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jakery

Guest

Metroid (alpha)

http://everybodyedits.com/games/PWJAEAAA

I had a vision where I would recreate the entire game of Metroid for NES as a playable EE level, using the Metroid World Map as my template.

http://www.nesmaps.com/maps/Metroid/Met … ateMap.png

After a little while I realized this wasn't going to work out quite as planned; I couldn't do a block-for-block recration because I would need a map at least 600x600 (!). Instead, I decided on a 1:2 scale map, but even that wasn't entirely possible because I'd still need 250 or 300 blocks wide and tall to make that work. So I started truncating repetitive areas from the Metroid map to make it all squeeze into a standard 200x200 level. First obstacle overcome. I did end up breaking this format and building some of the more "iconic" areas in their original 1:1 scale when I had room to do so.

The next challenge was making the level fun to play as an EE level, something I admit I am still working on. As a perfect recreation of Metroid, the map wasn't fun to play. I saw many users get stuck and quit on the big blue vertical tunnel because the jumps were too unforgiving, so I started "tweaking" the platforms to make it more EE-friendly.

The other thing that I can't do in EE is power-ups. One of the trademarks is powering up your character to allow her to reach new areas: Once you obtain bombs, you can blast through certain floors and walls. When you get the ice beam, you can freeze enemies and use them as stepping stones. You need find missiles to blast open red doors, and you'd better find at least three energy tanks before you try to kill either of the bosses, or you will die very fast.

Since I can't do power-ups, I'm using the coin door system as a substitute. Most people tend to get Bombs as their sixth item pickup in Metroid, so you need six coins to get through the coin doors that represent bombable blocks.

My level is "beatable" in its current form, although I've only finished the first area and created a skeleton of the final area. I ended up replacing part of the final level with a giant Metroid because it's not a Metroid level without a freaking Metroid in it.

What do you think so far? Is there anything that needs to be done differently? Suggestions for improvement?

Tips:
-Backtracking is necessary.

-"Construction" blocks are blocking unfinished areas. There's nothing worth seeing past them right now.

-Don't even try to cross the large acid pit at the top left of the world unless you have enough coins to activate the green bridge. In the real Metroid, if you tried you were rewarded with slow and unstoppable death.

-You're a woman. Just thought you'd like to know--the hero of the Metroid series is Samus Aran, a female bounty hunter.

Jamd

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

2 things to say:

use a 200x400 when you get it.

and on one of the last minis: |
                                                              |
                                                              |^
                                                              |^     is bad change it.
appart from that cool level!

EDIT 1: 300 POSTS!!!

EDIT 2: I challenge you to this in a 400x200 world: http://nesmaps.com/maps/Castlevania/Cas … 8aMap.html
;D

Last edited by Cthulhu (Mar 10 2011 9:53:10 am)

jakery

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

Thanks for the feedback. Regarding the 200x400 world: The original Metroid world is very square; doubling the world size horizontally only, in my opinion, would wreck the experience. (Also, I don't think I have the determination to scrap everything I've made so far and start over on a new map)

Good call on changing the vertical double-arrow in Mother Brain's chamber. I'll do that when I'm not at work.

I'm also interested in hearing an opinion from a fan of the original Metroid: Right now, Mother Brain looks more like Mother Red-Plus-Sign. The EE Tile set, being mostly solid squares only, doesn't allow me to draw Mother Brain in all her disgusting detail. Thoughts?

I'm slowly buying more coin block packs (when I started building the level I had zero), because I think it would be cool if you "kill" mother brain by collecting a final coin and making her disappear. Right now it's kind of a cop-out where you just travel underneath her to get to the escape shaft.
Response to edits:

1) Grats on 300.

2) Oh, WOW. It might be fun to make an EE level based off one of the NES Castlevanias, but I'd tear my hair out if I tried to make pixel art with that much detail. Challenge not accepted.

