24hoSMW #13 ~ RESULTS!!

A light 24 hours later, it's finally time for the contest's results! Without further ado, let's dive right into it!!!


In 3rd place,

NerDose, with a glimmer of hope

In 2nd place,

Stivi, with COSMIC JUMPS

And finally, in 1st place,

Far, with Refraction Airway

, DM or PM  Noivern to claim one of the following



Here are the full results:


There were no disqualifications this time around, so if your name is in here, but not in the top 3, then fret not, as you'll receive a wonderful, seafoamy trophy!


You can find the score summaries here.

Here are breakdowns for each individual judge's comments.  Anorakun was supposed to be our backup judge, but he went through and judged every level before the rest of us were done, so it didn't feel right not to include his scores.
Anorakun | bebn legg | DeppySlide | K.T.B. | NopeContest | patcdr

All the scores should match up, but if there are any discrepancies (which there shouldn't be), consider the spreadsheet linked above as the correct source.

Trophies will be handed out shortly.

Thank you all for participating, and we look forward to the next contest! We'll take all your feedback from the discussion thread, and any you may want to post here, into account, so don't be shy to give some comments if you haven't already!

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Nice to see the results out! I got a so-so placement this time, which I expected because I'm bad at level design on a timer and therefore tend to focus on visuals which don't weigh in as much.

(also neat how I got the #1 spot in the judging order. It might have put my entry at a disadvantage depending on how flaky first impressions are, but in any case I don't have to ctrl-f to read judge comments. :>)

Congrats to NerDose, Stivi and Far!

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i can't believe im still on a top 10 streak
congrats to the rest of the top 10 and top 3 lol, this was a tough theme to work with

Im still shocked I won this contest. This was a really fun theme for me personally. Hopefully everyone else had just as much fun as I had!

Huge congrats to the winners, especially . I had actually never heard of them before this contest, yet the moment I played the level I was blown away! Even aside from that one, though, there was a huge load of levels here that were super fun and well-designed; for as many complaints there were about the "vague"-ness of the theme, I'd say you guys did exceedingly well with it overall.




I tried to make my notes as detailed as possible to mitigate confusion about why I scored certain levels the way I did. I apologize in advance to anyone who dislikes reading the "wordier" feedbacks, but I'm hoping to have added a bit of variety to the styles of judging notes that were given. That sad, there are a few things I want to address, especially considering some of the feedback that was sent to the judges in the Discord channel:

1. Every single judge read every single readme that was provided with the levels. Some of us didn't actually read those txts until after playing, so I admit that there were some levels where our comments possibly don't reflect that perfectly. In my notes, where I say something like "I don't see how this connects to the level", what I'm really trying to say is "the connection is vague to the point where I wouldn't have seen the connection if it wasn't for the txt being there in the first place".

2. Reading through my comments, I can also see how some might get the (false) impression that I ranked certain levels lower purely because they were "too hard". This also isn't entirely true; Some of my favorite levels were also levels that I thought were among the hardest of the bunch, but again, I can see I failed to make that super clear in some instances, which might have contributed to some of the drama that resulted from all of this. If I said I had a problem with the level's difficulty, I'm usually complaining about it feeling "unfair" to some degree, or just annoying in general. If anyone dislikes the way I interpreted particular setups or gimmicks, then I'm sorry for that - but it's also worth noting that the judges communicated with each other pretty closely on some of the more problematic levels, and we tended to agree on a lot of the philosophies that caused certain levels to rank low for various reasons.

Quick reminder that everything above applies to my scores/comments and doesn't necessarily apply to every other judge.




Ahem .. now with that out of the way, I'll just re-iterate: As a whole, I think the entrants collectively did a very good job with the theme, and I had a good time playing and judging them. Pat on the back to anyone who entered despite the admittedly daunting theme!

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Twitter
The handomest people in the world are ones who follow my Twitch

Thank you so much guys for third place, It feels so good to make progress as a level designer.
Every contest I've been in so far was a valuable experience: I always learn from my mistakes and get helpful advice from the judges.
I'm so happy to be part of this community

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I suck at ASM and AMK

My Youtube

KLDC 2021

KLDC 2022

OLDC 2021

MY NEW VANILLA KAIZO HACK

I had fun making the level (well, more all the asm parts, the level was very rushed at the end lol) and that's what counts, but also getting a high place is satisfying. I'm glad I came up with this particular idea for the level or, knowing me, it would've probably ended up as a super generic low gravity or darkness gimmick level. And of course congratulations to the top places!

