now I can g- wait what. Really? Well I probably should have seen that coming, but somehow I thought I'd get a quick warp out!
This course was visually striking, and the platforming elements were familiar and well-executed. The need to complete the course in reverse was appreciated; some parts were especially successful here, being much harder in reverse than going forward. The implicit storytelling was well-done; I loved the attention to detail and the ending bit.
The boss was pretty disappointing as it was pulled directly from SM3 but made easier thanks to the fire flower and a broader area to battle. It's sensible to have an easy boss with the nature of this course, but this one was uninspired.
Very reasonable difficulty for the length - I completed this course on my first attempt (and somehow set a record despite not hurrying; I'm guessing our expert players haven't gotten around to this one yet).
A puzzler course that was incomplete when I started it and remains so upon giving up. The opening bit is bizarre - a coin message with no real context that will go crazy if you wait around or jump or whatever - and having to run through it every time to get to the puzzles is a bit awkward.
I figured out the solution to the first puzzle (all the way to the P-door), but actually executing it eluded me. The positioning of everything was just so to be frustrating, and it wasn't something that was enjoyable in repetition. Once I had everything positioned perfectly, only to find that the POW-block that I'd set aside for the munchers had disappeared because of scrolling. Getting the bob-ombs to reappear every time you fail to knock out the wall was a hassle, and the thwomp really didn't help matters.
Puzzles that require restarting the map because you get "stuck" -- and making that stuck condition very easy to reach (in this case it's the default thing that happens just from moving forward) -- is not good design.
I can't really speak to the rest of the course because I ragequit before I could make it through the first door.
Clever, varied, challenging, and elegant -- this course was a masterclass of design. Excellent work, and congratulations!
Cool! You can actually get the last coin using the koopa shell (just throw it down there and have it connect). On the bridges, only 1 of the enemies is not a spike top which is a red koopa. The alternate way is to use the star. The second coin in the long conveyor belt section can be completed without the P-Switch, but I made it purposely much more difficult without it. The bob-omb section has numerous different ways to complete it as you noted. I found it easiest to drop a bob-omb on the middle note block and have it bounce up and down.
I don't think this has been done before, so let's go for it:
Super Mario Maker Challenge #22
Verticality
Rules: Create maps with an emphasis on verticality, moving up and/or down (does NOT have to solely be vertical). Mario Maker is painfully limited in the vertical space so it'll be interesting to see what people come up with. "Memory" by @Dirk2112 comes to mind as something that can be done.
Deadline: End of the day April 17th
Come up with whatever you want that fits. I'll play them as they are submitted.
I'm pretty bad at this stuff, but figured I'd throw some things at the wall and see what sticks.
I can understand why all those things would be frustrating, and I might revisit the course. (It may in fact just be better to start over entirely). I can see why some of the parts definitely need to be resetable.
As for number 7, the idea was to lead the clown car through the spikes with the pow, and just run on the upper level. But I didn't really think about it being done more "traditionally".
I probably need to come into course building more open-minded and not have a single set "solution" in mind for everything.
Thx for the review! I can see how the magikoopa fight can be tough to figure out, but what would you have done to make it better?
I'll think about the bowser Jr fight. I liked the platforms, but originally I had planned for each boss to have a red coin or two hidden away. When the snake could not harbour a key I had to improvise, but kept the hidden coin in the bowser fight. Maybe I'll change the fight so it's only on the platforms as it's a much harder fight. On the other hand, you don't want to make it too hard.
Alphagaia on
Wanna try my Mario Maker levels?
Shoot m to BITS (hold Y) [hard] C109-0000-014D-4E09 P-POWER Switch Palace 3838-0000-0122-9359 Raiding the Serpents Tomb 1A04-0000-0098-C11E I like to move it, move it FCE2-0000-00D7-9048
It's sensible to have an easy boss with the nature of this course, but this one was uninspired.
I have a confession. The SMB3 Bowser fight is high on my favorite SMB endings, if not the top. Everyone here can probably get to the end with a fire flower, making it relatively trivial, but for a more intermediate player, which is what I was aiming for, it's an endurance battle. Everyone has been spoiled by the crazy boss designs here.
I'm pretty bad at this stuff, but figured I'd throw some things at the wall and see what sticks.
I can understand why all those things would be frustrating, and I might revisit the course. (It may in fact just be better to start over entirely). I can see why some of the parts definitely need to be resetable.
As for number 7, the idea was to lead the clown car through the spikes with the pow, and just run on the upper level. But I didn't really think about it being done more "traditionally".
I probably need to come into course building more open-minded and not have a single set "solution" in mind for everything.
Even after editing the level to work out the solution I didn't have it in me to try to finish it. If everything was more compressed, so that it didn't take so long to get back to where you died/reset and you could see how to work out a puzzle, I think it would help a lot to make it more enjoyable.
Thx for the review! I can see how the magikoopa fight can be tough to figure out, but what would you have done to make it better?
I'll think about the bowser Jr fight. I liked the platforms, but originally I had planned for each boss to have a red coin or two hidden away. When the snake could not harbour a key I had to improvise, but kept the hidden coin in the bowser fight. Maybe I'll change the fight so it's only on the platforms as it's a much harder fight. On the other hand, you don't want to make it too hard.
I thought your level really shined once you try to get all the keys. Knowing you have to get through all of them causes you to figure out the most efficient way to survive. I hated the fire snake at first but after you play it 20 times the only hard part is the waiting. Even Jr has a few tricks you can learn to exploit. Depending on your approach he'll shell right away or you can get him to shoot a fireball so you can get your first hit before he has left the starting platform.
The magikoopa has a lot of luck involved. The first hit is easy enough but once he's off the platform its all about where he teleports to.
I just found out if you ZL a winged magikoopa you can kill him in one hit, but the two hits were intended as it changes up the battle.
Wanna try my Mario Maker levels?
