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Member of the Month - December 2015

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Meet our last Member of the Month for 2015, levelengine, who is one of our helpers for the temporary hacks remoderation. This was a pretty interesting one.

Get comfortable...
Sixcorby Hi, levelengine!
levelengine Hey Sixcorby
Sixcorby How are things?
levelengine Going well

levelengine Just got done the Mario X World SER remoderation
levelengine Took about only 2 weeks
Sixcorby Good to know, and yes, you've been a big help with the temporary hacks remoderation.
Sixcorby How have you been finding the job to be?
levelengine Pretty lax
levelengine I first though you had to remoderate one hack per day
levelengine Then again, this is coming from Wakana, who's still setting more records for most hacks reviewed
Sixcorby He has superpowers
Sixcorby Which one has been your favorite so far?
levelengine I hadn't exactly pinned it down to one hack
levelengine As there almost always seemed to be something of interest to
levelengine I was impressed with quite a few
levelengine back then, people still made "alright" hacks
levelengine It's just we evolved so much over the past 2 years
levelengine Mario X World SER was one hell of a ride
levelengine Fun but insanely hard
levelengine Even the artifacts of marvelous birds was a unique finding
levelengine I also liked Sokoban's Combo Breaker

Sixcorby You've been on SMWC for several years. How did you find this site?
levelengine This was back in 2009, after wondering where most rom hacks are found
levelengine Not 100% sure on the specifics but I did watch ProtonJon and found out about SMW hacking
levelengine I'm pretty sure most of us did
Sixcorby Yeah, he was pretty popular.
Sixcorby I recall watching a few of his videos.
levelengine The Kaizo Special Stage 2 one?
Sixcorby Yeah
levelengine I think that was where Kaizo got a bunch of its popularity
levelengine It did take a while for it to evolve

Sixcorby What are your current feelings on the site?
levelengine There are a lot of friendly talented users
levelengine But getting your name out there is almost impossible, especially if you're still at the starting gate
levelengine That was mostly the case for 2012-2014
levelengine you have to do a lot to stand out
levelengine There's just so much competition if you look at it that way

Sixcorby I see you're working on a hack called "Bits and Pieces". Tell me about it.
levelengine Okay, it originally began as a user-centric approach, to have them assign blocks/sprites/asm to be used in each level
levelengine Unfortunately it didn't hold as well as I had hoped
levelengine But I did continue building it as normal, using even some custom resources chosen via random numbers
levelengine As of now, I'm two and a half levels away from releasing something playable
levelengine I can't promise, but I hope to release something playable this coming December
Sixcorby Sounds exciting!
levelengine Sure is
levelengine I've been trying to make the levels unique, though it gets tough not running out of ideas
levelengine One of the best things you can do is to play other games/rom hacks to get inspiration from
Sixcorby Indeed

Sixcorby You also have a pretty active YouTube channel. What got you into that?
levelengine It was originally going to be a place to showcase my levels from Secret Maryo Chronicles, which was an old open source free game based on Super Mario World
levelengine Over the years, it's been drifting off into becoming its own game
levelengine The title even changed to The Secret Chronicles of Dr M.
levelengine I then played both Luigi's Adventure OSE and Rise to the Challenge in 2012, and then wanted to play SMW hacks again
levelengine Those were the first two rom hacks I recorded let's plays of.
levelengine The RTTC one has been redone, simply to make a let's play better than the 2012 one
levelengine I had planned to do the same for Luigi's Adventure OSE
levelengine These let's plays improved in quality over the years, and have just been piling up
levelengine What makes it fun is sometimes, you just never know what you're gonna get
levelengine In fact, when I play a rom hack, I often enough give it a rating, in a similar spirit to another let's player, Azentiger
levelengine Ever heard of him?
Sixcorby I have not.
Sixcorby I'm guessing he inspired you?
levelengine Yes, sort of
levelengine I'm most fond of the episodes where he raged from how bad the hacks were
levelengine Episode 43, Super Mario Bros Crossover Demo 1 (an old 2010 rom hack) was probably my favorite one
levelengine I laughed so hard I almost cried
Sixcorby Heh

Sixcorby Finally, do you have any plans in ROM hacking for the future?
levelengine A few
levelengine In fact, one of my SMWCentral goals is to have relased 20 rom hacks
levelengine I'm currently on 14, counting 11 and 13, which are unfinished
Sixcorby Wow!
levelengine This does include absolutely everything that still exists, which dates back to 2009
levelengine I currently did outline hacks 15, 16 and also 17, though that could change

Sixcorby That's all. Do you have anything else you'd like to say?
levelengine Thanks to all the people that supported me, even if there may not be that many
Sixcorby Good shoutout. Thanks for your time.
nice
nice
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cool nice
Yeah, I've always liked your work, Levelengine. I mean like, a lot. Maybe it's not always as refined as I'd like to make, but what's great about it is that you, as an artist and level designer(level design is an art in my book) seem know how to balance work and motivation so flawlessly.

Low points are just part of the process, but unlike most of us, myself especially, you don't seem as privy to giving up. Instead, you power through and very much so live up to your username.

Make no mistake, this isn't an attempt to be backhanded or snarky; I truly think that having that voice in your head telling you when to stop or slow down is a more powerful tool than any amount of design knowledge when it comes to game development on a whole. Speaking as someone who's made too many projects of high quality to count, only to toss them within the month because I run out of juice for it, your skill to just keep on moving and power through your mental barriers just makes me fit to burst with unadulterated envy.

You deserve MotM, and frankly have deserved it for some time now.
I've become very grumpy these last few years, and have been biting my tongue here in SMWC's forums quite a bit. I just want to let you all know that if ever I come off as harsh, I still care about you all. You guys are great.

(Avatar by http://reyleias.tumblr.com/, butchered by me)
I think we all knew that levelengine would get MotM sooner or later. Congratulations, dude. I've only played one of your hacks (The Way of the M) but I can attest to its quality... and difficulty.


congrats, you. I knew you'd get member of the month sooner or later, glad it finally happened! Good luck with your projects, my friend! Good luck!!!
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Congrats for the nomination! I agree that you did and are doing a very good job with the temp hacks sections. Keep going!
Well, actually the remoderation's almost done. I've got Big Boo's Revenge on my eye; looks easy enough to be a break from playing Anikiti, but is going to take a while.
Excellent work levelengine, you work very hard, and this is definitely well deserved. Keep trucking!
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