Got better than I though with my rushed entry with unoriginal gimmick where I didn't had time to do a second half.
Still, I could have got slightly better but two judges didn't get the gimmick that coins add light. I didn't wanted to explain the gimmick in the intro text, I wanted for the players to discover it themselves when they play the level but not every players are the same, it's understandable.

Very nice of patcdr to include the youtube link of the stream and bps links in his judge comments. In the youtube after my level, you say that this gimmick probably use 6 lines of ASM. Well a bit more, and it also use a custom block for the coins, since there's no coins counter as I used a baserom without status bar for my level.
The reason it stop at 01 darkness and not 00 (full dark) is because dying while darkness is at 00 would glitch the game (it does that pixelate effect and I didn't know how to fix it).
The levelASM also restore the brightness to full when you enter a pipe, so it also doesn't glitch next sublevel.
Here is the ASM I quickly made, feel free to use and modify it: levelASM - customBlock


I will try harder next contest (if I can have more free time to work on my level!!!)

Congratulation to NerDose, Stivi and Far.

can't sleep so I came crawling back here to be part of the little bit of hype and debate alright.

I'm just super glad I made it to 20th place mainly thanks to the creativity score, I was horrified to see the streamers in trouble with the design's relative jank, so in the end it's good... I once again receive the comment the level is unfocused... Yet, story of my life. Hope I'll learn "focus" one day.

I'm glad, some of my favourite entries got a good rank, namely A Glimmer of Hope, Light Sleepers, Firework Factory, mario commits arson

Congratulations everyone, I had a blast discovering the entries as much as theming mine.

For the first time in such contest, I'm happy to be 32nd.
The judges were well rounded and had a lot to say for each and every entry.

The theme was pretty okay, nothing too vague but nothing to specific.

My level was relatively simple in design and structure while some other levels (like the top ranking ones) took a more complex approach and had an idea they could run with.

Congratulations to everyone who participated, judges, and the people who organized this contest.


Lots of love, S1Z2

This was a fun contest, congrats on all the entrants!

Just some notes for my commentary: any of the entries I marked as "Brutal" difficulty I had to use tool assists for (fortunately that only applied to about five entries). Also, some comments have an additional "aside" listed. Just wanna be clear that those don't affect the scoring at all.

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This was the first contest I judged for this community, and I had a blast doing it!

I feel it's worth saying that regardless of placements, this is a fine batch of levels that were made for this contest. There was a ton of love and creativity that showed in each and every one, and you should all feel proud for what you've made.

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Congratulations!

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List Soundtrack - List Hacks

Mega Man X3 OSTs

This is my first time reviewing levels, so yeah, I didn't write so much. As usual, would be nice if you leave your feedback about the themes, judges and contest, in general, so we know where to improve in the next version. We had a great variety of levels, and while some I enjoyed more than others, it was a very fun theme.

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I congratulate everyone. I couldn't use the light theme very well, that's right. I guess it's because I'm a newbie in UberASM. Thank you to the judges for their comments.

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I couldn't find anything to write :| By the way my Youtube channel

Alright so, I wanna outline some of the stuff that was being talked about in the discord last night and offer my feedback to the judges and the contest runners about the theme and prerequisites for being able to judge a level impartially.

Regarding the theme.
I see a lot of people saying the theme was too vague and couldn't be used creatively, and centering the blame for the reaction on that vagueness. I think that this isn't entirely true, while the theme definitely was a little bit vague and hard to use, it also feels like some of the judges had a distinctly close-minded interpretation, from the reviews I've seen at least one of the judges was trying to connect the use of the word light to the most obvious possible meaning, here's an example from a review of my level:

This is a misinterpretation of the theme, the theme which is explained in the readme I sent with my level. the readme said this about the theme:
"You are LIGHTing the house on fire with your careless fireball throwing."
This is the reason why it looks to some people like the judges didn't read the readme, and why people felt like their level was scored low unfairly, the scores themselves are not a problem (Hell, I got a 14/20 in creativity) but when it looks like the judge didn't bother to really understand how the theme was used, people are going to feel like they got a lower placement unfairly.

