The CyberDime Realm (Virtual Simplicity) 1.5.8

[Zeno]

Please be aware that this mod is still in development, as such there are things that are subject to change for varying degrees.​

Now without further ado...
Hello and welcome to the CyberDime Realm. A almost complete 10 zone mappack that started development back in the middle of 2018, and is a sort of simple but a fairly large collection of levels that i have been gradually adding and expanding on to. They aren't too terribly organised so the overall challenge factor greatly varies. All the extra characters unlocked from the main game can be played here right from the start.

Now believe it or not, but this thing has a story! Big props to my friend LightSpeedAngel for originally making this.

Spoiler

Immediately following the defeat of Brak Eggman and the destruction that followed forth, Sonic & the gang safely escape from the crumbling space station via a conveniently placed escape capsule. They land safe and sound with the capsule now lying at the bottom of a secluded beach, the area was unusually quiet.
They press forwards for a brand new adventure then suddenly find themselves strangely teleported to a normal looking lush green landscape, which perplexed everyone but they continued to press forward. As the gang moves further and further on they start to see some faint but strange distortions in the land. From familar locations to cold mountains to barren wastelands, deserts and even a abandoned city. It all just seems so...unnatural.
It's almost as if this world isnt real...

Credits for all the reusable content.

Spoiler

• 
  Everyone who's assets i have used that contributed to the Community Asset Pack
• 
  Egg Frostburn port by Deus
• Lat for the AMT Crawla
  (As of 1.4 That Azazel Fire for making new sprites for this)
  Zippy_Zolton for updating the SOC
• Egg Sandsub by Blade
• 
  All Super LUA by Aquatic Akito
• 
  TehRealSalt for the Game Gear Capsules
• 
  And a very big thank you to all my friends for helping with ideas and playtesting this with me

Changelog

Spoiler

V1.0:
Initial release

V1.1:

• 
  Green Hill, Bridge, Marble & Hidden Palace Zone are no longer in the level rotation, (though you can still pick them from the level select.)
• 
  Marble Zone's enemy count has been reduce by a tiny amount.
• 
  The first checkpoint in Marble 2 has also been moved forward a bit, so you shouldn't get stuck in the doorway anymore.
• 
  Most of the "Leaps of faith" have removed and replaced with something less confusing.
• 
  A very small amount of decorative details added to a few of the levels.
• 
  Some minor texture changes to Shoal Coast.

V1.2:

• You can now unlock and play Record attack.

• Ring, Time & Score Emblems have been appropiately added for it aswell.

• Updated a bunch of old level select pics. (Honestly alot of them were extremely outdated and garbage, didn't reflect the current state of the level very well)

• Custom boss music has been added in. (Only for eggman as of right now.)

• Shoal Coast has had more texture changes.

• The slope at the end of the level has been replaced and made way less arbitrary.

• Some more texture changes in a few other levels to be slightly less clashing.

• The classic levels have all been moved and given their own category now.

• Marble Zone's enemy count has been cut down again, this time to reduce the local Robo-Hood population.

• All but a select few of the "leaps of faith" are gone.

• Nightlight Gully & Terrance Trees have undergone theme changes.

• Certain sections of Chilly Cliffs has been merged into Shrewd Blizzard, (mainly for act 2) meaning there is only one snow level now.

• Barren Valley has been completely gutted from the mod now.

• Shrewd Blizzard, Terrance Trees (Now Mountain), Molten Tunnels & Dark Woods (rip Robohood) have different bosses now.

• Players now start most of the boss acts with 5 rings.

• Added some TNT barrels to fang's arena to make the fight slightly more entertaining.

• Fixed a potential softlock in Cyberdime 3.

• Cyberdime Zone now has a different sky.

• And many other tweaks that i'm not going to list here. Both in level design and a bunch of minor things.

• Also updated the credits list.

V1.2.1:

• Bug fixes.

V1.2.2:

• Fixed the old Eggscalibur's LUA causing lag in multiplayer.

V1.3:

• All 3 acts of Dry Gulch have almost been completely reworked. Act 1 is mostly a drastic overhaul, still featuring some old
  familiar areas mixed in with new ones where as Act 2 & 3 is remade entirely. And now has a bigger emphasis on the Desert Temple theme.

