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OCD about my MAP16 being organised?

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This may not be the place to post this, but I will anyway.

I think I'm a little OCD about my MAP16 pages being neatly organised. Here's a MAP16 page for a hack I'm working on:



I've looked at MAP16 pages from other hacks (Because I'm just weird like that), and they seem so disorganised. I know having stuff organised is a good thing, but is it eccentric or weird?
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It's a matter of preference on how you organize your placement of Map16 tiles. Being organized means you can use it as a single object or something. The disorganized ones are because of the limitations that the user may have (VLDC), or trying to save up space.
I'd argue that most people aim for good organization (you're certainly not the only one to); it's just that as time goes on it becomes less of a priority, and people tend to get hasty and messy in order to just "get things over with".


 
Organization is a good thing. A lot of Map 16 foreground tilesets I download come neatly organized so it makes things easier. When I insert custom blocks I generally try to keep them sorted to one page.
Speaking from experience, I can say that organization is certainly a good thing. Heck, I even duplicated some blocks when I couldn't find what I have inserted when my MAP16 tiles were a mess.
Yes, I like things to be organised with my Map16, but I don't usually make a big deal out of it. It's not a big deal for me either way, as long as it isn't a huge mess I'm OK.
This is exactly how I organize my tiles, because I really hate it when there's different tiles on different Map16 pages.
Honestly, it's just a matter of preference. My map16 is a bit messy, mostly because there is almost no space I might have, and it's up to the people to choose which page they would place the objects on. Although organization is a good thing, it's not a big deal if anything isn't organized.
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Not only do I want my tiles organized, I want them efficient.

I made a map16 optimizer tool back in the day that shoved everything into as small a space as possible, including using page 2's wackiness and removing duplicate tiles.
I'd really like my map16 to be organized, but since I rarely have all my tiles set up when I start designing I'm usually too lazy to put them together nicely. The result is this.

I always made sure my Map16 was organized much like in the OP, but I also drew every single tileset I made to use the same exact Map16 locations and properties so I didn't waste space, as trivial as it was. So yes, I can understand completely. It's not a bad thing though because bad organization is one of several major reasons why projects fail.

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Originally posted by Counterfeit
I made to use the same exact Map16 locations and properties so I didn't waste space, as trivial as it was. So yes, I can understand completely. It's not a bad thing though because bad organization is one of several major reasons why projects fail.



I wish more people actually did this (unfortunately, I'm not one of them). In addition to the organization, but looking to see how a level looks in a different tileset is that much quicker.

That's actually a good idea. I've thought of doing that for my (possible) hack, but I suppose it would be harder for me because I don't draw my own tilesets, so I'd have to rearrange the graphics files. I prefer to keep things as organized as possible, and I also prefer to use certain pages for specific things. Custom blocks, for instance, always go within one specific Map16 page (and sometimes two), and I might one for pipes in various palettes, one for other global foreground tiles, etc.

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Since I'm kind of a retard, I will forget what does what each time I open lunar magic. So it's best that I keep everything organized so that I can make heads or tails of my stuff and there's minimal backtracking.
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It is always better to have a neatly organized Map16. Unfortunately, my Map16 is a horrible mess because I tend to create new tiles according to what I need at the moment.


I know this is kind of considered bumping but I do have something to contribute to the thread so hope it's not problem. (Rules have been less strict on this as well so yeah.)

I'd just like to say that this thread has taught me how important it is to keep things organized. Usually my Map16 pages are really messy and disorganized. When working with Vanilla hacks my Map16 being messy is not much of a hassle as there aren't too many tile sets to work with and I don't even end up using half of the Foreground pages. With chocolate hacks on the other hand I do tend to use a lot of custom graphics. With my current hack Super Mute World Episode 2 I've made the mistake of trying to fit two separate tile sets on a single page to try and save room. Not only that, a lot of the times I didn't have all the graphics I needed for the level so I'd end up adding extra tiles to the page and if I ran out of room I'd end up putting those extra tiles on another page other than the one with the tile set I'm using. Let's just say I've ended up accidentally overwriting tiles on more then one occasion because of this. Things basically just got so messy that it was no longer bearable to work with which lead to one of the reasons I decided to restart the hack. Now I'm trying the hardest I can to keep my Map16 organized. Now every tile set goes on a different page and I make sure to have all the graphics I need for the level before starting it.

Keeping things organized does come a long way.
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to be honest, i do not find organization a bad thing; i find it a good thing indeed.

sometimes, when i download other people's graphics, their map16 files might come disorganized, and i get slightly agitated and it gets a tad more difficult to insert them in hacks.

i find it a good thing: organization.
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Well I like when it's organized, simply because it make it easier to make your level. Not because it look nice, just because it's more efficient. I doesn't have to be perfect, but I want it to not be confused. For example I ripped manually a FG and ordered it as such (top rows):


It's perfect here.

Even my page 3, my vanilla misc page isn't a total mess, as the tile of the same functions are close to each other:

It's acceptable for me.

However I've started looking around at romhacking of Kirby's Adventure, and the tiles are so unorganized, I hate it:

For example if you want to make a green square of 3*3 tiles, you need from left to right, up to down: tile 40, 58, 68, 48, 60, 70, F7, F6, FF.
It's a pain to use. So if in lunar magic I ever get a ExGFX of a FG who is unorganized like that, I will try to organize the tiles in the map16 editor before using them (but thankfully almost all the ExGFXs on smwcentral are not messy like in Kirby).
Except if it some graphics I will use once and only once for a very short level, then I don't mind if it's not correctly organized.
I try to keep my tiles organised, because it's much easier to look for a tileset. It reduces confusion and it's also more eye-friendly.
Originally posted by yogui
However I've started looking around at romhacking of Kirby's Adventure, and the tiles are so unorganized, I hate it:

For example if you want to make a green square of 3*3 tiles, you need from left to right, up to down: tile 40, 58, 68, 48, 60, 70, F7, F6, FF.
It's a pain to use. So if in lunar magic I ever get a ExGFX of a FG who is unorganized like that, I will try to organize the tiles in the map16 editor before using them (but thankfully almost all the ExGFXs on smwcentral are not messy like in Kirby).

Something highlighted my attention about the image, and the tile numbers you gave. First of all, the image itself appears to be split into 4 equal square parts, and the numbers end with 0 or 8 (with exception for bottom tiles). That suggests to me that the image is indeed organized, just not in a way you think it is.

You see, there is absolutely no layout information stored in the ROM (why there would be, it's not needed for the game). However, everything makes me think that the layout wasn't 16x16, but rather 8x32. The editor's author assumed that the layout is 16x16, because it seemed logical for the programmer (it's a square, not a rectangle). Quick ImageMagick script let me get the real layout. To avoid stretching the page vertically, I put 16x16 here, but you can see the actual result here.



This shows that the layout is logical (through I have to admit, I probably did some mistake in this image, but I'm too lazy to find it right now). The reason why the bottom tiles aren't as ordered is, as I believe, that they were added later in the development of the game (those aren't used as commonly as other green tiles).
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