distractionware forums

VVVVVV => VVVVVV Levels => Topic started by: endme on August 15, 2011, 09:00:17 PM

Title: The RYB maze by endme
Post by: endme on August 15, 2011, 09:00:17 PM
Hello everyone, first post here, I wanted to share a small (6x6 with some unused rooms) and easy level I've created.

Why should you play this level? Well, it takes a different approach than most of the levels I've seen. Technical skill is not required. Logic is rewarded here. I've used lots of trinkets and some scripting to make it possible. Want to know more? Download the level!

Although it's a beta, this is probably it's final state. Besides bugfixing, I won't plan on doing any major changes. Instead, if people like it, I can focus on doing a real and bigger maze.

Please notice that I'm not a native English speaker, so there might be some spelling errors. If you notice one, let me know and I'll update the map :viridian:
Title: Re: The RYB maze by endme
Post by: Terry on August 15, 2011, 09:44:52 PM
Oh, this is really interesting! I played through most of it; the first part I didn't really feel like I knew what I was doing, but managed to get by with trial and error, mostly. After that, though, there were a lot of sections I liked. I got to the final room, but chose the wrong checkpoint, and it set me back to 7-4.

Some basic notes:

  - I liked all the multi room puzzles after the first one - the "bouncy much better edition" one in particular stood out, since it's where I really understood the basic idea.

- The mario rooms seemed a bit glitchy: I'm looking around in the editor to remind myself of where everything was, and I didn't realise there was a puzzle here at all when I played. I'm guessing I was supposed to take the bottom teleporter out in the mid level credits room, but I didn't feel like I had enough info to put that together!

- A bigger problem is just walking off the screen on the left here leads to a big empty void! I continued playing from where I landed, but I can't help but feel like I did something wrong?

- I liked "Don't Worry" :viridian:

Definitely a very interesting level!
Title: Re: The RYB maze by endme
Post by: Stampy on August 15, 2011, 10:20:14 PM
I'm a little confused as to this level in all honesty, as I got the credits page after about half an hour then somehow wound up teleporting back falling through the world and getting lost  in rooms that I somehow bypassed before.. so I have no idea on the way the level's meant to be played, but I certainly didn't do it in that order!  also i didn't know VVVVVV had a die key.  I found it after teleporting into an empty room in red/blue/yellow, and had to save, quit, reload the level.  Eventually i found a die key.. but could you not just have placed a spike in there if you're forcing the player to die anyway?


EDIT

Okay, I played through the level again trying to see if I could work it out a little better. I then actually read the credits page and realised it was a mid level credits page.  Why would you do that, it's really confusing!  When I played it through the first time, I fell out of 7-4 to the left, and into don't worry.  Playing through it again, I found the credits page at the right point in the map, but then you have to backtrack and jump off into oblivion anyway!  Where are you actually meant to go from 7-4? The next time I played I got to the "Bouncy, much better edition".  I don't think there's anyway past the gravline in the credit screen is there?

Anyway, the most annoying thing personally, was the final room.  The first time I got there, I didn't remember everything and you can't replay.. so i just wound up back at 7-4 (which is when I found the credits for the first time).

Second time I grabbed a piece of paper and wrote down everything.  But I'm still not sure there's enough information there to work out which is the right room.  Saying that one room will kill you, and saying that the surrounding tokens to the 3 rooms that will take you to the beginning is useless information.. as you have no idea which room is going to kill you.  You do know that one of the five bottom rooms will kill you. And you do know that two of the bottom teleporters are going to take you to the same location.. You also know that its not any of the rooms in the fibbonacci sequence.. But with that knowledge, i'm not convinced there's a way to actually deduce the correct room from the given information!  And when the punishment for getting wrong is being pushed all the way back to 7-4, or even the start? Its too cruel a puzzle.

But yeah It's frustrating. as you've got a lot of good stuff in here! I wasn't a fan of the first RYB puzzle but the other two were good!  The combination lock puzzle was good too. I'm not sure how I opened the room above it though. That was luck the first time i played it c.c  Anyway I certainly wouldn't call it an easy level.
Title: Re: The RYB maze by endme
Post by: endme on August 16, 2011, 10:01:25 AM
Ok, let's see

Quote from: Terry on August 15, 2011, 09:44:52 PM
- The mario rooms seemed a bit glitchy: I'm looking around in the editor to remind myself of where everything was, and I didn't realise there was a puzzle here at all when I played. I'm guessing I was supposed to take the bottom teleporter out in the mid level credits room, but I didn't feel like I had enough info to put that together!

7-4 is a tribute to Super Mario Bros. Bowser's castle where you were supposed to take the right route to get to the finish. In fact, it's exactly like the beginning of 7-4.

I realize, maybe it isn't clear at all. Adding some sad faces when you take the wrong route may help?

Quote from: Terry on August 15, 2011, 09:44:52 PM
- A bigger problem is just walking off the screen on the left here leads to a big empty void! I continued playing from where I landed, but I can't help but feel like I did something wrong?

Bug. Those should warp. I'm sorry, at some point there were warplines, dunno where are they now.

About the die key: I'll put some spikes.

Last room: Mh, I was 100% sure that you could reread terminals, turns out I was wrong! Big problem here, I added a warning, but I don't know if there's other workaround...

Last room solving BIG SPOILER HERE:
You should already know that there are 9 warptokens, 4 destinations below you and

   9 8 7 6
      You
  1 2 3 4 5

3 warptokens that take you to the beginning
- Not in the corners,
- Surrounded by warptokens that won't harm you but won't take you to the exit.