Shoot m to BITS (hold Y) [hard] C109-0000-014D-4E09 P-POWER Switch Palace 3838-0000-0122-9359 Raiding the Serpents Tomb 1A04-0000-0098-C11E I like to move it, move it FCE2-0000-00D7-9048
Thx for the review! I can see how the magikoopa fight can be tough to figure out, but what would you have done to make it better?
I'll think about the bowser Jr fight. I liked the platforms, but originally I had planned for each boss to have a red coin or two hidden away. When the snake could not harbour a key I had to improvise, but kept the hidden coin in the bowser fight. Maybe I'll change the fight so it's only on the platforms as it's a much harder fight. On the other hand, you don't want to make it too hard.
I'd have to play with it in the editor, but basically if the fire wheels are going to be that large then there should be a little hole on each side to duck out of the way somehow if the player is on the bottom when the boss is approaching. It's still dangerous because of the magikoopa's projectiles, but at least there would be a possibility to survive. It shouldn't make it too easy because the player still has to come up to land any hits.
For Jr I'd remove the coin bit and shrink the platform you arrive on. To help with the difficulty you could remove a few beetles so they were only on every other platform or something.
Triptycho: A card-and-dice tabletop indie RPG currently in development and playtesting
Hmm, you can use the pipes or jump up to dodge the firewheel by going in a circle, though.
I will look into it!
Wanna try my Mario Maker levels?
Shoot m to BITS (hold Y) [hard] C109-0000-014D-4E09 P-POWER Switch Palace 3838-0000-0122-9359 Raiding the Serpents Tomb 1A04-0000-0098-C11E I like to move it, move it FCE2-0000-00D7-9048
Rules: Create maps with an emphasis on verticality, moving up and/or down (does NOT have to solely be vertical). Mario Maker is painfully limited in the vertical space so it'll be interesting to see what people come up with. "Memory" by @Dirk2112 comes to mind as something that can be done.
Deadline: End of the day April 17th
Come up with whatever you want that fits. I'll play them as they are submitted.
Alright I think this should work for this theme. If not let me know.
This is the second level in the series of 4 levels I have wanted to make a "world" of since the game came out. If you remember back for SMMC 3 I made that auto scrolling one. This is supposed to be the follow up to that.
About the level: It is basically made up of kind of a large map type of deal. The verticality comes from the fact that it is one map with three levels. Top middle and lower. There are pipes to move between them.
Because it is kind of an open type of world, there are multiple ways to really go about getting through it. The structure will kind of guide you, but even if you try to follow the level you could at least find two paths to take. For the most part, if you take it slow it should be fairly easy (except the last screen, that is why there is a checkpoint there). If you search enough to find the right power ups, even the last screen should be pretty simple.
Now if you decide to go for the red coins, good freaking luck. They are entirely optional, and unless you were playing this level as a part of the whole I plan to eventually make there is not really much of a reward (though the reward area for that should be substantial considering you get to keep stuff between levels I think, at the very least lives). If you choose to be a completionist though, prepare for pain. I only did it once, but I couldn't utilize the checkpoint as a kind of single save to start from like a halfway point when I was testing. You can only use it once though.
Outside of the red coins, if you notice the difficulty is a little too far off let me know. I had to struggle to make it fair but I did not want to make it too easy. Being as my intention for all 4 levels was to play them in series by loading them up as a 4 part in your local levels, and that actually gives you a lives count, the goal is to make it just hard enough that you will care about how many lives you have. This is why I haven't gone back and redone the first level yet like I did with many others. I can't consider that finished until the whole thing is done and I can do a pass on how many lives is fair and how much of a reward is enough.
@Kai_San So apparently checkpoints DO save red coins. I coulda sworn I tried it and it didn't save them, strange. Quick thoughts:
Red coins were in difficult areas for sure, but how the heck are you supposed to get the one that is on the far far left screen. It's blocked by two munchers. I'm assuming there is a POW block somewhere hidden, but I didn't find it yet. Tried using a green koopa shell, perhaps maybe it'd bounce up or something, didn't work. That was the only red coin I wasn't able to get (I got the rest). Also, the checkpoint, you put that green koopa fairly close to where you spawn, I can see being able to easily run into it by accident. The door next to the checkpoint, when you go through, there is a swarm of cheep-cheeps. I got hit every time, the timing to dodge them seems a little unforgiving, maybe I was waiting too long
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Kai_SanCommonly known as Klineshrike!Registered Userregular
@Kai_San So apparently checkpoints DO save red coins. I coulda sworn I tried it and it didn't save them, strange. Quick thoughts:
Red coins were in difficult areas for sure, but how the heck are you supposed to get the one that is on the far far left screen. It's blocked by two munchers. I'm assuming there is a POW block somewhere hidden, but I didn't find it yet. Tried using a green koopa shell, perhaps maybe it'd bounce up or something, didn't work. That was the only red coin I wasn't able to get (I got the rest). Also, the checkpoint, you put that green koopa fairly close to where you spawn, I can see being able to easily run into it by accident. The door next to the checkpoint, when you go through, there is a swarm of cheep-cheeps. I got hit every time, the timing to dodge them seems a little unforgiving, maybe I was waiting too long
If you go up and to the left, there is a POW block being held by one of the flying beetles. It should eventually put it up in the corner and be unreachable, but I guess you are going the other way first and despawning it. The purpose was to have you rush to get it quickly before it gets behind the bumper.
The koopah is a good point, I will need to remove that. It was supposed to help with the room full of fish though.
The fish can be handled by waiting early. It is definitely hard to avoid them, but since the rest of the level is quite short if you learn the layout, I wanted that room to take some time. The checkpoint is placed so you can retry it easy. I might clean that up a bit though, as I think the upper part is hard enough to slow someone down.
Thanks for the feedback. I might fix it up and reupload, but I will wait a little to see. I don't want to rush it and have to fix it a few more times.
Did you find the difficulty of the rest of the level to be fair? Outside of the coins, the level should be navigable without too much trouble. The lower level is supposed to be more difficult though because it has two pretty significant power ups.
