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No, you can replay it as much as you want until you scan another level, even if you reload the game cartridge. The only differences are that you don't get an instant exit option on the Start menu in an unsaved level, and you get asked whether you want to save it after you beat it.
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Hey everyone, I got it figured out. I made a binary patch that converts NO$GBA saves to VBA saves, so I can safely go between emulators now.
Today I realized that leftover points and coins shouldn't be a problem, because I can just get a Game Over to erase them all. However, the game still saves the grand total of coins that you can use to play mini-games.
Since I wanted to make this save file also useful for anyone who wanted to just have everything in World-e on one save file, I got all the Advance Coins on the starred "classic worlds" so that they wouldn't have to be played through to reach 142 Advance Coins if a player couldn't link up to put those levels back in. In doing this, I had to collect 3 coins in "classic" 1-2 because of the line of coins blocking the way to the pipe. (I managed this by using the boomerang to collect the Advance Coin and duck-jumping from coin to coin as Cape Mario.)
Now, you could get rid of these coins by collecting 30 and spending them on a mini-game, but that would require collecting more Advance Coins, and the whole point was to make this save file as clean as possible except for the classic worlds. So I think we should settle for starting with 3 coins, and um... don't play the Mushroom Houses with only 32 coins?
Although if you were going to play those toward the end anyway, Zowayix, then it shouldn't matter. Now, was there a particular SMB1 world (1-1, 1-2, 1-3, 1-4, or 2-2) you wanted me to include as a temporary save just in case you wanted to play through it once?
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Bisqwit wrote:
pirate_sephiroth wrote:
The 30 min rule... how come there are longer movies?
They were uploaded with accounts that were created before the 10 minute rule was introduced.
Actually, I thought that when the 10 minutes rule was introduced, it applied to everyone, but you could sign up for a special account that was an exception to the rule. But then they stopped offering sign-ups after a while.
Anyway, I read somewhere that it's possible to get stereo sound into a Youtube video by encoding it directly into FLV format first with just the right settings so that Youtube doesn't have to modify it. Has anybody here thought to take advantage of that sort of thing? Oh wait, now that I look again, I guess that's what we were discussing... But still! Stereo sound! Wowee!
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Zowayix wrote:
4. Yes, [.sav]s made with NO$GBA do work with VBA.
Uh oh, I can't get this to work. I can have NO$GBA load saved games made with VBA just fine, but using a save made by NO$GBA causes the game in VBA to declare the saved data corrupted. And I did make sure to set VBA's save type to Flash 128k. Is there something else I need to do? Do you think I need to change a setting in NO$GBA to make it write differently, or should I change a setting in VBA to make it read differently?
Edit: Well, I think I see the problem. VBA is making the save files 128 kilobytes, while NO$GBA makes them much smaller. I guess this means either there's some compression going on, or NO$GBA isn't saving the 128K Flash memory as it's supposed to, even when I have "FLASH 128K Sanyo" or "FLASH 128K Macronix" selected under "GBA Cartridge Backup Media". What's the deal?
Edit: Okay, I think I found the solution. Apparently NO$GBA's saves really are compressed, and I'll be getting some software to try to convert them. Hope this works!
Whoops, and after reading the documentation, it turns out all I had to do was switch off the compression option in the .INI file. I guess that option wasn't in the GUI. Nice!
Edit: It turns out the uncompressed save files are also unreadable in VBA. Now I'm stuck again.
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Okay, so, I just reminded myself that you can actually store 33 levels, since you can always have one in "temporary" storage. The only downside is that you wouldn't be able to leave the level without finishing it. So I could throw in one of the classic worlds just for kicks, but all they have are Fire Flowers and that one Frog Suit at the end of 1-4.
Also, when I said a multiple of 3 levels, I really meant just playing those levels with the card panels as their goals enough that there wouldn't be any cards left over. I might have to beat one level twice, since I counted 23 of them.
Zowayix wrote:
- Play all three mushroom houses
Ah, I never even thought of just playing the houses to demonstrate them; I only thought of them as a tool to gain lives and power-ups. Do you think it would be worth playing all the different variations of the mini-games as well? Maybe not for the first game, but the second and third have a few different layouts that would be fun to see. Hmm, do you think the level layout determines which power-up you receive?
Zowayix wrote:
This order is because Levels 29 and 30 are intended to be parts of a single level. Level 29 is an airship that ends in a boom-boom fight, and level 30 starts you off in that same room, and ends with a bowser fight.
Level 27 is a "remake" of Bowser's Castle, so I'm doing that last.
Okay, sure, but if you're going for theming, why not group more levels like that? Like putting desert levels together with desert levels, sky levels with sky levels, et cetera.
Zowayix wrote:
Green Switch: Slows down timer
I just found out that this also slows down the card roulette at the end, but the entire effect only lasts for the first 50 game seconds of the level. This is really funny to use in that "60 Seconds" level, though. No pressure!
Zowayix wrote:
Red Switch: Replaces enemies with harder to kill versions and gives double points for defeating
This was the one I thought might be worthwhile because it makes the levels harder, but I now realize that it's like the second quest in the original Super Mario Bros., cutting into enemy variety by replacing a few of the species. Maybe it's better to not mess with the switches and to stick with what the level designers had in mind. (Although sometimes I wonder if they always had Luigi in mind.)
And I think I see what you're saying about the millions of points idea, where it would make it easier to calculate how many points you actually earned while playing.
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Well, I don't know how easy getting exactly one million points would be... I was really thinking of getting the minimum number of points possible, to make it seem as though Mario did the least work possible to secure those levels, even though that would actually be harder than just getting a whole lot of points and not caring. I also just realized I should make sure to finish a multiple of 3 levels so that there are no lingering panel cards to match up.
