The First Mad Scientist ASM Contest - RESULTS

'Bout the download link for the bosses, are they in .ips or .asm format? 'Cuz I can't download on the phone. I'd be disappointed if they weren't in .asm format.

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I think the solution to the GFX issue would either be:

1. Providing it before the round starts (this could work if the task was 'recreate an interesting enemy from a certain game', since you could get someone to rip the GFX for literally every standard monster and take what ones are needed from that).

2. Have the ExGFX requested anonymously, from a central account. So it'd list all the characters people are making bosses/sprites/whatever based on, as well as frames needed, and people who are good at art could then post the ExGFX files in the topic.

For the complexity side, maybe making a 'normal' sprite could have worked out better than a boss. I'm sure you'd get a lot more entries if the goal was simply 'make a interesting enemy you might see in say, an ice or desert level' rather than 'make a boss'.



They're in both formats.

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As for Mario's Nightmare Quest? Well, it's currently on Fusion Gameworks, ROM Hacking.net or the GCN at the moment.

No. Just no.

If I was to disqualify entries for obfuscating code, I would made it clear in the rules. And the entry would not even be in the voting.

And I'd end up disqualifying Alcaro's round 0 entry too because it modifies original SMW code and likely won't work on a hack one without additional changes.

Either way, it'd be a dumb decision. What will you gain by disqualifying someone just because he obfuscated his code? The proofed that he made his code. The code is still insertable and should work normally in other ROMs (the code is decompressed to fixed RAM range, therefore there should be no problem with addressing mode; didn't test though, but that does not matter).



He's an asshole just because you 'never heard of that guy'? That gives me a feeling that you guys would just say instead "what a clever way of protecting and hiding his code!".

Regardless of what was your meaning anyway, he's not an asshole for obfuscating his code in any way. At all.

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In other news, first of all I'm sorry for delaying the results too much. Unfortunately I got pretty frustrated with how this contest ended up and college really pushed me recently so I ended up completely forgetting this.

I'm not sure if I will be doing a new one any soon. This one was pretty much a complete fiasco. It made me clear that our ASMers don't wanna solve open challenges and propose something that everyone can use. Either that or the awards weren't that appealing, I guess.

And since when a boss challenge is considered "too hard"? -- There's many things in the ASM world that is harder than simply making a boss.

Hence the boss in Round 1. Originally on my planning, Round 2 and 3 were gonna be totally technical and "free to do whatever", respectively. Technical because it would involve testing technical skills of the contestant, like writing code using some specific PPU feature or enhancement chip. And "free to do whatever" the contestant would just be free to code best they can do.

Either way, don't forget that you all, top three winners, can pick some free games. SMWC right now has over 100 games from 3DS to Steam. I will bug K3fka about the game picking details.

And don't forget that Ruberjig now has name color for six months.

And yes, I told you guys that the awards on this contest would be the best ones possible. Shame on you, for not submitting anything.

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Obfuscating your code in a contest like this where everyone is eager to try out and use the entries is definitely an assholeish thing to do, no amount of "no it's not!!" from you will change that.


Also making a boss isn't hard for anyone super great at ASM, but you have to keep SOME level accessibility here, you can't expect everyone to be on your level.
I can guarantee you that if people knew the level of competence required, 5 people max would've even signed up to begin with.

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dude everyone who isn't you agrees that bosses came way to early in the competition

Probably should have tested it. No, it will not work an any other ROM. Those other tables and functions in the sprite are referenced statically, so unless the sprite is inserted into the exact same location as in his ROM, it will almost certainly crash. Good luck making that happen.


No. I've never heard of him. My first impressions of him are that he is an asshole.

And I would never use the term "protecting code".


I was under the impression that including the source was to promote an air of openness, like in idol. Why even have that as a requirement if you can just include a source file that says "LOLNO", call it "Robirdo.asm", and have it be equally as useful as what he submitted? If you didn't want the code to be open, just have people submit IPS/BPS patches, like in level design contests.


Did he modify the ROM without including source code for it? If so, then yeah, it probably should have been disqualified, since that clearly broke the rules.


