Will's infuriatingly stupid levels

kuliwil · Post by **kuliwil** » Sun Jan 02, 2011 13:04

Okay, so I took a shot at using Mindbelt, and after annoying Tulip a LOT in order to figure out the odds and ends of the program and an hour of playing around, I made my first level!

It sucks, and I find it difficult (probably because I'm a Galaxy guy, and I've almost always looked at Vorticons as an oddity in the evolution of Keen), and I hope you enjoy it.

I've only made the one level, so I'm only uploading one file. Just slip it in to a copy of KEEN 1.

http://filedump.onecuckoosnest.com/LEVEL01.CK1

Level 02 coming.... sometime. I might make this in to a full levelpack one day. We'll see.

I just wanted everyone's opinion on the level.

Post by **tulip** » Sun Jan 02, 2011 13:19

1. It's not hard at all, but I like the difficulty level
2. You can bypass the door to the exit, just jump over it.
3. on the top left, I'm relatively sure you didn't plan to use all fall through blocks (where the fire is)
4. Waay too much ammo for a first level.

Other than that, a neat little level.

kuliwil · Post by **kuliwil** » Sun Jan 02, 2011 13:30

3. Haha, the fallthrough blocks will ultimately have an SGA sign next to them reading "stairway to heaven", in homage to Led Zeppelin. Or wait, are these the red blocks or the pink blocks you're talking about? My lack of K1 knowledge severely dogs my level designing.

2. I'll fix that door tomorrow, tonight I must sleep. As I meant to 20 minutes ago.

4. I shall reduce the ammo.

1. And I should practice K1 some more!

Thank you!

DHeadshot · Post by **DHeadshot** » Sun Jan 02, 2011 13:54

Nice level! The door and blocks things are irritations, but otherwise it's really well put together, especially the little touches like placing the blocks in the stairs in such a way that you can't really overshoot...

kuliwil · Post by **kuliwil** » Mon Jan 03, 2011 2:43

Okay, problems fixed. Link is still the same, new file in its place. No more fallthrough blocks and the ammo has been cut back. A couple of new hazards and I've made it so that the red door can't be bypassed any more.

Post by **Ceilick** » Mon Jan 03, 2011 3:30

Wooo another potential leveler for future levelpacks

Well designed little level, my main suggestions are with point placement.

The area to the right of the beginning with the tank robot is currently empty and is more of a trap than anything. I suggest either putting some points down there to encourage players to try their skill down there, or move the green key down there (although this would increase the level difficulty substantially, I had a hard time getting past the spikes and the robot!).

Another good spot for points would be between the 'K' and 'U' of your name, although I understand not placing there also since it interrupts the spelling

There's a little two tile space to the left of the purple blocks next to the four green barrels; ideal for points.

As the level is, the green door is kind of pointless; the way the green key is positioned the player will never have a situation in which they go to the green door and need to backtrack for the key. This isn't necessarily bad, but something to think about.

The spot with the fire and lollipop is impossible to escape

Some people like these situations in levels, others not so much. Just throwing that out there. Also, if you decide to make this area exitable, I suggest moving the two teddybears to this side of the red wall as a reward (rather than a single lollipop) and moving the lollipop to the red key side (since teddybears are a little over-rewarding in that situation, imko).

Hope that information is useful, also hope you keep leveling

kuliwil · Post by **kuliwil** » Mon Jan 03, 2011 3:50

Thanks for the advice Ceilick! (Oh, and thanks to Tulip too, I'm not sure if I said that earlier.)

My inability to play Vorticons all that well made me think that the tanke robot area was completely inaccessible. I had originally planned to put stuff there but decided against it in the end because I thought you couldn't get to it. I'll go and update it again now, with some points in there!

The fire area was intended to just be a frustration point, you go to all the effort to get there and it's only an inaccessible lollypop. I'm thinking that I might actually make it accessible now, and put the bears there as you said.

And points in my name sound a good idea. I was actually thinking of removing my name from it, my ego got to me a bit last night

And I plan to make at least three more levels and make a small levelpack. Thanks for the advice and encouragement

EDIT: Just got in to the robot and spikes area. Woo!