1 that kills you
- It's below you (positions 1 to 5)

1 that takes you to the exit

'Some' that take you to '7-4'
- Not in positions 1, 2, 3, 5 or 8

1 that takes you to an unknown destination

Let's do it:
- There needs to be a destination repeated below you. '7-4' can't be, because the warptokens below you are numbered 1 to 5. So, there's 2 warptokens that take you to the beginning.

- These 2 warptokens can't take the positions 2 and 4, because they are surrounded by others that won't harm you, and the one that kills you is below you. So 2,3 and 3,4 left.

- If they took positions 3 and 4, the one that kills you would be 1. 2 warptokens left, positions 2 and 5. The one that saves you is a no go (can't be near the beginning ones), and '7-4' can't go as they're fibonacci numbers. So we're left with 2 positions and only one warptoken (the unknown). No way.

The only working combination is:
1 - Unknown  2 - Beginning  3 - Beginning  4 - '7-4'  5 - Killer

We're left with the one that goes to the exit, 2 '7-4' and another 'beginning' one. I won't develop this one, but as you'll find out the only possible combination is:
9 - '7-4'  8 - Beginning  7 - '7-4'  6 - Exit.

BIG SPOILER ENDS


PLEASE let me know if there's anything that can't be understood.

Updated with the 7-4 fix, the sad faces, some spikes and the warning.
Title: Re: The RYB maze by endme
Post by: Terry on August 16, 2011, 11:54:10 AM
Hmm, ok, that's clearer - one thing that threw me was this line:

"The 5 below you will take you to 4 different destinations."

Which I took to mean that there are 8 possible destinations in total, and that one of them in the bottom row is repeated!
Title: Re: The RYB maze by endme
Post by: Stampy on August 16, 2011, 07:00:54 PM
There we go. Played through the level again just now. Fixing 7-4 makes the level a lot more playable!  I never really played super mario bros so I didn't really catch that reference which made it extra confusing when I played it before.  As for the final puzzle, from the wording I Had the same trouble as Terry. I didn't know how many total rooms there were.  Also I didn't work out that the 7-4 rooms were all in the Fibonacci sequence.  I think it was the wording of "Some will take you to room `7-4`.  They dislike Fibonacci series!"  Also I thought 7-4 was a reference to the rooms which would take you there.. Which I wasn't far off.. It just meant I didn't work out that 9 would take you there too!

Also you missed a room you need to reset in!
Title: Re: The RYB maze by endme
Post by: TheoX on August 20, 2011, 01:41:00 AM
This levels' a little too convoluted and confusing for me to figure out.  It has really cool ideas though :D
Title: Re: The RYB maze by endme
Post by: endme on August 22, 2011, 02:32:19 PM
Updated again: missings spikes added, finale is less cruel (changed some destinations), no mid level credits page (instead, there's some help).

Thanks for the feedback, I really appreciate it! I'm taking notes for future levels.
Title: Re: The RYB maze by endme
Post by: BillyTheBanana on September 15, 2011, 05:52:41 PM
This was really fun until I got sent back to the warp maze for like the fourth time with no warning. :victoria:
Title: Re: The RYB maze by endme
Post by: PJBottomz on September 15, 2011, 07:57:45 PM
:victoria: I tried to complete it, but I have absolutely no idea how I am supposed to...

Okay, so this is an OK level - I like the idea of what's supposed to happen.

Unfortunately, it's very confusing. I got lost multiple times and ended up repeating almost EVERYTHING I had to do. Eventually, I gave up, because I kept getting confused and lost, and I had to restart once because I got stuck somewhere. This is okay if there are places where you're supposed to be stuck, but I don't think it was intended and I still have no idea where or how I got stuck. :o

Also, the level design is a little... meh. Single tiles look kind of very ugly. And the backing! Don't get me started on that.

And I have a huge questions about the room with the bullet bill, mushroom, and invincistar - what do I even do? There's only 1 place to go, and the warp just leads me back to the room. I don't even get it. This was so confusing. :verdigris:

This is a good level, but it just needs a little - okay, a lot of fine tuning. I liked the idea though - it seems to work good.
Title: Re: The RYB maze by endme
Post by: ThePaSch on September 15, 2011, 09:37:37 PM
Quote from: PJBottomz on September 15, 2011, 07:57:45 PM
And I have a huge questions about the room with the bullet bill, mushroom, and invincistar - what do I even do? There's only 1 place to go, and the warp just leads me back to the room. I don't even get it. This was so confusing. :verdigris:

The level literally tells you what to do.
Just look for Room Texts and keep Viridian happy.

EDIT: You really need to make the ending less harsh. I played all the way through to the final challenge, worked out the basic stuff, then had to choose between 1 and 6. I thought that "they dislike the Fibonacci series" means that the tokens that send you back to the beginning are not part of the Fibonacci series. AFAIR, the Fibonacci go 1, 2, 3, 5, 8 and so forth. As 6 is not part of them, I immediately thought that Token 6 is going to send me somewhere bad, so I took Token 1.
And ended up in the frustration room. Which was when I quit out of frustration.

Was my thought process wrong? I don't see what's wrong with my way of thinking.
Title: Re: The RYB maze by endme
Post by: scottyjx on October 23, 2011, 07:57:45 PM
Hi endme.  Just wanted to say that I loved this level.  So far, it's my favorite of the featured.  Very clever.  I loved the mario reference, the room "Just a Bit More", and how good it felt to puzzle out the logic puzzle at the end.  Keep making levels!
Title: Re: The RYB maze by endme
Post by: Damn It AL to Hell on October 23, 2011, 09:41:23 PM
Let's see what you got.