There are 9 red coins in there, but they are optional, just there for bragging rights.
So, fair warning, this course is super hard, and if you try to go for red coins, it's insane.
@Kai_San So apparently checkpoints DO save red coins. I coulda sworn I tried it and it didn't save them, strange. Quick thoughts:
Red coins were in difficult areas for sure, but how the heck are you supposed to get the one that is on the far far left screen. It's blocked by two munchers. I'm assuming there is a POW block somewhere hidden, but I didn't find it yet. Tried using a green koopa shell, perhaps maybe it'd bounce up or something, didn't work. That was the only red coin I wasn't able to get (I got the rest). Also, the checkpoint, you put that green koopa fairly close to where you spawn, I can see being able to easily run into it by accident. The door next to the checkpoint, when you go through, there is a swarm of cheep-cheeps. I got hit every time, the timing to dodge them seems a little unforgiving, maybe I was waiting too long
If you go up and to the left, there is a POW block being held by one of the flying beetles. It should eventually put it up in the corner and be unreachable, but I guess you are going the other way first and despawning it. The purpose was to have you rush to get it quickly before it gets behind the bumper.
The koopah is a good point, I will need to remove that. It was supposed to help with the room full of fish though.
The fish can be handled by waiting early. It is definitely hard to avoid them, but since the rest of the level is quite short if you learn the layout, I wanted that room to take some time. The checkpoint is placed so you can retry it easy. I might clean that up a bit though, as I think the upper part is hard enough to slow someone down.
Thanks for the feedback. I might fix it up and reupload, but I will wait a little to see. I don't want to rush it and have to fix it a few more times.
Did you find the difficulty of the rest of the level to be fair? Outside of the coins, the level should be navigable without too much trouble. The lower level is supposed to be more difficult though because it has two pretty significant power ups.
@Kai_San I thought it was easy enough to navigate if you didn't go for the coins. I was always going for the coins though, so I took some more deaths. If you get the fire flower, it's a lot easier.
There are 9 red coins in there, but they are optional, just there for bragging rights.
So, fair warning, this course is super hard, and if you try to go for red coins, it's insane.
It was fairly difficult, although I was always going for the red coins. They require memorization to be able to get them all. I eventually got them all. One big annoyance was the second checkpoint. If you get the checkpoint and die, it resets all the red coins. Therefore, when I wanted to go for all of them, I had to not fuck up after getting the second checkpoint otherwise if I died I'd have to restart since you can't go back to get the coins. Maybe make it so you have some room to jump over the checkpoint flag? It makes me wonder though if people playing will think you need to get the red coins to complete the map and go for them.
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Kai_SanCommonly known as Klineshrike!Registered Userregular
It only resets the red coins when you get all of them. Because I guess it considers you to have the key, so it saves the key or something with the door?
The only solution would be to put one last red coin next to the door, so you could only get all of them after you finished.
I did it as well, also got the best time. Then I went and played my level for fun and did a perfect run in one attempt. Never did that while testing it. Though, I looked at the deaths and the only deaths are in the first room and the last room. That is odd, there is 26 attempts but only looks like 5 deaths.
It only resets the red coins when you get all of them. Because I guess it considers you to have the key, so it saves the key or something with the door?
The only solution would be to put one last red coin next to the door, so you could only get all of them after you finished.
I did it as well, also got the best time. Then I went and played my level for fun and did a perfect run in one attempt. Never did that while testing it. Though, I looked at the deaths and the only deaths are in the first room and the last room. That is odd, there is 26 attempts but only looks like 5 deaths.
It would reset even if I didn't have all of them. Once I got the second checkpoint and died, *poof*.
Also the game does not appear to show EVERY death, but areas where it most commonly happened.
TelMarine on
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Kai_SanCommonly known as Klineshrike!Registered Userregular
The one time I did it, I didn't get the last red coin cause I new I messed up the timing. So I purposely died and still had the 7. It was only when I got it and died they then went away.
It only resets the red coins when you get all of them. Because I guess it considers you to have the key, so it saves the key or something with the door?
The only solution would be to put one last red coin next to the door, so you could only get all of them after you finished.
I did it as well, also got the best time. Then I went and played my level for fun and did a perfect run in one attempt. Never did that while testing it. Though, I looked at the deaths and the only deaths are in the first room and the last room. That is odd, there is 26 attempts but only looks like 5 deaths.
It would reset even if I didn't have all of them. Once I got the second checkpoint and died, *poof*.
Also the game does not appear to show EVERY death, but areas where it most commonly happened.
Maybe the red coins disappearing is due to the second checkpoint being in the main zone and the first checkpoint being in the subzone? If that's the reason, I'll have to take it into account when I create another such course.
Shoot m to BITS (hold Y) [hard] C109-0000-014D-4E09 P-POWER Switch Palace 3838-0000-0122-9359 Raiding the Serpents Tomb 1A04-0000-0098-C11E I like to move it, move it FCE2-0000-00D7-9048
This is probably my most ambitious levels yet. I had a few false starts which gave me a bit of a time crunch but I really like how it turned out. I'm not sure how difficult it is going to be. I was able to get right through it during my upload but I know what to do and what is coming. I don't think it will give anyone too much trouble. There's some light exploration, possibly my first attempt at an actual boss area, and a little something extra. I even had some extra space to be able to doodle an area only used for the thumbnail.
Super Mario Maker ID: DBB-1RH-JJG
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Kai_SanCommonly known as Klineshrike!Registered Userregular
I don't know what to make of your comment on my level cravipat. Not sure if it's a good thing or a bad thing.
I don't know what to make of your comment on my level cravipat. Not sure if it's a good thing or a bad thing.
I'm not sure either now. I think the first time through I may have gotten lost, which is quite a feat on a mostly linear level. I think I took the bottom path and then through the pipe into the upper level instead of going through the door.
