Click to view my playthrough of the SP maps, complete with time stamps for every map. I tried to be constructive and make meaningful suggestions for improvement, but these are kneejerk reactions, so I apologize for anything that comes off as rude or harsh -- I'm only interested in helping people improve their work, not dragging them down. I am proud of every single person involved in the contest. Thank you all for participating!
My Rankings
1. Hollow Hill Zone
2. Mercury Mine Zone
3. Teal Tundra Zone
4. Ante-Station Zone
5. Lava Temple
6. Koopa Kastle Zone
7. Falcon Emissary Zone
8. Bombastic Beach Zone
9. Abyss Caverns Zone
10. Ridge Rapids Zone
11. Emerald Glade Zone
12. Fort Sunset Zone
13. Blizzard Bastion Zone
14. Music Mash Zone
15. Zaxel's Thunder Yard
16. Drenched Dam Zone
Overall Impressions & General Feedback
Hollow Hill: Pretty, has cool setpieces, good pacing, good use of slopes. It's fun, and that's all I really have to say about it.
Mercury Mine: Good use of slopes. Pretty good pacing. Some areas could stand to be scaled down or filled out with more geometry. I liked most of the texture work, but I suggest changing the indoor texturing to be less of the same shades of brown everywhere. Hollow Hill is objectively better, sure, but this is still my favorite map in the contest.
Teal Tundra: Some areas could stand to be scaled down or filled with more geometry. The layout is fine, but all the straight lines everywhere make caves and outdoor areas feel much less natural. Play around with sector-based scenery some more, especially in the cave areas. This map is good, and it has so much more potential. I hope you choose to polish it some more and release it separately.
Ante-Station: A tad confusing at times, but generally solid. Use of portals made for very interesting scenery. I liked the textures as well. Use of Axis2D on top of all that makes the map quite memorable with the cool camera angles. I liked it!
Lava Temple: I didn't care for the unsettling theming, but I thought the bone midtextures were cool. Next time, try to use the same texture on walls and ceilings less. Some of those areas covered in green are hard to navigate because all the surfaces blend together. I thought the doors for each character at the end were cool, and I may come back to this map later to check out those paths.
Koopa Kastle: Enjoyable! Visuals were a strong point. I would have rated this higher if the Brak fight was absent -- the boss as used in vanilla is just not that fun, in my opinion. The boss fight is both improved and made worse by the block in the center of the arena. On one hand, it makes dodging Brak's attacks much easier, but it also means you just kinda hang around by the block while you wait for the boss's i-frames to end. I would like to see a revised version of the map come with a full Bowser boss fight. Maybe you can collab with some other community members to make it happen!
Falcon Emissary: I probably would have enjoyed this more if I played as Sonic. As Knuckles, it's impossible to tell what you're allowed to climb on, and you're not allowed to climb on a lot of things. Visuals were a strong point, especially when it comes to sector based scenery. The wind gimmicks were used pretty well for the most part. I think the enemy placement needs work. Having to fight pretty much every enemy in the game -- and there are a lot of enemies placed -- wasn't an enjoyable experience. I have to say that I really do dig the vibe of the place, though. Right off the bat I felt like I was really on an airship! Not an easy task in SRB2.
Bombastic Beach: Visuals are a strong point here. See my video for suggestions to further improve the (already pretty nice) textures. I recall getting a bit lost in the room at the end, so you might want to move the exit to a more obvious spot. There's also an odd noclimb spot around there; you should really just let Knux climb it since the area it blocks is accessible by climbing the terrain across from it. I thought the underwater air bubbles were charming, and I think the pacing was spot on.
Abyss Caverns: This didn't make much of an impression on me because of how it throws all the different themes in -- the map lacks a cohesive identity. I recall getting lost in a couple areas, so try to use lighting, ring placement, and geometry to guide the player's eyes toward the goal in an immersive way. I completely missed the dark colored arrow on the ground because it was surrounded by other dark colors. I think the actual platforming was pretty well designed, though.
Ridge Rapids: I probably would have enjoyed this more if I played as Sonic. My low rating for this map stems from having played as Knuckles, since you can't climb on ANYTHING in this map save for one texture. I wanted to climb around and explore and find secret areas, but I ended up just going from point A to point B. In my playthrough, I got frustrated after completing a Knuckles path, then falling down and having to do the section over again instead of being able to climb back up. The section itself isn't that hard in retrospect, but I had trouble with it anyway, and having to redo it was not enjoyable. Texturing is another weak point. The screen is filled with the same shades of brown most of the time. During my playthrough, I couldn't remember how to progress in an area I had to redo, and it took looking around from several angles to notice the texture Knuckles could climb on in order to progress. This could be improved by making the climbable texture a more distinct color. Outer walls of the map could also be a different color (a darker, more saturated brown, perhaps) to help distinguish them from regular terrain. I will say that the colors you used work well together, though.
Emerald Glade: The most positive thing I can say about the experience was that the emerald shards were easier to find than those in other emerald hunts I've played. See my video for advice on where to go from here.