BEE

Member

Joined: 2015-03-14

Posts: 1,679

Re: Metroid (alpha)

I wish I knew more about metroid so I could give more feedback, but I can tell you that the colors look great and I like how you took advantage of the varying shades

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Chimi

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

This is a more fun-looking one.

Last edited by Chimi (Mar 10 2011 3:46:32 pm)

jakery

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

Well... how very crushing. Someone beat me to this.

http://everybodyedits.com/games/PWYAMAAA

Hell, now I don't know if I want to bother finishing mine.

Edit:

I just spoke to my awesome wife about it. She says, "there's room for more than one Metroid level." And she's right... that world is well-made but it's different from my vision. I'm continuing my build.

Last edited by jakery (Mar 10 2011 7:11:21 pm)

Bigbaddrag

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

looks awewome, only problem I see is when there are several people on at once, one of them could hit, say a green key, and someone who doesn't have enough coins to do it themselves can go through/get across. unfortunately, I can't think of how that can be fixed :/

Jamd

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

just place a coindoor on the other side

and tell me when you updated the map because i'd love to play it.

jakery

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

just place a coindoor on the other side

Good idea. I will... once I earn some more coindoors...

I'm halfway done with the skeleton of Norfair (the Purple area). I unblocked a tiny portion of it that I've finished.

To make sure I had room I started building out the skeleton of Ridley's lair (red/green, bottom-right corner). I only have space for about 30% of Ridley's lair in my EE map, which is fine by me; IMO Ridley's lair in Metroid was way too repetitive and drawn out; slimming it down will actually make it better.

I also started to consider how much backtracking players will be willing to do, vs how much backtracking NES Metroid forces you to do. Name any two linked areas in NES metroid, and there is exactly one elevator to travel between them.

Brinstar (Blue/Gold) <-> Norfair (Purple/Green)
Brinstar <-> Kraid (White/Blue, not built yet)
Brinstar <-> Tourian (Gray, final area)
Norfair <-> Ridley (Red/Green)

I'm going to get lots of rage-quitters if I don't install some coin-door-access shortcuts between the different major areas. Further, if I've just finished Kraid's area, and I need to get to Ridley next, this is my path:

Kraid -> Brinstar -> Norfair -> Ridley

That's a very long way to backtrack just to get to your next goal. On the NES this was somewhat tolerable because of the extra item pickups and exploration. In EE, this won't fly. Who says I can't make a tunnel connecting Kraid to Ridley? (I just need to have a coin door with a high enough number that you are required to "beat" one of the bosses to get to use the shortcut)

Last edited by jakery (Mar 11 2011 2:24:01 pm)

jakery

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

Nothing new built since last update but I seek advice:

To do this level according to my vision, I need a lot of coin doors. A lot of coin doors. I've been dumping most of my energy into buying more but I only have 30; almost 40. Any recommendations on how I can make the level work with this temporary limitation?

Also, my concern about the backtracking is growing. A good level design should be intuitive enough that the player has a good idea where to go next, without being directly told, "go this way." The early metroid games gave too few clues, and the newer games give too many clues. I might need to tinker with the path the player takes through the world.

Last edited by jakery (Mar 18 2011 12:23:13 pm)

kerred

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

Hey Jakery, I made the Metroid NES map, but I'd still like to see yours!     Keep at it

jakery

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

Hey Jakery, I made the Metroid NES map, but I'd still like to see yours!     Keep at it

Thanks for the karma.

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I think I know of a good compromise for the "where do I go next?" dilemma. Of course, the solution requires even more coin doors.
Each area requires a certain number of coins to access:
Brinstar (start area): 1
Norfair: ~6 (not apparent yet; I've got some obstacles to build)
Ridley: ~20
Kraid: ~30
Tourian: ~50
At the start of the level, outside the playable area, I'll have five "indicator" coin blocks, each surrounded by a square.