Super Mario Maker ID: DBB-1RH-JJG
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Kai_SanCommonly known as Klineshrike!Registered Userregular
It is not a linear level though. Even though the structure guides you to mostly one of two paths, the whole level is designed to be kind of an open world. The top bottom and middle all match up in design to make one whole map. That was the verticality of it anyway.
If you ended up being forced to explore, then the level did it's job
Yeah, me neither. A week time is just to short for me.
Wanna try my Mario Maker levels?
Shoot m to BITS (hold Y) [hard] C109-0000-014D-4E09 P-POWER Switch Palace 3838-0000-0122-9359 Raiding the Serpents Tomb 1A04-0000-0098-C11E I like to move it, move it FCE2-0000-00D7-9048
Thoughts: It was a nice change of pace being an underwater level. I find underwater levels hard to create because it feels so limiting and samey. I liked the approach here making it an open/sandbox type of deal. Expanding on my quick thoughts posted earlier, I think the map is more fun trying to get the coins, in my opinion. I like the added difficulty in going for them, but I think the coin that you need to get the POW is easily missed. I didn't even realize the POW was on screen and leaving until I asked. I played it again not going for the red coins and I found one minor issue. The area right after going through the door at the checkpoint. At the very top, you have to fight some goombas. However, if you have the fire flower and you go to the top of the screen and start shooting, your fireballs don't make it. This is because you used a semi-solid platform as a background, but the top is exposed a little bit. This means when you swim to the max height, your fireballs travel on top of the semi-solid platform instead of going downward. Not a huge deal, but something I noticed. As you mentioned, the map is a lot easier with the fire flower.
Thoughts: The most difficult out of the entries. Since I'm always trying to go for the extra coins in Mario games (like star coins in the New Super Mario series) the map was even harder. There's a good variety of challenge here with each room having something a little different from the room before. Echoing my quick thoughts from earlier, getting all the red coins was a bit difficult because of how the second checkpoint would reset the red coins for me. So I had to get a perfect run starting from the first checkpoint on. Going for the red coins also requires a fair bit of memorization, but it's not that big of a deal since they are optional. However, this map is probably extremely difficult to complete on the first try since you gotta react real fast. This map would be a doozie if there was vertical scrolling allowed.
Thoughts: The aesthetic here is pretty cool. Sometimes vines as decoration is annoying to me because I've accidentally got caught on them when jumping around, impeding movement. I didn't have that issue here. The map has two parts, the first section is a more plodding pace and the second one is a quick reaction type, like Djiem's map. I really liked the second section with the quick reaction segments, I find those fun to run through. It didn't happen to me, but I can see a couple places where people might get accidental deaths. One being the part where you bring down a bullet bill launcher to shoot a winged fireball at one giant bob-omb. This is similar to the last SMMC entry, where you can get surprised by the projectile that comes out. I got lucky and dodged it. The second one is the last screen with the flag. The falling brick can squish you and kill you if you get trapped under it, but it looks like you added it for added aesthetic. I think the challenge on this map is a decent balance and the two different parts work together, in my opinion.
One added thought: The boss area is too forgiving. With the 2 fire flower pipes, I just took hits and didn't really care about dodging the fireballs or piranha plants.
Winner:
I enjoyed all the maps and I waffled back and forth, but I will go with The Manor Basement by @cravipat. Nice work buddy.
I could see the possible issue with the surprise flying fireball. Especially if you were climbing down the vines normally. I always waited on the left vine above the platform until the wigglers were at their furthest apart, jumping off the vine, falling to the left, bouncing off the left wiggler and move/fall to the right. That gets you to the ground long before it fires. The falling "roof tile" at the end is very much on purpose though. I usually hate that tactic but I felt it fit with the horror nature of the level. One last gotcha when it feels like you might be safe.
I do still need work on my boss techniques. It's tough to find the balance between a challenge and frustration. Plus I need to be able to finish it myself. In the current setup there is a star on a track that will eventually drop to the center if you've taken too long. An alternative would be to focus on waiting for that star. Replace the fire flowers in the pipes with the fire plants on the tracks instead, and have maybe two power ups in ? blocks in the upper section. The downside would be that the ? blocks would block fireballs. Maybe I'll try a redesign to see how that would work out.
Super Mario Maker Challenge #23
Sub World Synergy
Rules: Create a level with a sub world that is a reflection of the main world. Some examples are upside down sub worlds, like Pipeflip Airship, or the enemies change, like SMB3 4-6, or the main world shows how to solve a sub world puzzle, like Memory. You also don't need to keep the same style between the main and sub worlds. The main world could be a normal world while the sub work is a post apocalyptic wasteland version of the main world. As long as the sub work has some relation to the main world and isn't just used to make the level longer.
Deadline: End of the day May 1st.
I'm going a little longer to see if that lets more people get finished.
Uh oh. I've had an idea I've been wanting to do for awhile that's right in line with this theme, but I thought I needed to step away from Mario Maker for a little while.
Hrrrrrrgh.
Well, we'll see how these two weekends go.
Triptycho: A card-and-dice tabletop indie RPG currently in development and playtesting
I really wish you could have more warp pipes and doors (especially warp pipes). I could have gone much further with this idea, but I spent some of those precious pipes to create semi-tutorial rooms. Still, this course might be short and easy, but I'm happy with the result, I think it's pretty clever.
It looked like our thing might be dieing out with a couple people moving on, so I hope we can get a real turn out today.
I know I myself rarely get a level in, but I always make sure to play every one posted. Especially since they are not posted at a furious pace now.
I regret not grabbing this at release. By the time I finally got it a lot of people here had moved on and it feels like without an external community there's no real point. There are too many levels to be able to find an audience through the game and even harder to find good levels. If I'm lucky a run though 100-Mario might get me one good course out of 16.
What I'm really surprised at is that Nintendo didn't run their own themed contests. They did it for WarioWare DIY and Picross 3D. Although neither of those games had a way to publicly share things. Maybe they thought course world was good enough but I'd love to be able to play through a bunch of curated levels based around a theme.