• As part of the second wave of aesthetic upgrades, Desolated City has gone under a bit of a paint job, many of the buildings are
  now sporting different colours, and added a small amount of decorative destruction to the level..

• Techno Trouble has also undergone a partial theme change. Now called Amaranthine Outpost.

• Barren Valley returns (and is now called Timeless Wastes) and has been heavily overhauled, all 3 acts have now been merged
  into one level & is sporting some small changes in the level design and many, many decorative details added. Oh and the music has
  been changed aswell. (Unlockable Level)

• Terrance Trees also returns and has also been merged into a single act (except for act 3), aswell as a few small similar changes
  to it's spookier counterpart. (Also Unlockable)

• All of the classic levels have been removed from the mod, but they will return in some other fashion.

• Added in new music for a bunch of levels.

• Added in some short sections for Fang for the parts he gets stuck/softlocked in Shrewd Blizzard 1 & Terrance Mountain 2.

• Updated some of the level select pics again.

• Way too many more texture changes. (are you seeing a pattern here?)

• And of course a bunch of minor other fixed stuff that i'm not listing here.

V1.3.1:

• Another bug fix update.

V1.3.2:

• Even more bugs fixed!

• Added custom music to Dark Woods 2.

• Updated the Greenflower section in Cyberdime 1 to feature the 2.2 version now.

V1.4:

• Overhauled a bunch of levels, some more heavily than others:

• Added a skybox to Shoal Coast Zone

Sunrise Uplands:

• Act 1 has been massively overhauled, sporting several areas redone and a ton more new areas added in, the level has also been extended a bit.
• (Act 2 will recieve its fair share of changes in the next update)

Shrewd Blizzard 2:

• Altered a few paths a bit in a attempt to make the level less confusing to navigate.

Nightlight Gully:

• The entire Zone now has a global colourmap.

Dark Woods 2:

• Altered the level design in a few spots to hopefully make the level a little less difficult to navigate.

Cyberdime Zone:

• Added some small decorative details in for act 2.
• Finally added in the missing rvz and erz sections for act 3.
• Remade the final boss's arena. (And gave him a new theme too.)

• Updated the AMT Crawla sprites (thanks That Azazel Fire for making them)
• Updated the old Eggscalibur again (thanks to Sonic1983 for porting and updating this thing)

• Fixed the title screen map using the wrong sky. (oh god how did i overlook this for so long)

• And of course the usual fare of a ton of minor changes not worth listing here and
  bug fixes because i apparently don't test my levels enough

V1.4.1:

• I did a big bruh moment and broke the special stages somewhat, they should be fixed now

• 
  For the time being until it gets remade, i have decided to gut the entirety of Dark Woods Zone for the mod since i feel like in its current state is a irredeemable mess.

• Restored the old eggscalibur to Molten Tunnels 3 and remade the arena to accompany it.

V1.4.2

• Remade the title screen and added music to it.

• Shrewd Blizzard 3: Remade the boss arena so the fight itself shouldn't be exceedingly difficult anymore.

• Nightlight Gully 3: Raised the bottom floor height to make the fight less cheap and irritating.

• Molten Tunnels 3: Scrapped the old eggscalibur entirely and restored the egg sandsub to the map.

• Digital Destruction: Added in the 2nd phase for the final boss from the Sonic.EXE character mod.

V1.4.3:

• Removed the 2nd phase for the final boss because of the crashing problem being way worse than I thought, and made it so you start with 5 rings in the level.

V1.4.4:

• Added new music to Shoal Coast & Nightlight Gully 2.

• Updated the entirety of Sunrise Uplands Zone to sport a updated and better looking global and water colourmap.

• Made a small level design change in act 1 in one of the paths to attempt to reduce unnecessary backtracking.

• Included Zippy_Zolton's updated AMT Crawla SOC.

• Fixed the final boss map so it's beatable in multiplayer again.

• Starting from this version and onwards, the file name has been updated as the V prefix is no longer necessary.