So, are you planning on ever using Luigi to complete any of the e levels? He is pretty good at flying, you know. And do you think it should be a requirement to beat the levels in the order they're listed, or would it be better to allow the runner to play the levels in any order in case it helps to have a certain power for a certain level?
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Yeah, getting NO$GBA to play two different ROMs at the same time is a little tricky. Maybe I will go ahead and try to make a new save file of those levels, and what you're working on now could be the practice run.
Zowayix wrote:
5. Uh...could you restate this?
Oh, well, mainly I'm wondering if anyone cares whether the levels were pre-completed with Mario or Luigi, and if anyone cares if the game starts with a very high score or many extra lives or power-ups or a powered-up character or anything like that. I'm thinking I'll make the most bare-bones version of the level card file first, and then we could add stuff onto it from there if it seems okay. But starting with as little as possible makes sense if we're trying to make this seem like a first-time run of every level, with the compromise that every level has had its goal reached once so it doesn't have to be re-scanned.
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Yep, and there are only 50 rounds in total you have to get through before you get to the silly little ending screen where Lolo is happy, then gets these big, creepy eyes, then does the V sign in your face. I don't know how that was supposed to wrap up the story movie from the beginning, but whatever.
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Tompa wrote:
Collecting maps is just ass to do. There's a reason why, in for example Super Metroid, you only need to collect powerups in order to get 100%. Visiting the map stations is useless. Why should it be any different with Majora's Mask? Because you won't get any % in it? Why make a new 100% definition when there are good ones in other games and at SDA.
Well, I consider the maps and compasses and keys to be permanently collectible items. They enhance your ability to see where things are and to open doors. You have to do some actual questing to collect them, meaning that this makes a 100% run that much more distinguished and interesting. And hey, why should we be deprived of meeting Tingle?
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I actually started getting into these levels myself last month. I'm considering making my own new, "clean" save file for doing runs of the e-Reader levels, but there are a few things we need to take into consideration:
1. You can only store 32 levels on one game, and there are 37 levels that I have found. Fortunately, 5 of them are mere remakes of Super Mario Brothers 1 levels in the updated Super Mario Brothers 3 engine, and there's nothing too interesting about collecting their Advance Coins except that you have to remember that shells can collect coins in 1-3. You might be able to get away with having those five levels completed with their Advance Coins already collected and just start right away on the all-new levels, but it might still be fun to see them played sometime regardless. This is all assuming that you can't record a movie of the two ROMs, the game and the e-Reader, linked together, which just sounds messy no matter how you do it.
2. A majority of the e-Reader levels weren't released in North America thanks to the e-Reader being a flop. Luckily, I've found scans of all the Japanese level cards, which have been made compatible with the (U) version; but naturally, they all have garbage titles in the English text, and I'm not sure if mixing them in with the actual American levels wouldn't confuse the game somehow in the long run. This is one thing I'll need to test more.
3. I've heard rumors that there's at least one more level that hasn't been scanned and distributed yet, but it's very rare. Something about "B-Dash" or whatever. Let me know if you've heard anything.
4. I only know how to link the Super Mario Advance 4 ROM and the e-Reader ROM in NO$GBA. Can its save files be made to work with VisualBoyAdvance? I mean, I think there's a way if there are already VisualBoyAdvance saves with the levels on them, but I need to check for sure soon.
5. As far as I can tell, you can only store a level permanently (that is, be able to load another level without losing the current one) once you've beaten it. This means you wouldn't really be able to have a "clean" level card, since you'd have to have either the M or the L filled in showing which brother you completed each level with. Would it be acceptable to just complete all the levels once with only Mario, dodging all the special coins and perhaps getting as few points as possible? I just don't want a situation where somebody says "Hey, that's not fair, that run started with extra stuff! They should have used my save file instead!" Perhaps the level data should be hacked to be cleaner instead?
6. More on that point, should it be unacceptable to add in power-ups and switch effects with the other e-Cards, even if the switches might make it harder or more interesting? (Actually, I haven't tried any of the switches yet, so I don't even know for sure if any of them work in World-e.) I suppose there's nothing wrong with playing the Mushroom House mini-games for power-ups, since you have to earn their unlocking by collecting coins and then actually earn the power-ups and use up valuable time doing that. Probably not worth it, but hey.
7. Would this be considered pirating, since the levels are actually downloaded into the save space rather than unlocked?
Please tell me all your thoughts so I'll know what I'm getting into!
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I'm not sure a Souzouhe no Tabidachi run would be worth submitting, since all the levels were either re-used in Adventures of Lolo 1 or modified and used in Adventures of Lolo 2. But I would still watch it.
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There's plenty of reason to skip cutscenes. Cutscenes make the videos bigger without showing any more actual gameplay. If I really wanted to watch them, I would just play the game to earn them myself, or I would find a video site devoted to just cutscenes.
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They will hear sound effects that tell what the player is doing, and they will know about how far the player has gotten in each level by when the music gets cut off! Don't you think?
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upthorn wrote:
Xkeeper: I don't see why you consider version number to be useless trivial cruft. Version number should be a movie's position in the chain of obsoletion. v1 if it's the first of it's game and category. And, say, 12 if it's like SM64, SMB1, or MM1 where there've been numerous publications worth of refinement.
As JXQ pointed out, the current system is really only helpful if only one author makes runs for a particular game. Otherwise, you get multiple version 1s, version 2s, version 3s... for different people, and there's no way of knowing what came before what outside of a single author's set.
I guess you could have two version numbers for each movie, one for the author and one for the game, if you didn't want the new system confused with the old one.
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