Rules: Create a level with a sub world that is a reflection of the main world. Some examples are upside down sub worlds, like Pipeflip Airship, or the enemies change, like SMB3 4-6, or the main world shows how to solve a sub world puzzle, like Memory. You also don't need to keep the same style between the main and sub worlds. The main world could be a normal world while the sub work is a post apocalyptic wasteland version of the main world. As long as the sub work has some relation to the main world and isn't just used to make the level longer.
Deadline: End of the day May 1st.
I'm going a little longer to see if that lets more people get finished.
A Small Problem Gets Giant - 8CB4-0000-0231-F8A1
Went with the normal->giant motif. It's fairly short, but the boss section is pretty difficult. I tried to get both the main and sub-world as identical as possible (including doodads). It's pretty much spot on, save for a few adjustments I made because of giant enemies.
Woah, why is there so much empty space between the last Event Course mystery mushroom costumes and the new BABYMETAL one?
@TelMarine: That small/giant course was pretty cool, but I gave up on the Giant Boss. It's WAY too hard, mostly because of how cramped it feels with the pipes and ceiling being so low.
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Kai_SanCommonly known as Klineshrike!Registered Userregular
Isn't that space for the costumes you get from Super Expert?
I beat it once and got baby mario. Less than exciting. I also got to the 6th level with like 60+ lives and couldn't finish one more level.
Isn't that space for the costumes you get from Super Expert?
I beat it once and got baby mario. Less than exciting. I also got to the 6th level with like 60+ lives and couldn't finish one more level.
Maybe? I thought the Super Expert costumes would be before or after the event ones. I'm talking about a bunch of costumes hidden between two event costumes here.
Posts
I replayed this one and I thought it was actually kinda fun so - enjoy. XD
K.K. Ice Slider
https://supermariomakerbookmark.nintendo.net/courses/160D-0000-004E-F25D
Key To My Heart
RESULTS
Red Coin Round-up (Hard) by @TelMarine
This course absolutely nailed the "hard but fair" theme. It reminded me of Dark Souls in all the best ways, punishing your errors but you know that it's pretty much always your fault when you fail. And every failure leads to improvement, not in the sense of mere rote memorization, but rather in figuring out the best way to solve each challenge. The choice of four coins was perfect given the escalating difficulty, and the challenges surrounding each one were varied, creative, and delightful.
I didn't really figure out any alternate ways to collect the coins, though of course the bomb area has many possible solutions depending on what feels more natural to you (I used the first note block and dropped bombs carefully to time them to explode at the apex of a single bounce, but I noticed a throw to the right worked as well). That segment was ridiculously difficult and absolutely genius. I failed to get the final coin with the star still active, but managed it during invincibility afterward in a very close call that led to a triumphant victory where I shouted aloud, just like after vanquishing a difficult Souls boss.
My only thought for improvement would be to adjust the layout so you can more freely get the coins in any order. Backtracking is possible, but it's cumbersome due to the linear layout; if you want to head straight for the muncher coin to practice, you still have to clear quite a bit of the level, then on success go back and repeat a few harrowing elements. Despite this minor quibble, this course was excellent and easily my favorite work by TelMarine to date.
Five Red Coins, Passing By by @Djiem
This course features a really great concept -- a looping auto-scroller where you have to repeat several times in order to collect all the coins to finally exit. The method to collect each coin was unique; some required care, others clever thinking, and one or two some hectic action to avoid getting crushed. Djiem can always be counted on for new and clever ideas for courses, and this one's no different.
The difficulty was quite reasonable for all the loops -- I never died despite a couple close calls -- but I did nearly run out of time. This was a result of the "hidden" coin, which took forever and a dose of pure luck to find. By the time I finally found it the looping had lost its enchantment. Excellent design with the other four coins, though.
Bossy Battles: can u beat all 4? by @Alphagaia
This course featured four boss battles of varying types that would grant keys or red coins. You only have to get one key to complete the course, but collecting more gives you more rewards at the end and, of course, bragging rights. I didn't attempt to beat all four in a single run, but I did give each of them a go across several attempts.
Some of the boss battles were excellent. Giant Bowser Jr. is something we've all dealt with in Mario Maker, but the environment is what made this one special. I'm torn on the element of using Jr. to break the wall for the extra red coin; this wound up making the fight much easier when you guide Jr. over there instead of fighting atop the crazy blue beetle platforms, but there was a sense of accomplishment from figuring out this method and getting the coin.
The helmet goomba was excellent design as well. The battle was a little short but hectic, which is perfect for a boss rush course like this one.
The two track-based bosses were less successful. They looked amazing, but in play it mostly came down to memorizing patterns so that you don't get yourself lodged in a death corner that is impossible to escape from. A few tweaks to the layout could have saved these bosses and made them something really special. As is, I just mushroom face-planted the fire wheel for a rapid kill and gave up trying to get the coins after a few tries with the fire snake.
Visually the course was pretty consistently striking. I always love a hub area and enjoy what you did with this one, and the reward tiers were a nice touch.
Locked Out - SMMC #21 by @cravipat
Oh hey, a traditional platformer! That's a nice change of pace. Okay, so I got the key, and now I can g- wait what. Really? Well I probably should have seen that coming, but somehow I thought I'd get a quick warp out!
This course was visually striking, and the platforming elements were familiar and well-executed. The need to complete the course in reverse was appreciated; some parts were especially successful here, being much harder in reverse than going forward. The implicit storytelling was well-done; I loved the attention to detail and the ending bit.
The boss was pretty disappointing as it was pulled directly from SM3 but made easier thanks to the fire flower and a broader area to battle. It's sensible to have an easy boss with the nature of this course, but this one was uninspired.
Very reasonable difficulty for the length - I completed this course on my first attempt (and somehow set a record despite not hurrying; I'm guessing our expert players haven't gotten around to this one yet).
