all my levels

[doctorbenjiphd]

OK...if I don't upload this now, I'll probably keep tweaking away at it a piece at a time from now until the end of the universe. These are the seven levels I uploaded onto here about a year ago, plus the "Showdown" boss level I posted last month, plus two more I've made since then. I don't know if I'm done. I set it up for one final level, but who knows if I'll ever get around to making it.

I've gone through a fixed a few things that were bugging me in the original seven level release. Mostly streamlined the terminals, fixed a few untextured sides, balanced out the enemies and weapons a little bit, and so on. I also included a level that I had originally designed last year, but left out of the seven map pack because it's original purpose didn't work correctly. I decided to abandon the genius idea I originally had for the level, and just make it more straightforward. Except the level still kind of sucks.

The second level sucks, too.

But the rest is good stuff, at least I think so. I realized that in working on the later levels, my earlier ones are painfully bland. But I still think the fun factor exists in them.

I'm sure there are still some bugs. In particular, the last couple levels I tried to do a few tricks, such as allies beaming out at a specific time, but I could never get it to work properly. Sometimes monsters half-way disappear between transparent lines. Whatever. I'm tired of tweaking them. Besides, as I said, unless I upload this now, I probably will never stop.

Please play, and provide feedback.

I also wonder, is Simplici7y a better place to upload my work? I can't help but notice only a handful actually download files from here, and those files hosted on Simplici7y seem to get hundreds more downloads.

I hope you all enjoy playing these levels a tenth as much as I enjoyed making them.

[Crater Creator]

I also wonder, is Simplici7y a better place to upload my work? I can't help but notice only a handful actually download files from here, and those files hosted on Simplici7y seem to get hundreds more downloads.

Seeing how *everything* gets hundreds of downloads, I'm convinced there are one or more robots crawling the web that find the front page of Simplici7y and download every file there daily, inflating the download totals. That seems more likely than the Simplici7y userbase somehow being many times larger than the Pfhorums community.

It's also possible the download tracking is just broken on some files. If my Megalopia pack was actually still being downloaded 4 times a day, you'd expect a higher total download count.

[edit]I should say, though, that I see Simplici7y as a place for completed or nearly completed works, say alpha stage or later. Works in progress are better off posted here if you want feedback/help, in my opinion.

[Tycho X]

[edit]I should say, though, that I see Simplici7y as a place for completed or nearly completed works, say alpha stage or later. Works in progress are better off posted here if you want feedback/help, in my opinion.

Exactly what I think.

[VikingBoyBilly]

I started playing your scenario, and in the first map I'm starving for ammo. That's a bad thing coming from me, because I'm very conservative; I'll always punch fighters, drones and s'pht whenever possible. Is the ammo supply supposed to be so scarce? I'm playing on Major Damage, did you only test this on Normal? A rule of thumb I've seen regarding map design is to "always include enough ammo to kill all the enemies if the player enters with none, plus one more."

Edit: played some more. The 2nd level is fine, but it's a bit too symmetrical. But the third... a map about killing all f'licktas, and ONLY f'licktas? Why would you make this? It's so huge, and due to the sparse pattern buffer locations, it's super tedius. The architecture is okay, but you chose the most boring/worst army of enemies to exterminate, other than drones or cyborgs.

Also, there's some misaligned polygons/vertexes, or whatever causes that polygon-jumping glitch, and I don't feel like pointing them out so you have to find them and fix them.

[VikingBoyBilly]

I'm stuck on Pfhor King and Country in a room with what looks like a teleporter (that does nothing) and a terminal that says some cargo was teleported to the bridge where Blevins is holding up in. What do I do?

I found the developer terminal. I'm also adamantly holding on to a dead imac =(

[doctorbenjiphd]

Thanks for playing, Viking.

If this were a larger conversion scenario (which I would like to make, but am a terrible graphical artist), that F'litcka level would feature an original monster. I agree that they are boring enemies; I just thought the idea of alien specimens on your ship breaking out and having to help the crew take them down was cool.

I have played through only on Normal. I don't have a 10-key keyboard, and am terrible at using the mouse, so I have to play single handed, and was never able to play on a difficulty higher than Normal. Therefore, on any higher difficulty level, I am not surprised to hear the ammo count is low. Also, I tweaked the order of the levels some, which explains why by the end you probably have plenty of ammo, but early are starved of it.

I don't really get why you can't beat the last level. I don't believe the level has an objective--when you reach the end, you should be able to just step into the teleporter and win. (I assume to are referring to the teleporter in the bottom right corner of the map) I have never had this problem playing through it. However, this was the level that I spent the *least* amount of time fine-tuning, so I guess I don't find it impossible that something is wrong. I also think it might be too hard. Bobs that fire immediately and take a couple shotgun blasts to kill are cruel and unusual.

And yeah, stupid dead iMacs. If I could fix that thing, I could upload 17 or so more levels that I made way back in the day (that probably don't hold up so well, but were good in the pre-Aleph days)

[VikingBoyBilly]

So there isn't an epilogue screen, is there? Just making sure I didn't miss anything.

Spoiler:

You used a point I've been wanting to see forever: The pfhor have just as much of a right to live as humanity. I was so enraged by this one short scenario that ended with creating a virus that kills the entire pfhor population, and there's all this love even in canon of bombing them to extinction.

But even after the pfhor beg for you to defect, you have no choice but to continue killing them and let yourself get betrayed. The inevitability sets in a feeling of dread that you're at the mercy of your masters.

I was stuck on that oen level with the developer terminal when the last door didn't open, but the terminal gave a good hint to explore the sewage. That's what's missing from a lot of games of this type: subtle clues, instead of A) sledgehammer tutorials or nothing.

[philtron]

Haven't played through all of it, but some thoughts.

I agree with Vikingboy that the second level is too symmetrical which makes it feel monotonous. In the first level I had about ten fusion cells but never found an actual fusion pistol.

The level with all flickta didn't bother me or seem boring. It actually was kind of relaxing since you give a lot more ammo in that level and the flickta are easy enemies. It was kind of like popcorn entertainment; just there to be fun. So I liked it actually.

I know you've addressed the difficulty already, but even after I switched to Normal I was starved for ammo in the first level; maybe because I never found the fusion pistol. By the second level the ammo situation improved.

[VikingBoyBilly]

It probably only bothers me because of my urge to punch them, and those azure ones take forever to punch out.