Regarding Judge Prerequisites
Another topic which I didn't expect to come up was the use of "obscure glitches" in levels. This lead to a discussion about how much should a judge know about SMW if they are to judge a contest. I don't have a clear answer to what exactly should or shouldn't count as an obscure glitch, but considering how long SMWC has been around, I think it's entirely fair to expect the judges to have a fair amount of familiarity with the game. In a lot of high-ranking levels, there is likely to be a lot of things which someone who's not very well-versed in SMW hacking might understand, it's completely natural to expect some level of knowledge considering how explored the game's engine has been in the past what, 15 years? A judge shouldn't be someone who hasn't played enough SMW to understand at least a few of the more well known glitches, but the real question is: Where should the line be drawn? I don't exactly know. If you ask me, I feel like a lot of the glitches used in some of the most well-known hacks should be considered common knowledge (at least for someone who wants to judge a contest), JUMP and JUMP1/2 are both pretty technical hacks, and even if you haven't played them, JUMP1/2 at least got played by multiple bigger streamers so it's likely that most people have at least seen them.

I agree that judges should be skilled and experienced with the smw "meta". However in this case I find not understanding a setup the creator's fault, not the judges'. Introducing game elements is an important level design principle and if people who've been in this community for years can't figure out a section they have the right to call it confusing.

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I suck at ASM and AMK

My Youtube

KLDC 2021

KLDC 2022

OLDC 2021

MY NEW VANILLA KAIZO HACK

Congrats to Far, Stivi, and NerDose! I played a bunch of entries and I liked pretty much every entry. It's unfortunate that I was too busy to participate myself, but maybe next time. Also want to thank the judges for their time of course. Judging is never easy; we appreciate your hard work (and the quick turnaround). patcdr's judge sheet was also wonderfully organized.

I didn't participate so I don't really have any personal stakes in this, but from an outside observation, I do have to agree with Sancles wholeheartedly. I noticed a couple things that I think would be nice to improve on for next year, and just a few general things that the staff could maybe discuss.

1. I think the vague themes we've had for 24hr #13 and #12 have been nice and all, but I kinda miss the creative 24hr contests of the past (i.e. make a level with an original smw level's sprites intact, or make a title screen using vanilla movements). I think it would be a good idea to alternate between the two types of contest as it goes on. Perhaps one year we can have a more vague, one-word theme, and the next year have a specific challenge we have to take on?

2. I think it would be nice to experiment with a 48hr format. Just a thought; I know it reduces some of the thrill of finishing a level in 1 day, but it may raise participation and allow some much needed polish. Curious what people's thoughts are.

3. I was a bit confused about the judge interpretation of the theme, like Sancles. I was originally under the impression that levels that adhered to the theme would receive full points for theme adherence, and creativity would be based simply on how creative the level is and how creatively it implemented its theme. However, it seemed like a lot of levels received low points in theme for not having a strict enough adherence to what the judge's preconceived notion of what the theme was. I noticed firework factory, Sancle's level, and Jupi's level received less points because they used "fire", whereas levels that used light in the literal sense received more full points. Would be nice to have some consistency or at least break out the creativity rubric by theme (perhaps 15/15 for level creativity and 5/5 for theme creativity?)

4. Difficulty: this was a hot topic the other day but personally, I didn't find it as much an issue as the theme interpretation issue. I think only a couple hard levels got shafted, but also this is just something that hard level designers have come to expect. However, I still think that being a judge does require a bit of objective reasoning, as well as clear and concise use of the categories. For example, if a level is clearly well designed, but you didn't have fun with it, does it deserve a 2/20 in design? Or a 3/20? And in addition, should enjoyment affect the creativity score? In my mind, a level that is well designed but too hard for you to enjoy should receive at least a few more points than 2/20. I think the same could be said for levels with creative gimmicks that didn't execute them as well as they could. You can't change the way you feel about a level, but I don't think that should hinder the judging process from a purely technical/level design standpoint.

5. Glitch use: not much to say about this one cause you either know a glitch or you don't. I think having at least 1 or 2 judges on the roster who are familiar with glitches would be beneficial.

6. Category consistency: I mentioned this a while ago in the discussion thread, but I don't really see why the weights of the categories can't be the same as VLDC, CLDC, or any other contest we have on the site. I get that the 50/50 score is easier to manage, but if we wanted to reflect VLDC's weights, we could just make it 30/30 for design, 15/15 for creativity, and 5/5 for aesthetics. Or perhaps split up the creativity category so it's 10/10 for level creativity and 5/5 for theme creativity (for 24hr contests that have themes).

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On a positive note, the judge comments were some of the most organized and thorough I can remember, especially from all 6 judges. I appreciate the consistency and organization a lot. The writeups were interesting to read, and I'm super impressed with how quick the turnaround for results was too. Not that there's anything wrong with taking longer, judges should take as much time as they need of course. So yeah. Thanks for the hard work all around!