2016c by @crimsoncoyote
A puzzler course that was incomplete when I started it and remains so upon giving up. The opening bit is bizarre - a coin message with no real context that will go crazy if you wait around or jump or whatever - and having to run through it every time to get to the puzzles is a bit awkward.
I figured out the solution to the first puzzle (all the way to the P-door), but actually executing it eluded me. The positioning of everything was just so to be frustrating, and it wasn't something that was enjoyable in repetition. Once I had everything positioned perfectly, only to find that the POW-block that I'd set aside for the munchers had disappeared because of scrolling. Getting the bob-ombs to reappear every time you fail to knock out the wall was a hassle, and the thwomp really didn't help matters.
Puzzles that require restarting the map because you get "stuck" -- and making that stuck condition very easy to reach (in this case it's the default thing that happens just from moving forward) -- is not good design.
I can't really speak to the rest of the course because I ragequit before I could make it through the first door.
And the winner is....
@TelMarine with Red Coin Round-up!
Clever, varied, challenging, and elegant -- this course was a masterclass of design. Excellent work, and congratulations!
@crimsoncoyote First off, I found this quite difficult. I think you need to play test this one a bit more. There's a lot of situations where you can totally get fucked and have to start all over again from the beginning. Checkpoints won't help because they reset the red coins and considering there are the maximum 10 of them in this level, it exacerbates the issue.
1. The very beginning, you can trigger the thwomp above by jumping. I eventually figured this was intentional? Since a mushroom drops down. However, this part is re-used to get one of the red coins and if you fall trying to get that red coin under the thwomp, it sends you back to the very beginning which becomes unbeatable. You have to restart since the part with the spiked helmet can't be completed again (items that spawn from blocks don't come back or reset). This was very aggravating since I fell having 9/10 coins.
2. If the first section (after the opening sequence), you can accidentally kill the thwomp before you even know what's really going on. It's the very beginning so it's not too bad, but just annoying. Since you have 10 coins to collect here, maybe be a little bit more forgiving and allow a quick reset.
3. Second section has a non-obvious trap (in my opinion) since you are racing because of the P-switch timer and then jump in to get a key and realize you can't get out. It's unnecessary and should be removed, in my opinion.
4. The 3rd coin/spikey helmet section, I would say be a little more forgiving here and add a reset since you gotta go all the way back to the beginning if you make 1 mistake, which is easy since it's not clear what to do immediately.
5. The next section that has you jump on the blue skull platform, if you are just a smidgen off center, when it's taking you through, you can get caught on the far left flame moving up and down, causing you to go off the platform and it continues on without you. It doesn't come back and there doesn't appear to be a way to reset it, so you have to restart.
6. The section with the 2 piranha plants with wings, two things. One, if you have the fire flower or obtain it there, you can kill the piranha plants without even realizing that you are supposed to need them. I got lucky and took a guess that you were supposed to jump off them, but I can see people easily killing them and not realizing you need them to bounce up and get Yoshi. On top of that, since you need to spin jump to bounce off them, if you have the fire flower, you can accidentally kill them while spin jumping.
7. Is there a point to the POW block in the clown car section? I just used it to kill the lone chain chomp before proceeding.
Cool! You can actually get the last coin using the koopa shell (just throw it down there and have it connect). On the bridges, only 1 of the enemies is not a spike top which is a red koopa. The alternate way is to use the star. The second coin in the long conveyor belt section can be completed without the P-Switch, but I made it purposely much more difficult without it. The bob-omb section has numerous different ways to complete it as you noted. I found it easiest to drop a bob-omb on the middle note block and have it bounce up and down.
I don't think this has been done before, so let's go for it:
Verticality
Rules: Create maps with an emphasis on verticality, moving up and/or down (does NOT have to solely be vertical). Mario Maker is painfully limited in the vertical space so it'll be interesting to see what people come up with. "Memory" by @Dirk2112 comes to mind as something that can be done.
Deadline: End of the day April 17th
Come up with whatever you want that fits. I'll play them as they are submitted.
I'm pretty bad at this stuff, but figured I'd throw some things at the wall and see what sticks.
I can understand why all those things would be frustrating, and I might revisit the course. (It may in fact just be better to start over entirely). I can see why some of the parts definitely need to be resetable.
As for number 7, the idea was to lead the clown car through the spikes with the pow, and just run on the upper level. But I didn't really think about it being done more "traditionally".
I probably need to come into course building more open-minded and not have a single set "solution" in mind for everything.
I'll think about the bowser Jr fight. I liked the platforms, but originally I had planned for each boss to have a red coin or two hidden away. When the snake could not harbour a key I had to improvise, but kept the hidden coin in the bowser fight. Maybe I'll change the fight so it's only on the platforms as it's a much harder fight. On the other hand, you don't want to make it too hard.
Shoot m to BITS (hold Y) [hard] C109-0000-014D-4E09
P-POWER Switch Palace 3838-0000-0122-9359
Raiding the Serpents Tomb 1A04-0000-0098-C11E
I like to move it, move it FCE2-0000-00D7-9048
See my profile here!
I have a confession. The SMB3 Bowser fight is high on my favorite SMB endings, if not the top. Everyone here can probably get to the end with a fire flower, making it relatively trivial, but for a more intermediate player, which is what I was aiming for, it's an endurance battle. Everyone has been spoiled by the crazy boss designs here.
Even after editing the level to work out the solution I didn't have it in me to try to finish it. If everything was more compressed, so that it didn't take so long to get back to where you died/reset and you could see how to work out a puzzle, I think it would help a lot to make it more enjoyable.
I thought your level really shined once you try to get all the keys. Knowing you have to get through all of them causes you to figure out the most efficient way to survive. I hated the fire snake at first but after you play it 20 times the only hard part is the waiting. Even Jr has a few tricks you can learn to exploit. Depending on your approach he'll shell right away or you can get him to shoot a fireball so you can get your first hit before he has left the starting platform.
The magikoopa has a lot of luck involved. The first hit is easy enough but once he's off the platform its all about where he teleports to.
