making this thread because i want to place a little bit higher than worst world like last time, so give some feedback please!

screenies:



here's the level, and again please give me feedback on how to make it better!

Can you post a .bps cause I'm lazy? Haha

So for starters, the bright orange background doesn't look great. I assume you're using layer 2? Try including a layer 3 background, which also works with layer 2. You can download them here.

Once you have them, put them into an exgfx file and click this , and follow this tutorial.

Unless you want to use the layer 3 itself in the level. I would make the background completely black at least, it will look better than the orange. Maybe make it completely black and add some starts on layer 1.

I also assume that you are using the donut bridges as a sort of wheel for a moving platform, but there are tiles that would work better as wheels, in my opinion. Specifically, check out GFX file 1B, which is used for the hill backgrounds, but they can be used to make circular objects in map16.

Open up the super gfx bypass and use the map16 editors to add it into map16. I think some real wheels would look a lot better than the donut bridges.

i did post .bps file, it's just in the link i put

also, thanks for the advice on the graphics. i made the bg bright orange for a sorta sunset motif in the opening. i think i'll dull the orange a bit add some hills + a sun in layer 3. the donut bridge blocks were used because they're made of wood. i'll see what i can do about it, since the bridges obviously aren't completely circular

palette here looks like an OG gameboy game

unless that was the intent it would imo benefit from being a bit less monochromatic

@palerider: never realized it looked like that, huh. not sure what to do about that though, maybe make it a tad darker?

alright, so after complaints of an admittedly empty bg i've decided to add some layer 3 hills. not sure about the palettes though, should i just have the mountains or have some dynamic shadowed ones? leaning a bit to the latter, it looks nicer.


reference images

Much better! It looks significantly better with those actual hills. Nice work.


Now... on to the palette. Don't let this be discouraging, but I suggest that you start over completely. 100% start over, like make everything vanilla smw palettes again.

Now, the tricky thing about sunsets is that a gradient is almost necessary for them to actually look like decent sunsets, but since you're using a mixture of these ghost tilesets and stuff, it really doesn't give off a sunset feel. Instead, it kinda just looks like you made the sky orange. So I would start by scrapping the palette, unless you would like to make a gradient, in which case I can point you to a tutorial or just tell you how here. I know you want to make it look like a sunset, but it's really hard to pull that off, and the black background doesn't work with making it look like a sunset because the foreground is colored.

So, now you have your vanilla palettes right? Now, I would stay away from orange and make the sky black with stars added, because I think right now that would make for the best looking BG. In order to do that, disable for a sec and click and change the first option to rope 2. Now, you should be able to access stars in whatever gfx you have in your level, and you can make it a nighttime level, which would go well with the ghost tilesets and castle sprites in my opinion. Once the background is night time, make the hills a very dark shade of blue or green, or honestly, you could just keep the blue hills the way they are (it would look better than what they currently look like).

As for the foreground and ghost house tiles on the contraption thingy, make the foreground the regular smw palette but maybe change the green shading in the grass slightly? When in doubt, keep the original smw palette because the original palette usually looks better than a lot of palette combinations, unless they're done well.

As for the rolling contraption, the donut bridges indeed don't look anything like wheels, and it really wouldn't hurt to completely get rid of them. Also, I would keep the ghost house tiles brown, because they look best when brown, they don't really look great while orange.

i was gonna find some playtesters on the vldc irc channel but i ended up having my free time eaten up by other stuff and i forgot

BUT i still did some notable changes to this level! it's (hopefully) less ugly, more involved, and fun for the whole family, including grandma!

new screens:


castle is still monochromatic, because i have decided that it is in actuality a reference to the game boy classic Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle. please understand

here's the link

I know it's a little too late to say that, but your .bps file from newest link that you put in your submission doesn't work. I always get message "This patch is not intended for this ROM.". Luckily your DROPBOX version from first link works. So if it's still possible, send working .bps to Vitor Vilela.