--- --- ---- ---- ---- |1| |6| |20| |30| |50| --- --- ---- ---- ----

Each one of the block areas will be color-coded by the area it represents. This lets the player know when areas are unlocked.

Example: When the 6-coin block disappears, the player sees it was inside the purple square. The player now knows that he can get into Norfair, the purple area of the map.

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Also, I'd love to work on this map more, but I can't do it at work...
And at home, I'm addicted to Borderlands at the moment.
(oh, and housework)

Edit: It's quitting time, and I'm such an effing dork that I'm going to go home and edit.

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Updates:

1) I've put in the coin block feature described above. It looks good. I'm also installing mini versions at all the area elevators.

2) I got some help from Pike270, who added some minigames to the blackout area of Tourian, and came up with the cool idea of having players travel inside the huge Metroid.

3) I fleshed out the uppermost part of Norfair. And I realized that this map is going to take forever to finish. Not only do I have little time to work on it, but I'm spending more time making sure it's true to the original map than I'm spending on actually building the level.

Last edited by jakery (Mar 24 2011 12:12:26 am)

jakery

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

Major progress:

I finished all of Norfair and Ridley's Lair.
I figured out a system of "coaxing" players to their next goal: Think E.T. picking up Reese's Pieces.

Updated coin access numbers:
Brinstar (start area): 1
Norfair: 8
Ridley: 28
Kraid: X
Tourian: 35

And as a "bonus," those who reach the winners' room get access to the skeleton of Kraid's lair, the last area I need to build.

Tako

Member

From: Memphis, Tennessee, USA

Joined: 2015-08-10

Posts: 6,663

Website

Re: Metroid (alpha)

Lol, I had no idea what you just said; but it's still a great level, so nothing else matters

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Yeah, well, you know that's just like, uh, your opinion, man.

jakery

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

Lol, I had no idea what you just said; but it's still a great level, so nothing else matters

Thanks.

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Update:

Skeleton of Kraid's hideout (bottom-left, blue & white) is finished. With that, the entire map's skeleton is complete.

...or at least, it would be, except I've decided to redo the entire area of Tourian (upper left corner, white and gray). I want to do a GIANT incarnation of Mother Brain...

...and that means I need a huge area to do the art:

1 EE block = 1 NES pixel.

Each NES tile is 16x16 pixel, and mother brain is 5x4 tiles.
That's an 80 x 64 area.
That's 5,120 EE blocks that I will be drawing by hand to make it perfect.

To have the space, I have to tear down and rework Tourian.

But I won't be doing this tonight, or even this week; I have a day job.

Jojomanjo

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

Have fun with that.

jakery

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

Have fun with that.

...yeah, about that...

I changed my mind. I really don't feel like turning a good chunk of the world into pixel art. It goes against my world design philosophy, anyway.

Having said that...

UPDATE:

-Kraid (lower left) is finished.
-Indicator map at start point is now mini version of the whole world.
-Finished Tourian (upper left).

-Map is now 99% finished. I just need to do more testing and tweaking.

Luuu

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

well, for me, ur world is really great!!! Contrags!!
I loves worlds with coin doors!!!   I saw ur levels, and i think u are one of the best minis creator!!!(for me at least!! )

jakery

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

Thanks, Luuu.

nice level but after a while i was going in cirles and got lost searching for other coins like crazy

Thanks for the feedback. I tried to leave "coin trails" wherever possible as a hint on where to go next. If you remember the number of coins you had when you got stuck, or the general area you were in, I can look into reworking that part of the world.

Oturan

Guest

Re: Metroid (alpha)

Its was an excellent recreation of the real metroid, almost felt like i was playing the real one for a while. So it really made me feel nostalgic. But I seriously missed the backtracking.

Tako

Member

From: Memphis, Tennessee, USA

Joined: 2015-08-10

Posts: 6,663

Website

Re: Metroid (alpha)

Aw, man. I got to the end and then I got spat out to the lobby D:

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Yeah, well, you know that's just like, uh, your opinion, man.