Super Mario Maker ID: DBB-1RH-JJG
Shoot m to BITS (hold Y) [hard] C109-0000-014D-4E09
P-POWER Switch Palace 3838-0000-0122-9359
Raiding the Serpents Tomb 1A04-0000-0098-C11E
I like to move it, move it FCE2-0000-00D7-9048
See my profile here!
For Jr I'd remove the coin bit and shrink the platform you arrive on. To help with the difficulty you could remove a few beetles so they were only on every other platform or something.
I will look into it!
Shoot m to BITS (hold Y) [hard] C109-0000-014D-4E09
P-POWER Switch Palace 3838-0000-0122-9359
Raiding the Serpents Tomb 1A04-0000-0098-C11E
I like to move it, move it FCE2-0000-00D7-9048
See my profile here!
Alright I think this should work for this theme. If not let me know.
Underwater Cavern
This is the second level in the series of 4 levels I have wanted to make a "world" of since the game came out. If you remember back for SMMC 3 I made that auto scrolling one. This is supposed to be the follow up to that.
About the level: It is basically made up of kind of a large map type of deal. The verticality comes from the fact that it is one map with three levels. Top middle and lower. There are pipes to move between them.
Because it is kind of an open type of world, there are multiple ways to really go about getting through it. The structure will kind of guide you, but even if you try to follow the level you could at least find two paths to take. For the most part, if you take it slow it should be fairly easy (except the last screen, that is why there is a checkpoint there). If you search enough to find the right power ups, even the last screen should be pretty simple.
Now if you decide to go for the red coins, good freaking luck. They are entirely optional, and unless you were playing this level as a part of the whole I plan to eventually make there is not really much of a reward (though the reward area for that should be substantial considering you get to keep stuff between levels I think, at the very least lives). If you choose to be a completionist though, prepare for pain. I only did it once, but I couldn't utilize the checkpoint as a kind of single save to start from like a halfway point when I was testing. You can only use it once though.
Outside of the red coins, if you notice the difficulty is a little too far off let me know. I had to struggle to make it fair but I did not want to make it too easy. Being as my intention for all 4 levels was to play them in series by loading them up as a 4 part in your local levels, and that actually gives you a lives count, the goal is to make it just hard enough that you will care about how many lives you have. This is why I haven't gone back and redone the first level yet like I did with many others. I can't consider that finished until the whole thing is done and I can do a pass on how many lives is fair and how much of a reward is enough.
The koopah is a good point, I will need to remove that. It was supposed to help with the room full of fish though.
The fish can be handled by waiting early. It is definitely hard to avoid them, but since the rest of the level is quite short if you learn the layout, I wanted that room to take some time. The checkpoint is placed so you can retry it easy. I might clean that up a bit though, as I think the upper part is hard enough to slow someone down.
Thanks for the feedback. I might fix it up and reupload, but I will wait a little to see. I don't want to rush it and have to fix it a few more times.
Did you find the difficulty of the rest of the level to be fair? Outside of the coins, the level should be navigable without too much trouble. The lower level is supposed to be more difficult though because it has two pretty significant power ups.
It won't save them while clearing the stage to upload it, so you do need someway to go back if the coins are required to clear the stage.
Serrated Tower Climb
03C4-0000-0221-E347
There are 9 red coins in there, but they are optional, just there for bragging rights.
So, fair warning, this course is super hard, and if you try to go for red coins, it's insane.
@Kai_San I thought it was easy enough to navigate if you didn't go for the coins. I was always going for the coins though, so I took some more deaths. If you get the fire flower, it's a lot easier.
@Djiem Quick thoughts:
The only solution would be to put one last red coin next to the door, so you could only get all of them after you finished.
I did it as well, also got the best time. Then I went and played my level for fun and did a perfect run in one attempt. Never did that while testing it. Though, I looked at the deaths and the only deaths are in the first room and the last room. That is odd, there is 26 attempts but only looks like 5 deaths.
It would reset even if I didn't have all of them. Once I got the second checkpoint and died, *poof*.
Also the game does not appear to show EVERY death, but areas where it most commonly happened.
Maybe the red coins disappearing is due to the second checkpoint being in the main zone and the first checkpoint being in the subzone? If that's the reason, I'll have to take it into account when I create another such course.
Shoot m to BITS (hold Y) [hard] C109-0000-014D-4E09
P-POWER Switch Palace 3838-0000-0122-9359
Raiding the Serpents Tomb 1A04-0000-0098-C11E
I like to move it, move it FCE2-0000-00D7-9048
See my profile here!
What will you find in...
The Manor Basement
(2FEF-0000-0225-D30B)
This is probably my most ambitious levels yet. I had a few false starts which gave me a bit of a time crunch but I really like how it turned out. I'm not sure how difficult it is going to be. I was able to get right through it during my upload but I know what to do and what is coming. I don't think it will give anyone too much trouble. There's some light exploration, possibly my first attempt at an actual boss area, and a little something extra. I even had some extra space to be able to doodle an area only used for the thumbnail.
Super Mario Maker ID: DBB-1RH-JJG
I'm not sure either now. I think the first time through I may have gotten lost, which is quite a feat on a mostly linear level. I think I took the bottom path and then through the pipe into the upper level instead of going through the door.
Super Mario Maker ID: DBB-1RH-JJG
If you ended up being forced to explore, then the level did it's job
Shoot m to BITS (hold Y) [hard] C109-0000-014D-4E09
P-POWER Switch Palace 3838-0000-0122-9359
Raiding the Serpents Tomb 1A04-0000-0098-C11E
I like to move it, move it FCE2-0000-00D7-9048
See my profile here!