Fort Sunset: Getting 500 coins as a single player was boring, and losing them all to a single hit made it worse. The map could be improved by expanding the area around the fort so that single players have more terrain to explore or by reducing the coins required to exit. I would also suggest adding a script that keeps track of your coins independently of rings so that getting hit doesn't start you over from square one. Maybe the script could also scale the coin requirement with the player count. I enjoyed the cute visuals and music, though!
Blizzard Bastion: The thick fog makes the stage's colors blur together, hindering navigation. The room full of conveyor belts should be outright replaced in a future revision, in my opinion -- without Twitch chat, I would have had a very hard time figuring out I was supposed to press a button to progress, since I couldn't see the button from just about anywhere in there. The turret in there can't even hit you most of the time since, again, there are all those conveyor belts in the way. The texture on the bustable FOF to access the Knuckles path should be changed to stand out more. Try using two (larger) polyobjects together in that section so that players only have to wait half as long to progress if they miss it. The transparent wall in the underwater section looks invisible at first, which was confusing. Overall, I can tell you put a lot of effort into this, but there's plenty of room for improvement. Keep honing those design skills!
Music Mash: I don't think there's anything I can say about the visuals that hasn't already been said, so I'll spare you my take on them. The layout itself seems fine. A definite improvement over your previous maps in that regard. I thought the piano area was kind of cool. See my video for more feedback. I look forward to seeing more improvement from you!
Zaxel's Thunder Yard: The biggest factor into my low rating for this map is the pacing. I took over 15 minutes to complete it. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but the whole map looks and feels pretty samey, so it overstays its welcome. The layout itself is pretty good, though. You could cut out some of the less interesting parts and make two or three maps out of what you have here. I'm not gonna be nice about the fake exits, though -- they're all GIANT dick moves, and I understand one of them is a softlock. Straight up remove them. If you wanna mess with the player a bit, that's fine, but this is the least funny and most frustrating way to do it. Visuals were a strong point here, but the bright green enemies on bright green grass were not easy to see. Overall, I'm impressed with the amount of effort put into this, but it didn't make for a very satisfying experience. Don't give up, though!
Drenched Dam: Invisible walls, one color being used for almost every surface, and the same texture being used for walls and floors everywhere really drag this down. Most areas are pretty cramped even without the crates in the way. I found the fan section too frustrating since there's no way to recover from failure, so I switched to Tails and skipped it. In the future, use the Solid Midtexture flag to make fences solid, and use actual walls to keep the player on the path. I can see some potential in this map, so I strongly urge you to continue honing your design skills. I have a feeling your next map will be much better!
Feel free to hit me up on Discord if you'd like to talk about my feedback. Please don't DM me, though; I would prefer a ping in the #mapping channel.
See you in Round 2!
My Rankings
1. Hollow Hill Zone
2. Mercury Mine Zone
3. Teal Tundra Zone
4. Ante-Station Zone
5. Lava Temple
6. Koopa Kastle Zone
7. Falcon Emissary Zone
8. Bombastic Beach Zone
9. Abyss Caverns Zone
10. Ridge Rapids Zone
11. Emerald Glade Zone
12. Fort Sunset Zone
13. Blizzard Bastion Zone
14. Music Mash Zone
15. Zaxel's Thunder Yard
16. Drenched Dam Zone
Overall Impressions & General Feedback
Hollow Hill: Pretty, has cool setpieces, good pacing, good use of slopes. It's fun, and that's all I really have to say about it.
Mercury Mine: Good use of slopes. Pretty good pacing. Some areas could stand to be scaled down or filled out with more geometry. I liked most of the texture work, but I suggest changing the indoor texturing to be less of the same shades of brown everywhere. Hollow Hill is objectively better, sure, but this is still my favorite map in the contest.
Teal Tundra: Some areas could stand to be scaled down or filled with more geometry. The layout is fine, but all the straight lines everywhere make caves and outdoor areas feel much less natural. Play around with sector-based scenery some more, especially in the cave areas. This map is good, and it has so much more potential. I hope you choose to polish it some more and release it separately.
Ante-Station: A tad confusing at times, but generally solid. Use of portals made for very interesting scenery. I liked the textures as well. Use of Axis2D on top of all that makes the map quite memorable with the cool camera angles. I liked it!
Lava Temple: I didn't care for the unsettling theming, but I thought the bone midtextures were cool. Next time, try to use the same texture on walls and ceilings less. Some of those areas covered in green are hard to navigate because all the surfaces blend together. I thought the doors for each character at the end were cool, and I may come back to this map later to check out those paths.
Koopa Kastle: Enjoyable! Visuals were a strong point. I would have rated this higher if the Brak fight was absent -- the boss as used in vanilla is just not that fun, in my opinion. The boss fight is both improved and made worse by the block in the center of the arena. On one hand, it makes dodging Brak's attacks much easier, but it also means you just kinda hang around by the block while you wait for the boss's i-frames to end. I would like to see a revised version of the map come with a full Bowser boss fight. Maybe you can collab with some other community members to make it happen!