V1.5:

Shoal Coast:

• The entire level has been updated and opened up to feature more areas to explore along with even more visual changes,
  some small level design additions and less awkward thok barrier issues.

Sunrise Uplands:

• All 3 acts have undergone a big theme change. Act 1 has also had it's ugly thok barrier problem fixed which should improve navigation.

• Act 2 has been extended by a bit and small level design changes/additions to the already existing areas.

• Act 3 now has a new boss fight.

• Added new music in for Act 1.

Nightlight Gully:

• Act 1 has been opened up a smidge and has been extended.

• Minor similar edits to act 2.

• Adjusted the global colourmap so it's not as strong now.

Terrace Mountain:

• Edited the zone name a tad as *Terrance* apparently sounds really stupid to a lot of people.

• Act 3's arena has been remade and now has a unique boss fight courtesy of Spectra.

Molten Tunnels:

• Act 1 has now been completely gutted from the mod due to serious optimization issues. Act 2 is now Act 1 in it's place.

Amaranthine Outpost:

• Remade act 3 and added in another unique boss just for it, also by Spectra.

Dry Gulch:

• Added a few new areas to act 2, extending the level a bit and the split path part way through the level is now gone.

Cyberdime Core:

• Updated the level name a tad to reflect what the level really is.

• Act 2 has been removed with Act 3 now taking it's place, and formerly Digital Destruction zone is now act 3.

• Made some small level design changes to act 2.

• Added some decor to act 1 and 2. (mostly act 2)

Extra Stuff:

• 2 more levels have been included, the first level i ever made: Frozen Valley Zone makes it's overly long grand return as a VERY short and simple unlockable level.

• The boss rush level has been re-added in from a very old version of CDR and has been remade. (Doesn't include two certain bosses for being a nightmare to get working)

• Made Timeless Wastes even more moody than it already was.

• Most importantly that the gamedata for the mod has been changed. Apologies if you have multiple save files but the old save data was too much of a mess to deal with after so many massive changes.

• And of course many minor changes to a couple of the levels that i'm not gonna go into detail here.

V1.5.1:

• Fixed a nasty visual bug in NGZ1 in software mode and a misplaced death pit in MTZ1

• Fixed CCZ2 being accidentally skipped over

Supporters/Co-Authors:

• >*LightSpeedAngel*<
• Lat'
• Zippy_Zolton

 

[MellowJacket]

I do have a lot of thoughts about this pack, and at some point, I'll be sure to compile up a big set of constructive criticism and go over what I do like and don't like about this pack if you'd be interested. But this is a pretty long level pack.

But definitely welcome to releases!

Certain levels in this pack use the emerald hunt game mode, and this sometimes does not work as intended in SRB2 2.2, however, I understand this is being fixed in 2.2.1 and holding the release back over something that is out of your control seems a little unfair to me. But until 2.2.1 comes out, do keep that in mind.

 

[Mr Beagle]

Spoiler: initial feedback

I have played with Sonic up to Marble Zone so far.

I liked how the prior levels were fairly expansive and open, with a variety of terrain and enemies. The very first one could see smoother transitions in the theming, but I did like the unexpected way it ended.

Marble Zone's Emerald Hunt though seems to see a bug in the way it gets re-initialized if you die in the middle of it. In addition, or maybe as a result, it's not at all obvious how to proceed beyond the big outdoor area in the second act.

EDIT: Okay, figured everything out and got passed Marble Zone's boss. The issue is the idea that only some of the gargoyles are pushable. While that is fine if the gate blocks items like extra lives, it's less so if discovering this somewhat obscure puzzle idea is mandated to make progress. I tried and failed to push one of those things so I thought all of them were decorative.