Verticality Results
1. @Kai_San - Underwater Cavern - https://supermariomakerbookmark.nintendo.net/courses/09EC-0000-0221-417C
Thoughts: It was a nice change of pace being an underwater level. I find underwater levels hard to create because it feels so limiting and samey. I liked the approach here making it an open/sandbox type of deal. Expanding on my quick thoughts posted earlier, I think the map is more fun trying to get the coins, in my opinion. I like the added difficulty in going for them, but I think the coin that you need to get the POW is easily missed. I didn't even realize the POW was on screen and leaving until I asked. I played it again not going for the red coins and I found one minor issue. The area right after going through the door at the checkpoint. At the very top, you have to fight some goombas. However, if you have the fire flower and you go to the top of the screen and start shooting, your fireballs don't make it. This is because you used a semi-solid platform as a background, but the top is exposed a little bit. This means when you swim to the max height, your fireballs travel on top of the semi-solid platform instead of going downward. Not a huge deal, but something I noticed. As you mentioned, the map is a lot easier with the fire flower.
2. @Djiem - Serrated Tower Climb - https://supermariomakerbookmark.nintendo.net/courses/03C4-0000-0221-E347
Thoughts: The most difficult out of the entries. Since I'm always trying to go for the extra coins in Mario games (like star coins in the New Super Mario series) the map was even harder. There's a good variety of challenge here with each room having something a little different from the room before. Echoing my quick thoughts from earlier, getting all the red coins was a bit difficult because of how the second checkpoint would reset the red coins for me. So I had to get a perfect run starting from the first checkpoint on. Going for the red coins also requires a fair bit of memorization, but it's not that big of a deal since they are optional. However, this map is probably extremely difficult to complete on the first try since you gotta react real fast. This map would be a doozie if there was vertical scrolling allowed.
3. @cravipat - The Manor Basement - https://supermariomakerbookmark.nintendo.net/courses/2FEF-0000-0225-D30B
Thoughts: The aesthetic here is pretty cool. Sometimes vines as decoration is annoying to me because I've accidentally got caught on them when jumping around, impeding movement. I didn't have that issue here. The map has two parts, the first section is a more plodding pace and the second one is a quick reaction type, like Djiem's map. I really liked the second section with the quick reaction segments, I find those fun to run through. It didn't happen to me, but I can see a couple places where people might get accidental deaths. One being the part where you bring down a bullet bill launcher to shoot a winged fireball at one giant bob-omb. This is similar to the last SMMC entry, where you can get surprised by the projectile that comes out. I got lucky and dodged it. The second one is the last screen with the flag. The falling brick can squish you and kill you if you get trapped under it, but it looks like you added it for added aesthetic. I think the challenge on this map is a decent balance and the two different parts work together, in my opinion.
One added thought: The boss area is too forgiving. With the 2 fire flower pipes, I just took hits and didn't really care about dodging the fireballs or piranha plants.
Winner:
I could see the possible issue with the surprise flying fireball. Especially if you were climbing down the vines normally. I always waited on the left vine above the platform until the wigglers were at their furthest apart, jumping off the vine, falling to the left, bouncing off the left wiggler and move/fall to the right. That gets you to the ground long before it fires. The falling "roof tile" at the end is very much on purpose though. I usually hate that tactic but I felt it fit with the horror nature of the level. One last gotcha when it feels like you might be safe.
I do still need work on my boss techniques. It's tough to find the balance between a challenge and frustration. Plus I need to be able to finish it myself. In the current setup there is a star on a track that will eventually drop to the center if you've taken too long. An alternative would be to focus on waiting for that star. Replace the fire flowers in the pipes with the fire plants on the tracks instead, and have maybe two power ups in ? blocks in the upper section. The downside would be that the ? blocks would block fireballs. Maybe I'll try a redesign to see how that would work out.
Sub World Synergy
Rules: Create a level with a sub world that is a reflection of the main world. Some examples are upside down sub worlds, like Pipeflip Airship, or the enemies change, like SMB3 4-6, or the main world shows how to solve a sub world puzzle, like Memory. You also don't need to keep the same style between the main and sub worlds. The main world could be a normal world while the sub work is a post apocalyptic wasteland version of the main world. As long as the sub work has some relation to the main world and isn't just used to make the level longer.
Deadline: End of the day May 1st.
I'm going a little longer to see if that lets more people get finished.
Super Mario Maker ID: DBB-1RH-JJG
Hrrrrrrgh.
Well, we'll see how these two weekends go.
Lemme think...
I know I myself rarely get a level in, but I always make sure to play every one posted. Especially since they are not posted at a furious pace now.
Perplexing Pipes
A0F7-0000-022C-43D9
I really wish you could have more warp pipes and doors (especially warp pipes). I could have gone much further with this idea, but I spent some of those precious pipes to create semi-tutorial rooms. Still, this course might be short and easy, but I'm happy with the result, I think it's pretty clever.
This level alone makes me super glad I used that topic. I can't wait to see the rest.
I regret not grabbing this at release. By the time I finally got it a lot of people here had moved on and it feels like without an external community there's no real point. There are too many levels to be able to find an audience through the game and even harder to find good levels. If I'm lucky a run though 100-Mario might get me one good course out of 16.
What I'm really surprised at is that Nintendo didn't run their own themed contests. They did it for WarioWare DIY and Picross 3D. Although neither of those games had a way to publicly share things. Maybe they thought course world was good enough but I'd love to be able to play through a bunch of curated levels based around a theme.
Super Mario Maker ID: DBB-1RH-JJG
A Small Problem Gets Giant - 8CB4-0000-0231-F8A1
Went with the normal->giant motif. It's fairly short, but the boss section is pretty difficult. I tried to get both the main and sub-world as identical as possible (including doodads). It's pretty much spot on, save for a few adjustments I made because of giant enemies.
@TelMarine: That small/giant course was pretty cool, but I gave up on the Giant Boss. It's WAY too hard, mostly because of how cramped it feels with the pipes and ceiling being so low.
I beat it once and got baby mario. Less than exciting. I also got to the 6th level with like 60+ lives and couldn't finish one more level.
Maybe? I thought the Super Expert costumes would be before or after the event ones. I'm talking about a bunch of costumes hidden between two event costumes here.