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Main - ROM Hacking Related Releases - Epic Racers is dead. Download the beta. New thread | New reply


Stifu
Posted on 08-11-16 08:06 PM (rev. 2 of 08-12-16 08:06 AM) Link | Quote | ID: 163748


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Last view: 308 days 		TL;DR: Download the Epic Racers beta patch here (to be applied on a headerless US Super Mario Kart ROM).
Very outdated screenshots here


Hi guys.

This is something I've wanted to do for a while now. I'd like to take a moment to officially put an end to Epic Racers, my Super Mario Kart hack project. Sorry to everyone who's been looking forward to it.

Captain's log:
  • 2002. Ok Impala! releases "Super Mario Kart - The Impala Battles", a little SMK hack which replaces the 4 battle tracks.
  • 2003. Impala proposes to Sasori and myself that we work together on a new ambitious Super Mario Kart hack. The 3 of us knew each other from having used RPG Maker 95, and so we decided to create a ROM hack that would contain some of the characters of our RPG Maker games. Our ROM hack was first called Epic Battle, but we ended up renaming it Epic Racers to make it clear it's a racing game. The word "Epic" wasn't trendy back then and hadn't been ruined yet, and we picked it to symbolize the "RPG" or heroic fantasy nature of our game. About the team work, Impala would take care of the hacking and track design, and Sasori and I would take care of the graphics.
  • A little while later, Sasori leaves the project without a word. Not a problem, I'll just take care of all of the graphics. By 2006, I've drawn all of the 8 new drivers and replaced the title screen, among other things. The main graphic-related task left is redrawing the track tiles (road and background).
  • Impala struggles to find some data we want to change, such as some graphics and texts. I decide to help with hacking too, find the missing data we need, and start documenting everything we know about SMK.
  • Impala gets frustrated with Track Designer, which has no zoom feature and cannot change the CPU AI, among other things. We need a new editor.
  • DJ Bouche announces with great fanfare that he's going to work on Track Designer 2, which is going to have all the features we could have ever dreamed of. It will also fix climate change and end world hunger. Not long after, DJ Bouche just disappears and stops answering messages.
  • 2007. I start working on my own SMK editor, Epic Edit. By 2009 (v1.0), it's all around better than Track Designer. By 2010 (v2.0), it has caught up with MAKE's features. At this point, most of my time goes into Epic Edit, and I neglect Epic Racers. On a side note, smkdan gives me a hand with both Epic Edit and Epic Racers, which is pretty cool.
  • 2014. After years of little to no activity, Impala announces he's leaving the project.

Now, I can't find it in me to finish this project alone.

The reasons:
  • We were supposed to work on this as a team. I didn't start this project thinking I'd do everything.
  • It's been so long, I don't even like some of the heroes we picked back then anymore.
  • This might come out as a surprise, but I'm not a huge fan of Super Mario Kart. I like the game, but there are games from the same era that I like much better, such as Secret of Mana, Streets of Rage 2 or Super Bomberman. In my opinion, these games have all aged more gracefully than SMK. Mode 7 was cool back then, now it gives some people headaches.
  • ROM hacking is not rewarding. You're forever trapped in the shadow of the original game, no matter how much you struggle.

Here's the latest Epic Racers patch (to be applied on a headerless US SMK ROM). Feel free to do anything you want with it. If someone feels like finishing the hack, be my guest (if you're serious about it, I can help).
What's missing: good tracks, mainly, as well as some polishing (some unchanged graphics, a few broken color palettes etc). New musics would have been nice, too. If I had to describe Epic Racers as it is now, I'd say it's eye candy with poor gameplay.

In closing:
  • I'd like to make it clear that I don't hold a grudge against anyone. I still consider Impala and Sasori as my friends.
  • Although Epic Racers is a failure, Epic Edit is a success, so it's not all that bad. I'll still maintain Epic Edit and fix anything that gets reported (nothing lately), but don't plan to add any big feature.
  • As for me, I've moved on to a new game project called Zabuyaki. It's a retro beat 'em up I started working on earlier this year. It's free, open source and cross platform. (GitHub, Blog, Youtube)

gridatttack
Posted on 08-12-16 04:51 AM (rev. 3 of 08-12-16 04:53 AM) Link | Quote | ID: 163763


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Is the link broken? Gives me a 404.

I want to try this out.

Also:
ROM hacking is not rewarding. You're forever trapped in the shadow of the original game, no matter how much you struggle.


Hasn't many SMW hacks broken this?

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Stifu
Posted on 08-12-16 08:08 AM (rev. 2 of 08-12-16 08:11 AM) Link | Quote | ID: 163764


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Posted by gridatttack
Is the link broken? Gives me a 404.

I want to try this out.

Oops. Thought I tested it. Fixed.
This board doesn't like spaces in URLs.

Posted by gridatttack

Also:
ROM hacking is not rewarding. You're forever trapped in the shadow of the original game, no matter how much you struggle.