Spoiler: further feedback

- The custom campaign seems to go on and on and on (with many zones a full set of 3), and that is a good thing when the levels don't seem too rushed as a result. There's a lot of environments to run through and a lot of opportunities for extra lives. This pack is one of those things you really want to see once you complete all of the vanilla levels.
- I like how you managed to incorporate every SRB2 boss (including Brak and Egg-scaliber) and then some. The custom bosses were a nice addition that added a lot more variety.
- Custom badniks made it into one zone, that was nice.
- Catchy music in some zones
- That toxic slime is some really bad stuff, it can take away your shield and your rings in one hit, fortunately it's not terribly difficult to dodge.
- I hope the 2.2.1 patch that fixes emerald hunt comes out soon, it makes it easy to cheese those levels by accident as of now.
- The zones reward you for taking your time to explore rather than rush to the end, I'm a sucker for exploration so that is a good thing.
- The zones make you consider risk/reward on a frequent basis, good for those wanting something more difficult to do.
- Some zones are a little lacking when it comes to the variance and the contrast in the lighting, especially the lava one. Though you made a lot of zones so it might take time to polish them all.

Good work so far, considering the sheer length here I anticipate there will be a lot of revisions, especially if you decide to integrate emblems.

 

[Zanda_Sama]

Oh god not the bees

 

[Frostiikin]

Maybe you could give the sources of all the music? It really sucks that this has some really catchy tunes with no source of where to find the original tracks

 

[Zeno]

Maybe you could give the sources of all the music? It really sucks that this has some really catchy tunes with no source of where to find the original tracks

Well you'll be pleased to know i have added in a list of most of the music used in this. I only linked the MOD Modules though

 

[Mario A. Roach]

I liked the maps where you could actually run fast and not get hit with the emerald/witch hunt parts. But so far, I liked the map making work and music selection, I can say I liked most stages because I got near to complete it and I can say with certainty that Marble is the worst so far.

 

[Rumia1]

Well I like what I've seen so far but... Green Hill caused my game to hang in singleplayer. No SigSev warning or anything but it just stalled.

 

[Zeno]

That happens rarely and i have no idea why

 

[Steelie]

Nightlight Gully appears to be unplayable for me. Out of 6 attempts to play act 1 I sigsegv'd 6 times - each time in a completely different spot. Anybody else having this issue? I'm using the 64-bit build of 2.2 (because the fps is smoother) and not a single time did it actually produce an error log.

 

[frozenLake]

Honestly, I found Cyberdime Act 2 harder than the final boss: It ate through all my lives, a continue, and then on the reload of the save... I accidently managed to cheese it, and the difficulty was circumvented.

I would have liked for there to be some sort of cutscene or shift in the level after the final boss, instead of jumping right to the bad ending, since I didn't get all the chaos emeralds, due to A, there not being many tokens, and B, the fact that of the tokens I did see, I only managed to pick up one, considering that after finding out that it was just the vanilla stages, I didn't feel like getting the rest.

But yeah, the end of the first level was great. And then we just... never see anything like that again.

 

[Zeno]

Ok so for your first point about placing a cutscene in instead of the bad ending, i would love to include one but i haven't got a clue how to make cutscenes.
And as for the second point, technically this is still unfinished, so there's still more stuff i want to include.

And Steelie, the random crashing might be just a problem with the 64 bit version. The level never crashes for me.

 

[Snowy]

Long and hot dang does it show the effort.

Honestly, I personally had no issue with any of the levels except for the emerald hunt ones- While some levels did kinda blend into eachother here and there, I do feel like all of them generally understand the simple motto of "Gotta go fast", to the point where when I'm not emerald hunting, I'm finding myself speeding through levels with curiosity about what little tricks will be done in the next corner.
All in all, I'd say it's a really good pack- and the thought that it's still 'unfinished' is pretty exciting to me. Keep it going, you've hit something nice here!!

 

[Zipper]

And as for the second point, technically this is still unfinished, so there's still more stuff i want to include.

Honestly, the current issue with this pack is that it has too much content in it already, with half of them mashing together in themes, muddling the experience (5 grass zones is too much, 4 "nostalgia" zones even more so).

 

[SSG3]

I've never seen this on the message board before... but some of the screenshots just tell me that the majority of this is from the development versions of your Zenos_Levels pack. I happen to have V4.0 in my files. Huh. if that's the case, I'd better download this version to keep up to date. Good job! (I still remember the old versions i had on srb2 v2.1, slowly watching how the levels evolve over each version was a real blast)

 

[Crum]

There's so much I could say about this pack and most of it would devolve into rambling about my first full playthrough. I think this screenshot gets most of the point across.

