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[Broccolirampage]

<Removed by author>

[Wohlstand]

Hello and welcome!

I just want to make your sure that I was about to reject this as a spam (Yes, spam bots had post their mess in the very similar look like you done). But after reviewing the thing deeply, I decided to approve.

Please, anybody who register here, introduce yourself properly, that's would be easier for moderators team to not confuse you and random spammer.

P.S. Just in a case, I'll preserve your thing at the SMBX Archive at SMBX2 section.

Added after 22 minutes 6 seconds:
Just a first note: I made a look on the content, and some cases are inoptimal. You used large audio files without proper looping and content optimizations, and you grown the gigabyte of the stuff.

Just a pro tip: it's enough to compress OGG files with the quality of 5 or 4. Just listen result to ensure content isn't so damaged. (Hearable damage usually appears somewhere at 4, 3 or lower). And, you can use loop tags to make a seamless looping of the middle part of the song. There are a lot of manuals on how to make that. I do have one too: https://wohlsoft.ru/pgewiki/How_To:_Looping_music_files, You might take a look and optimize your content.

Just don't bloat episodes data size without real necessary (like, thousand unique levels and thousand variants of custom graphics, etc). You have only 50 levels, and just get the gigabyte? Okay, I checked the thing deeper, all the audio files just takes around 243 MB. However, I found that you used huge background pictures (every of them takes 4~7 MB of size, wow). Isn't better to make smaller but keep them look nice as your idea is? Please don't spit on general optimisation and rationality use. Not everybody has Core i42, MegaUltra4K screens, 1 TB RAM, RTX9999 SUPER, so, spit on optimisation will hurt even TOP-level PC users, seriously.

P.S. No, gigabyte per game is not okay. Modern games often suck by the plot and general quality. Having over 80GB of game data is not okay. Absolutely. I mean, large data size NEVER means the "game is awesome" (Only exception that "Dark Messiah of Might and Magic" is awesome game that loved by my brother even it takes 7 GB of the space. Actually nobody beated the quality of it's battle system and other stuff).

Added after 25 minutes 47 seconds:
P.P.S. My conclusion: general overall idea looks super, but it needs more work.

[Broccolirampage]

<Removed by author>

[Wohlstand]

No, I'm not a bot, and I'm really not sure what created that impression. I certainly don't think that my introduction to my episode in any way screams "AI mess", actually, I put a lot of thought into it. Anyways, I appreciate your avoiding a knee jerk reaction and simply deciding to delete it out of suspicion.

Don't worry, all okay since I already approved your post. Just because on a quick look the pattern "block of text and link to thirdparty site" makes an impression that it's a possible spam. But I always carefully read what's the content is before to make final decission.

are NOT able to be made into loops of the middle section of a track

Ye, I saw several examples like that, and from some of them I made a kind of loops. It's need to make that wisely. Find the moment that can be set to be repeated relatively seamless. I could try to take some examples that were already done on my end, just random songs.

I have avoided using blocks and tiles. Instead, I have pre-designed the levels in a gfx editor, laying out the level in a single or series of large visual elements. That is the reason so many files in this game are 3000+ px width. I think it is possible still to knock SOME size off of them, but in those cases, you won't get anything more than a shrug's worth of compression unless you go down to like 5%. It's simply a feature and necessity of pre-rendering the vast majority of the levels and backgrounds.

You can build a kind of composition of elements using multi-layered background system (without tiling, just placing them like in graphical editor, but as level objects), or make a kind of BGOs that will serve as pieces for your composition. Like an example of the large mounting, it's just a spam of rocks, and you might draw the same spam just by BGOs, and spruces pieces also can be done by BGOs. Or use multi-layered backgrounds system's power to draw that at absolute positions and with explicit Z-order. In result, the complex composition can use just few files, and draw the same as you draw on the huge canvas.

Overall, I wish you good luck in your project, just take some advices on how to implement idea in rational way

Added after 4 minutes 52 seconds:
Just an examlpe composition that I built a while ago as a test of BGO ordering at my projects: Just one large castle built from small pieces;



But in your case you shuold make custom elements and align them in the way that needed to build up the final composition.