Hasn't many SMW hacks broken this?

Matter of perspective. Can you really say you've made your own game?
But platformers are more generic, so the source is less obvious.

Termingamer2-JD
Posted on 08-12-16 02:06 PM (rev. 2 of 08-12-16 02:07 PM) Link | Quote | ID: 163775


Ropa
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Stifu, just wondering, would you endorse anyone who would try to finish the project for you?
I'm not going to (no PC plus I am a computer noob), but just wondering on anyone else's behalf.

Great to hear from you after a while but sad to hear the news...

For SMW, kind of a point, just look at Kaizo hacks, KMW was the first and original of its kind and probably the best. Also a really well known genre of hack which has spread to other games hacking!

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Jamie Dignam

Stifu
Posted on 08-12-16 08:10 PM Link | Quote | ID: 163778


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Posted by Termingamer2-JD
Stifu, just wondering, would you endorse anyone who would try to finish the project for you?

Well, that's pretty much what I said:
Posted by Stifu
If someone feels like finishing the hack, be my guest (if you're serious about it, I can help).

Or you can just rip anything you like and include it in your own project. If so, credits would be nice.

Termingamer2-JD
Posted on 08-12-16 11:11 PM Link | Quote | ID: 163781


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Whoops. I missed that part of the post, but did read the rest of it.
Thanks for letting us use the resources you've provided over the years, by the way.

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Jamie Dignam

Googie
Posted on 08-14-16 05:44 AM Link | Quote | ID: 163789


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Last view: 9 days 		I respect your decision, Stifu. Maybe someone at RHDN might wanna complete this hack if you feel like posting this over there. I just tried this hack out, it's really cool and I like the characters a lot, they're very smooth.

I also like the game you're working on, I wish I could make a game with my cartoon characters. Making a game from scratch looks really hard.

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Stifu
Posted on 08-14-16 09:13 AM Link | Quote | ID: 163791


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Posted by Googie
I respect your decision, Stifu. Maybe someone at RHDN might wanna complete this hack if you feel like posting this over there.

Probably, since that place has much more traffic than this one. But I don't feel comfortable posting it there, since I've never been there. Don't wanna just join and be like "Hi guys, let me dump my failure of a project here!"

Posted by Googie
I just tried this hack out, it's really cool and I like the characters a lot, they're very smooth.

Thanks. Spent a lot of time on them.

Posted by Googie
I also like the game you're working on,

Cool. There are 3 of us working on it. Don Miguel is our programmer (the guy who translated RPG Maker 95 and 2000, among other things). I can code too, but I decided I'd only take care of the graphics (which is a lot of work already).

Posted by Googie
I wish I could make a game with my cartoon characters. Making a game from scratch looks really hard.

Sounds like Cuphead, which looks great.

Googie
Posted on 08-14-16 05:03 PM Link | Quote | ID: 163792


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Last view: 9 days 		OMG I'm dying for Cuphead to get released, that game is gonna kick ass when it gets released.

I downloaded Gamemaker on Steam, I'm gonna give it a spin.

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Trinitronity
Posted on 08-16-16 07:43 PM Link | Quote | ID: 163813


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Posted by Googie
OMG I'm dying for Cuphead to get released, that game is gonna kick ass when it gets released.

I downloaded Gamemaker on Steam, I'm gonna give it a spin.

If it's Game Maker 8, then I can help you with certain things.
If it's Game Maker Studio, though, immidiately switch to Game Maker 8. Game Maker Studio is very prone to corrupting your project files, and when that happens, it's back to square 1, and That's nooooo good!

Googie
Posted on 08-17-16 05:23 AM Link | Quote | ID: 163820


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Posted by Trinitronity
If it's Game Maker 8, then I can help you with certain things.
If it's Game Maker Studio, though, immidiately switch to Game Maker 8. Game Maker Studio is very prone to corrupting your project files, and when that happens, it's back to square 1, and That's nooooo good!


I have Gamemaker 8 Pro now and I deleted the one on Steam, just got GM8 Pro from someone on You Tube, thanks for the offer I really appreciate it.




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Termingamer2-JD
Posted on 08-17-16 11:57 AM Link | Quote | ID: 163824


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I'm going to ask GamesWithIsaac from here and my website if he can help you, he's got an Asteroids Remastered project that looks decent that he's posted on both sites.

Hopefully he can help.

Also, I have a computer again, so should be able to beta test some NES hacks should you want me to. Just gotta see if I still have my ROM collection and I will help.

(This thread is also on the board2 facebook page that I need to update more)

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Jamie Dignam

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Posted on 08-18-16 01:43 AM Link | Quote | ID: 163825


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Last view: 9 days 		Thanks for askin' GamesWithIsaac if he can help me. I had Game Salad a while back, but I uninstalled it cause you gotta pay thirty dollars a month? No thanks...

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Main - ROM Hacking Related Releases - Epic Racers is dead. Download the beta. New thread | New reply

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