In your first level is a bunch of clashing textures and toward the end you have this slope that I arbitrarily can't just walk up and have to jump out but only with a blue spring because you decided that needs to go there. But it's under the lip that doesn't need to be there so I'm stuck and completely trapped while bees assault me and thankfully I don't get my rings back and die. Not all of the level design comes off this bad but it still brings up the same level of "why." Like...

• Wide open stretches of land with spikes scattered around that you won't run into
• Bad texture usage leading to eyesores like the all transparent ice room in the first snow level
• Overuse of teleporters when your level should be organically connecting to the next section most of the time
• Too many sections where you're expecting to just blind drop down in front of a wall to progress
• Texturing vertical teleporters like death pits
• The combination of the previous three leading to players actually jumping to their death in some cases cause it looks like a teleport forward
• Emerald Hunt stages with teleports and designed in a way where it feels less like a hunt and more like running down every single dead end hallway until I find the way forward
• That one starpost in Bridge Zone with a Crushtacean right behind it that'll instakill any character that can't immediately get out of the way or isn't expecting it.
• Too many GFZ1 bosses
• Modifying the arena for the Egg Slimer to have its damaging goop be impossible to see and thus unfair or redesigning the Brak arena to make it more luck based when the boss fight already wasn't great
• Painful misuse of CEZ enemies especially in Marble Zone leading to frustration due to turning corners and getting instantly charged or needing to hit switches while being assaulted by 2 to 8 Robo-Hoods at a time
• The Knuckles fight seemingly obeying no rules when it comes to when you can attack him
• The entire Super Robo-Hood fight
• The pack itself being improved not by any direct changes, but by having to remove the awful Infinite boss fight due to credit reasons which was an unfun bottleneck in the earlier versions released on the SMP server.

I'm just gonna cut it off there. That's not even the complete list of things I don't like, I could just go on for too long listing complaints that are either minor or major. There's a groundwork here for something that's actually fun and it can be at times in the first half of the pack but afterwards it drags on too long and the flaws get too grating or the level design just becomes dead boring. I can applaud you for managing to complete a full game long campaign but I wouldn't want to join a server running this.

 

[DollyCloudy]

marble zone just crashed for me and when i readded the pack, it doesn't load as an emerald hunt stage and is unbeatable, epic

 

[Zeno]

I think you misread Whackjood's comment, emerald hunt is a bit finicky in 2.2.0 and doesn't work properly if you reload the level, it is beatable but it ends the level prematurely after you get the first shard

---------- Post added at 10:48 PM ---------- Previous post was at 10:27 PM ----------

[*]Bad texture usage leading to eyesores like the all transparent ice room in the first snow level

[*]Too many sections where you're expecting to just blind drop down in front of a wall to progress

[*]Too many GFZ1 bosses

While i thank you for your constructive criticism, i want to bring up 3 of your complaints that stand out to me the most:

[*] I don't quite fully understand what you mean by that, can i ask that you visually clarify those cases?

[*] Yeah i've been considering replacing a lot of those, or just add arrows in to better guide players

[*] Honestly, the reason why there is so many GFZ3 bosses is because vanilla SRB2 doesn't really have the biggest selection of bosses to choose from, that and my severe lack of SOC/Lua'ing skills

 

[Zanda_Sama]

My main complaint is getting hurt by bees. I mean on the FIRST level, you have to make tight jumps/thoks to even hurt the nest. I mean don't think of it as a first level problem, I just hate bees.

 

[Twins'R'Okay]

Hey, I remember when this pack was originally called "Zeno's Levels", good times, good times.

Anyways, this level pack is mediocre. Not good, but not bad either. The main problem that stems from this pack I feel is a good case of Quantity > Quality.

A lot of the levels feel barren and lifeless, the skyboxes are kinda questionable at times, and it's too long.

My suggestion would be to gut a few of the zones (make it a 6 - 7 zone adventure, 8 if you're insane) and try making something more unique than the "Jump here, run here, act 1 - 3 done" and add a gimmick in there (be it original or otherwise).