I'm actually fine with boss round 2. Seems pretty easy to me, I just wish there were a way to manage the problem with having no ideas, which seemed to be the real issue.

so i guess real life doesnt exist?

i really would have loved to complete my entry (not alone on this), but things happen that are out of our control. you yourself said you had college shenanigans

the contest was just run at a really bad time, that's it. no need to blame anyone

-Not everyone who knows some ASM is also maining as a programmer or even working as a programmer. For some people, yes, coding a boss IS hard (heck, for some people, coding even a simple sprite is hard). It's actually totally fine to have a more challenging round, but only for later rounds. You can't just assume that because something is easy for you, it's also easy for everyone else.
-That aside, difficulty isn't the only problem here. Coding a boss arguably takes more time than most other things, let alone coding a boss that is actually any fun. Real life is a thing, finding ideas and motivation is too. I know from my own experience that the larger a task is, the harder it is to find the motivation to even get started with it. For some, that's something they can't overcome.



That would have been an even bigger disaster. I mean, how many people here do you expect to actually know something about those things? Like, about SA-1, SuperFX or whatever other thing there may be that isn't very commonly used in SMW hacking. Now if it's only a minor new thing, something like "make a neat gimmick using BG mode 5" or something like that, that would be acceptable, I guess, since you could learn about that stuff rather quickly, but actually learning about an enhancement chip or something even more advanced would take a considerable amount of time (and again, motivation). I personally wouldn't have seen any hope for that one. To put this into perspective: you could as well say "program your own server using Python" or "program a PacMan clone running on an ARM CPU". Yes, those examples are a bit exaggerated, but for people who don't already know about these things, they're simply out of reach, and the time they would need to learn about them wouldn't really justify an actual participation.

If a contest like this ever happens again (which I hope, because the idea itself is still great) and you happen to host it again, I suggest that you at least speak with two or three other people first before you set the rounds in stone. I don't mean to be offending or anything, but I think your perspective on what experience and talents you expect an average ASM coder to have is quite blurry, you seem a bit out-of-touch with the average SMW hacker. Don't forget that not everyone is born with a natural talent for coding or can afford to invest all their time into just a single hobby.

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It's difficult to think of a good mario boss.

The only problem with Mario bosses is that just about all of them are easy, but outside of rehashed ones(birbo, boom boom, koopalings..) they aren't bad, personally I liked smb2 and YI ones.

But if we are talking about custom/non-official bosses then thats completely different story.

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The code gets called when birdo died.
Conversely, thought so why.

I felt good at all when I was treated like asshole by you. Would you say more again?

I don't care what you suddenly said "spirit of the rule". It is a manner and is not the rule of this contest.
When I submit the source which other people cannot use, there is not the rule to be disqualified.
Since my submission works with this code, it is right source.


And this rule allowed what kind of ASM may be used.

If rule revision is carried out, it should be carried out at the submission period or the next round.

I thought that might have been the case. I was far too lazy to actually beath the boss while I was testing. I didn't figure anyone actually wanted it anyways, so I didn't bother putting that much work into it. A cursory glance and I still can't find it though. Is it called from another location, or did I do one of my conversions wrong in the tables or something?


If someone calls you an asshole, saying that it makes you feel bad is not a very good argument. They think you are an asshole, you feeling bad is not a thing they are super worried about.

If you enter a contest and see a rule that requires you to submit source, with the intention of the sources being released publicly, and the first thing you think is "How can I stop what I made from being useful to anyone else?", you are being an asshole, and I won't apologize for saying so.

The point was that whatever is submitted to this contest is usable by people.
You have to realize that you're just trying to abuse some loophole to keep your code to yourself (which hasn't really worked out now, has it).
Vitor defended you in the assumption that the code is still usable, just not readable, but it clearly isn't. I don't know how he even verified that the code is the real code considering he likely wouldn't have been able to insert it, which I'm assuming was also a point for that rule.

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And even then, you still can disassamble the code so all what it did is to delay the usability for other people and yeah, it already happened so it pretty much did nothing.