Level select and scene reorganization

[iznaut]

the current multi-level structure is kind of problematic as we keep getting PRs in that add new levels in sequence (so if one person adds a third level, it conflicts with another person's third level)

would like to start a conversation around how to better manage this! i think creating levels is one of the lowest hanging fruit as far as contributing goes (it's very easy to get in there and paint on tiles) so we're likely to see a lot of changes in this area. maybe we should be asking for folks to prepend their names to level files (e.g. scenes/levels/iznaut_001) and if they want to chain them together (as is probably the most interesting way to play rn), there could be some concept of a "playlist" that handles that.

finally, when players actually play the game, they can select which "playlist" of levels they want to play from some sort of level select menu.

thoughts? this is just my first pass at a potential solution - def open to other ideas!

[vegeta897]

I think this is a good solution.

Personal take: Menus are boring, make a hub level (dare I say... a warp zone?) with a pipe for each playlist that you can enter. Ideally this would be generated at build/run-time so we don't run into the same problem of conflicts with contributors adding their pipe to the hub.

We might want to keep a couple "default" levels at the start to let the player learn the controls and get comfortable. I think it's better to give the player the experience of playing the game as soon as possible before we present them with playlist options. Throw a button in there to skip it for players who already know what they're doing.

[iznaut]

menus ARE boring! i'm super into the generated hub idea.....

i agree about the "default" levels too! probably good enough to keep the ~3 that we have now as the "tutorial" area and then kick them out into the wider world. we could also keep them more or less as "basic" as they are now (just running and jumping) and let the other levels change up the mechanics if they want (adding coins, enemies, online competitive match 3 puzzle arena....)

[iznaut]

i've been trying to work out what the balance is here with allowing total creative freedom but also making this thing easy to layer on to - i wonder if little mario's ultimate destiny is just to become a juiced up Mario Maker??

like, the core platforming stays indefinitely but contributors keep adding assets and mechanical components to augment their own spaces. that feels like we're siloing things out a little more, but then any of these components can be (ideally) reused in OTHER ppl's levels

so, we have a coin scene (or prefab, for unity folks) that is able to function independent of any other systems, so new level creators can just drag n' drop it in. this probably stays in the realm of mario-y stuff for a time, but then hopefully at some point it starts getting weirder (and the ways ppl mash them up becomes more complex, just as it did in mario maker)

[vegeta897]

I see what you're saying. But an element of chaos, that chaos that any gamedev immediately imagines when seeing the pitch for this project, makes this more interesting. Mario Maker's mechanics are set in stone, and people get creative with them. In this project, anyone can change the mechanics, and this automatically changes everybody's levels to some degree. I think that is magical and amazing, and I hope we don't lose it for fear of breaking some things. I think we should meet that expectation of chaos.

Edit: This is separate from your idea of drag-n-drop modules, which is a great idea. Those modules too could then be changed at any point, for CHAOS!

[iznaut]

for sure - honestly, the thing i'm struggling with the most rn is that by simply including "mario" in the project title and making it a platformer, there's a certain rut we may likely be stuck in for a long time.....everyone is doing a very good job of making it more of a mario! but i would really love it to just like....randomly be a zelda or something else one day

there's nothing stopping someone from creating a new level that you enter (as boring platformer mario) and suddenly it's a turn-based strategy game with full mouse and keyboard support. you could never do that in mario maker! but if there was a change to the core player script that allowed this functionality, it would likely just break every other person's platformer level. that's an extreme example, but the scenario holds the same for something as simple as tweaking the jump height - a lot of ppl's carefully crafted work is suddenly unplayable

and that is chaotic and kind of cool? but i think the possibility space is so large here that we can find ways to find a middle ground that doesn't compromise too much. maybe there's a mario.config file that contains default jump heights and run speeds, but you can make your own per-playlist copy and turn him into sonic the hedgehog.

the more "galaxy brain" reference is probably a Little Big Planet or Dreams - they serve a similar purpose as Mario Maker but the range of expression is much wider

also! i think there are probably some interesting lessons to be learned from the SHARECART1000 project https://alts.github.io/sharecart.lua/

[vegeta897]

You make a solid point, there has to be a limit to what we can allow to break. It needs to break in ways that the player can understand and deal with for it to remain fun.

I made a new topic to gather feedback on the concept: #87

On copied config files: If I was creating a level where I wanted changed physics, I'd make a new item to give the player, and/or change the properties of the world itself, to achieve the same effect. This solves problems like config versioning/compatibility and lets others borrow the items I create for their own levels, and keeps just a little bit of chaos because the items can extend defaults rather than overwrite them. e.g. "These shoes make you run really fast" but "really fast" means 4x whatever the default is, not some predefined value. This also allows the player to understand why the physics are changed, instead of hiding it in a config file they can't see.

[paulloz]

I agree with both of you.
We still can keep the current implementation and extend it:

• Have a dynamic hub with portals leading to the first level of a "playlist"
• Have a special portal type that sends you back to the hub

Then within the "playlist" people can link their levels however they want.

In the future, we can extend on it to transform the "playlists" into worlds where you can select individual levels etc.

[paulloz]

Drafted something really quickly in #91.