EDIT 2: NEW VERSION UPLOADED. If you're wondering why the doors have changed colour, it's because I recoloured my spritesheet. I don't know how to reintegrate the spritesheet into the program yet, but I'll just keep using the original colours and such for now. I've only changed the colour of two doors, the soda can and the lollypop anyway. I've always hated the colour of that lollypop.

EDIT 3: Something for your boredom: http://filedump.onecuckoosnest.com/LEVEL02.CK1

Paramultart · Post by **Paramultart** » Mon Jan 03, 2011 16:31

Played and beat Level01. Really fun little level! Your mapping style is really compatible with me and kept me playing til the end.

Haven't played Level02 yet, but I'll probably get to that later since I rather enjoyed the first one. Good job!

EDIT: Just played Level02. Nice work.

My advice would be to keep cranking these out, and when you've completed a set, start skinning the graphics and you'll have a complete mod.

DHeadshot · Post by **DHeadshot** » Mon Jan 03, 2011 18:43

Odd. I went to level 2, game glitched out and I got a game over despite having 5 lives left. Reloaded from where I saved and the map was replaced by a weird glitched out thing with an entirely new tileset, which I presume was parts of your level mixed with crash stuff...
[edit]Demo

Paramultart · Post by **Paramultart** » Mon Jan 03, 2011 21:56

DHeadshot wrote:Odd. I went to level 2, game glitched out and I got a game over despite having 5 lives left. Reloaded from where I saved and the map was replaced by a weird glitched out thing with an entirely new tileset, which I presume was parts of your level mixed with crash stuff...
[edit]Demo

WTF?!!?!?

That didn't happen to me. It was just a small level with lots of keycards.

DHeadshot · Post by **DHeadshot** » Mon Jan 03, 2011 22:46

Paramultart wrote:
DHeadshot wrote:Odd. I went to level 2, game glitched out and I got a game over despite having 5 lives left. Reloaded from where I saved and the map was replaced by a weird glitched out thing with an entirely new tileset, which I presume was parts of your level mixed with crash stuff...
[edit]Demo

WTF?!!?!?

That didn't happen to me. It was just a small level with lots of keycards.

Since I recorded that on my third play-through of the level, I can assure you it's not a momentary glitch...

kuliwil · Post by **kuliwil** » Tue Jan 04, 2011 3:54

Wow! As I commented on the video - I've not laughed so hard in ages! That was hilariously catastrophic!

Those weren't my graphics, it looked like the tileset went for a long walk through the black forest and didn't come back in one piece. A couple of times there I saw the tileset flashing up semi-intact. (as in, intact as in how it appears in the bitmap)

Try plugging it in to a fresh install of Keen, it might be your old game files confusing it. Or it could possibly be a different version of Keen?

And thanks Paramultart!

I might just do that

Keenfan · Post by **Keenfan** » Tue Jan 04, 2011 23:21

I just had the time to play through the two levels and I really liked them.
The difficulty is perfect for me and I love the short but cool level design, especially in the second level.
The second level looks a bit ugly by now, especially the red blocks at the start.
I'm looking forward to see more levels from you!

Post by **Levellass** » Thu Jan 13, 2011 23:23

These have been put in my patch crash-testing folder so I'll be looking at them for a while now. They're very nice. Both show you're starting out as a (keen 1) level builder but are entertaining.

The video seems to be the result of a corrupt savegame, though also maybe the exe is at fault since it's loading levels, but incorrectly, you can even identify the levels being loaded (Levels 80, 81 and 90, plus probably level 2 and maybe 4)

OR, maybe you just right-clicked 'save as' instead of opening the site to get the attachment? You'd get a .ck1 file, but made of html, which wouldn't run in the game (Go ahead, try it!)

DHeadshot · Post by **DHeadshot** » Fri Jan 14, 2011 12:20

Here's a zip of what I have inserted into the game, if anyone wants to experience the glitch themselves...
[edit=link insert didn't work]