I have been working on my hack "Mario Hard On" from time to time. Though not much work has been done since I last worked on this diligently, I thought it would nice to put out a bare-minimum demo that shows the idea of the hack and what to expect from it.

What IS Mario Hard On?
Mario Hard On is my hack that aims to provide a variety of largely unrelated levels that are challenging yet simple. This hack spawned from the numerous attempts I have done in the past to create a hack, but have failed to go through due to incredibly tedious work that comes with creating an ambitious "chocolate" hack. Mario Hard On is my simplified take on creating a hack: use vanilla sources to its potential, while using outside resources to provide fresh, creative gameplay. Mario Hard On also takes levels from numerous past works, namely from contests and failed hacks. All levels will be challenging, but not unfair. I hope I'd succeed in that. The plan is to also have a boss at the end of almost every level.

What is in this Demo?
As I mentioned above, I have not worked on this much for a while, so this demo only has very few things in it. There is only one completely playable level, and two levels that are completely finished aside from its end. There are three other playable levels in the demo, but all three are unfinished. There are several unplayable levels that are inserted, but I deleted them in this demo. I'll talk about them later.

Only Three Real Levels? What's the Pont?
The point of this demo is to show what to expect from this hack, as well as show the potential of this hack. I would also like to catch the attention of people who will be willing to help and contribute to something.

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The Playable Levels
Full:
But Also Hammers

The only completely finished level. It was specifically made for this hack.

JUST NETS

A port and remake of my VLD6 level, FISH NETS. This level is the NETS area, and is now separated from its FISH side. There is no boss yet at the end, but the placeholder should hint at what's to come.

PURE FISH

The fish section of FISH NETS. Largely the same, aside from the aesthetics. Like its former sister level, PURE FISH does not have a proper boss yet, and only has a placeholder.

Unfinished:
Stroll

My unfinished HLDC 2014 entry. A majority of the level is done, but gimmick was far too tedious, so I did not submit it. I plan to overhaul the gimmick while keeping the main idea of the level.

Groundless

A level without ground. The level is currently very empty and rough, but it should be clear on its gimmick.

Hostel 1

Now separated into 5 different levels, Hostel 1 (name tbd) is the first room of the original Hostel level from the 2013 VLDC7. It was not playable in the compilation hack. Hostel will be a world in itself, btw!

Turbulent Tides

Originally a level for SMWCP2. Never got around finishing it. Currently has placeholder graphics.

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The Unplayable Levels
Levels are unplayable due to problems in porting and/or general buggyness. Screenshots are not what they will look like in-game.

Buttermilk Sky

My 2011 secret santa level for Kenny. One of my first levels, and it was quit complex too. It had multiple midways, and a Normal Mode and Hard Mode. I spared the hack of normal mode and inserted the hard mode version. Because this was a highly chocolate level, porting it to a largely vanilla hack caused issues. There's also the fact I made this in 2011, so I'd have to overhaul some ugly level design.

Project 2

The second level of one of my failed hacks, A Super Mario Project.

24hos

My 3rd 24hos submission. It was the one where you keep a level's sprites and make new objects around it.

Radical

The first level to my unfinished 12 Days submission.

Cryptic Graveyard

The second level of my first hack, Super Mario: Bowser World.

Cloud Forward
A buggy contest level. Autoscroll on a level made up of cloud tiles that are being eaten by Piranha Plants. ROM file got corrupted, so I'd have to redo it from scratch.

Hostel 2/3/4/5 and Hostel?
The rest of Hostel is simply not inserted yet, as well as the newest Hostel from VLDC8. Since both levels use the same MAP16 tiles, porting Hostel(?) is gonna be a pain.

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BIG DOWNLOAD LINK

I hope to hear feedback! I would really like to hear your thoughts on the levels! Also, if you're interested in helping out, hit me up some time. I don't specifically have a need for help right now, aside from sprites, but I know I'll be needing some support in the future.

So ya. This is my C3 thread. A barely demonstration of a barely made hack but hey, a managed to make a long post about it!

Releasing some graphics I made for my older hacks.




Originally made for SMWCP2, it went unused. I used it in A Super Mario Project, as well. Also include the colorful blocks in the first two screenshots.

Click Me To Download!

I'll edit this post to add some other graphics. I can't find them right now, unfortunately, and I have to leave soon.

I'm also working on adding another playable level (or two) to the demo. So stay tuned for that!

I think it's a cool thing to recycle old, unfinished levels and revamp them for new hacks, so no work goes to waste.

I've given a try to all the levels in the demo and beat most (but I mostly paid attention to the two that are finished). On the nets level, I've had a hard time with timing some carrot lifts. It was a hard level overall, but the short length made it fair enough. The hammers level was enjoyable too, but I didn't really get to beat the boss (if it wasn't this late I would've kept trying D:) - the hammer dodging gets a little intense near the ending and a powerup right before the boss room would certainly have been nice.

So far I like where this is going - levels that are challenging but not tedious/too long. I'm also liking the way you're integrating (semi) vanilla stuff in your levels making up to nice gimmicks. The no ground level sounds like a really neat idea, but yeah, it still needs more!



Oh and splitting Hostel in an entire world is a good choice I suppose




Also neat graphics!

This looks good, I'll give it a try right now and see how it is.

Edit: I can't seem to play it as the patch doesn't work on my clean SMW rom?

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End of this message.

Which carrot lifts?



Hmm. I'll see what I can do. I used to have a power up before the boss, but it made it far too easy as you can tank through the boss. I can probably make the last onslaught of hammers more manageable.



Thanks! After I finish up PURE FISH I'm tackling Groundless next, so I could post an update on that soon!



The original level takes about 9 minutes to finish not blind. So ya I decided people would like it better if I split it up.


Thanks!



You must use FLIPS for bps files.

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I've finally made PURE FISH playable! Fixed its issues after spending a day working on it. The level is largely unchanged from its past iteration, so it might be a little on the bad side of design, since the level is largely why my VLDC6 entry wasn't any higher than 27th place. There's also a placeholder boss at the end.

Loving your first hack's name.

Ah yeah. That jump. I'll take munchers out. I thought that waiting during that part would be manageable, but I have to say I've died many a times from that jump. I'll probably pull the wall down to replace the munchers though.