Falcon Emissary: I probably would have enjoyed this more if I played as Sonic. As Knuckles, it's impossible to tell what you're allowed to climb on, and you're not allowed to climb on a lot of things. Visuals were a strong point, especially when it comes to sector based scenery. The wind gimmicks were used pretty well for the most part. I think the enemy placement needs work. Having to fight pretty much every enemy in the game -- and there are a lot of enemies placed -- wasn't an enjoyable experience. I have to say that I really do dig the vibe of the place, though. Right off the bat I felt like I was really on an airship! Not an easy task in SRB2.
Bombastic Beach: Visuals are a strong point here. See my video for suggestions to further improve the (already pretty nice) textures. I recall getting a bit lost in the room at the end, so you might want to move the exit to a more obvious spot. There's also an odd noclimb spot around there; you should really just let Knux climb it since the area it blocks is accessible by climbing the terrain across from it. I thought the underwater air bubbles were charming, and I think the pacing was spot on.
Abyss Caverns: This didn't make much of an impression on me because of how it throws all the different themes in -- the map lacks a cohesive identity. I recall getting lost in a couple areas, so try to use lighting, ring placement, and geometry to guide the player's eyes toward the goal in an immersive way. I completely missed the dark colored arrow on the ground because it was surrounded by other dark colors. I think the actual platforming was pretty well designed, though.
Ridge Rapids: I probably would have enjoyed this more if I played as Sonic. My low rating for this map stems from having played as Knuckles, since you can't climb on ANYTHING in this map save for one texture. I wanted to climb around and explore and find secret areas, but I ended up just going from point A to point B. In my playthrough, I got frustrated after completing a Knuckles path, then falling down and having to do the section over again instead of being able to climb back up. The section itself isn't that hard in retrospect, but I had trouble with it anyway, and having to redo it was not enjoyable. Texturing is another weak point. The screen is filled with the same shades of brown most of the time. During my playthrough, I couldn't remember how to progress in an area I had to redo, and it took looking around from several angles to notice the texture Knuckles could climb on in order to progress. This could be improved by making the climbable texture a more distinct color. Outer walls of the map could also be a different color (a darker, more saturated brown, perhaps) to help distinguish them from regular terrain. I will say that the colors you used work well together, though.
Emerald Glade: The most positive thing I can say about the experience was that the emerald shards were easier to find than those in other emerald hunts I've played. See my video for advice on where to go from here.
Fort Sunset: Getting 500 coins as a single player was boring, and losing them all to a single hit made it worse. The map could be improved by expanding the area around the fort so that single players have more terrain to explore or by reducing the coins required to exit. I would also suggest adding a script that keeps track of your coins independently of rings so that getting hit doesn't start you over from square one. Maybe the script could also scale the coin requirement with the player count. I enjoyed the cute visuals and music, though!
Blizzard Bastion: The thick fog makes the stage's colors blur together, hindering navigation. The room full of conveyor belts should be outright replaced in a future revision, in my opinion -- without Twitch chat, I would have had a very hard time figuring out I was supposed to press a button to progress, since I couldn't see the button from just about anywhere in there. The turret in there can't even hit you most of the time since, again, there are all those conveyor belts in the way. The texture on the bustable FOF to access the Knuckles path should be changed to stand out more. Try using two (larger) polyobjects together in that section so that players only have to wait half as long to progress if they miss it. The transparent wall in the underwater section looks invisible at first, which was confusing. Overall, I can tell you put a lot of effort into this, but there's plenty of room for improvement. Keep honing those design skills!
Music Mash: I don't think there's anything I can say about the visuals that hasn't already been said, so I'll spare you my take on them. The layout itself seems fine. A definite improvement over your previous maps in that regard. I thought the piano area was kind of cool. See my video for more feedback. I look forward to seeing more improvement from you!
Zaxel's Thunder Yard: The biggest factor into my low rating for this map is the pacing. I took over 15 minutes to complete it. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but the whole map looks and feels pretty samey, so it overstays its welcome. The layout itself is pretty good, though. You could cut out some of the less interesting parts and make two or three maps out of what you have here. I'm not gonna be nice about the fake exits, though -- they're all GIANT dick moves, and I understand one of them is a softlock. Straight up remove them. If you wanna mess with the player a bit, that's fine, but this is the least funny and most frustrating way to do it. Visuals were a strong point here, but the bright green enemies on bright green grass were not easy to see. Overall, I'm impressed with the amount of effort put into this, but it didn't make for a very satisfying experience. Don't give up, though!
Drenched Dam: Invisible walls, one color being used for almost every surface, and the same texture being used for walls and floors everywhere really drag this down. Most areas are pretty cramped even without the crates in the way. I found the fan section too frustrating since there's no way to recover from failure, so I switched to Tails and skipped it. In the future, use the Solid Midtexture flag to make fences solid, and use actual walls to keep the player on the path. I can see some potential in this map, so I strongly urge you to continue honing your design skills. I have a feeling your next map will be much better!
Feel free to hit me up on Discord if you'd like to talk about my feedback. Please don't DM me, though; I would prefer a ping in the #mapping channel.
See you in Round 2!
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